Less land available to hunt with increased cost for those that do hunt. Difficulty finding affordable lease could have negative effects on hunting.

If you are a hunter with young people in your family who do enjoy hunting this will help to increase the number of hunters. In my case there will be 3 additional hunters.

Another factor is there will be less land to hunt on in the future. ,

always land to hunt, convenient it may not be

Another factor is there will be less land to hunt on in the future. ,

always land to hunt, convenient it may not be

I don't want to sound to millenial here, but sounds like a lot of you walked uphill both ways to school in snow, while living in the desert of central texas.

Seriously guys, these problems have been around for my whole life, and yet hunter numbers aren't dropping.

Convenient land access has and always will be an issue. Costs are all relative to the sliding scale of inflation. Sure things cost less back then, but everything did. We still do these things today, like buy new cars, houses, eggs and milk. People will find ways to do what they want to do.

As hobbies increase, so does a reach back to be outdoors. Remember, we aren't talking about 75% of Americans hunting, we are talking about 4%, Yes we all know gamers and netflixers and whatever else, but I still see more than enough people outside to give me hope for the future. This isn't WWII era anymore no, but it certainly isn't Wall-E era yet.

Fathers in the household has little to do with hunting. My father was present 100% of the time and a great dad, and yet I only remember hunting with him once in my life, and that was not made fun for us kids nor did he have fun on it. I think it may be the only time he hunted as an adult (cant speak to his childhood). But yet, three of his adult sons hunt and we all started well into adulthood. Who says you need a dad to teach you anything about hunting. It helps for sure, but there are a lot of bad habits formed by "doin what pops taught me" too.

This thread has a lot of ole timers (figure of speech, I have no idea how old any of you are) being pessimistic about the future. Raise your chins and realize the sky isn't fallin yet.

I dont think you can judge the amount of hunting by how many shots you here. Hunters are much more selective now days. The goal used to be to shoot the first thing with horns, so your season was often over opening day. Many guys like me hunt all year long and rarely fire a shot.

True. The production of land mass was over a very long time ago. Population increase, rural development, younger people having more entertainment options than ever before and other things have reduced the supply and demand for hunting land. That said, I have had an easier time of finding good leases over that last 15 years than I did long ago. I've paid to be on a lease for about 35 total years. Networking through technology, great mapping and satellite resources, etc have really changed how to go about finding a great ranch to hunt. I remember in the 80's calling local chamber of commerce org's and asking them to mail me a list of land owners that leased, calling them on a land line, taking a drive to look at a place........I guess if you really want to hunt, you will find a way now as we did "back then".

I dont think you can judge the amount of hunting by how many shots you here. Hunters are much more selective now days. The goal used to be to shoot the first thing with horns, so your season was often over opening day. Many guys like me hunt all year long and rarely fire a shot.