Guest Post - Connecticut Deer Hunting

To me, deer hunting is more than an opportunity to escape the house, put some meat in the freezer, or hang horn on the wall. It's a discipline, and I take every chance allowed to learn more about my craft and how it is practiced in various parts of the country.

As such, I invited the author of Whitetail Woods, Rick Kratzke, to share what the hunting experience around his stomping grounds of Connecticut is all about, and he kindly offered this post.

In some ways, Connecticut is a state much like Florida - strong populations of whitetail, passionate sportspeople, yet largely ignored by the hunting press because neither region is known for B&C antlers.

So thanks to Mr. Kratzke, and I hope his information will help advance your education of whitetail deer hunting.


Connecticut offers some good Deer Hunting
By: Rick Kratzke / Whitetail Woods

Well I received a request to do a guest post for Ian Nance of "The Wild Life" and I was happy to oblige. I know Ian is from Florida so I am going to talk a little about deer hunting in New England - Connecticut to be exact.

I live in what is called the "quiet corner" which is the northeast corner of Connecticut. I have lived in CT. all my life, but I have only been hunting for what will be 20 years this coming season. I have been lucky enough to take quite a few deer in that amount of time. For me, I started out bowhunting then picked up the shotgun then muzzleloader and rifle. After injuring my shoulder I gave up bowhunting and stayed with the firearms. I always did better when the temperatures dropped anyway.

Just an FYI, if you can not hunt with normal archery equipment in CT. due to a medical injury you can apply for a handicap license to hunt with crossbow, with a doctors approval.

Typically in Connecticut, bowhunting season starts about the middle of September and pretty much goes right to the end of December with a couple of slight breaks.

Shotgun & Rifle opens in mid November; for state land shotgun it is split into two parts: "A" season which is lottery and "B" season which is not. Private land is both A & B combined.

Muzzleloader season starts early December and goes to just before Christmas.

I can say that in the northeast part of Connecticut there is a lot of hardwoods, swamps & laurels. The hardwoods consist of a lot of Oaks both white and red. When the white oaks are abundant you really don't see the deer as much because they stay where the acorns are which means you have to put in some scouting time to find them.

I have hunted everything from the hardwoods to the laurels and into the swamps which I really like. Back in 2007 I harvested this 7 point buck which was walking between the edge of a swamp and a small dried up pond that was surrounded with laurel bushes. He dressed out at 150 pounds.

Connecticut does offer a lot of different areas to hunt including farm land, if you can get permission. Deer totals the past few years, in my opinion, have been increasing so the opportunity is there to fill a tag or two.

I hope you enjoyed this short post and invite you to stop by and browse my "Whitetail Woods".

Connecticut's 2010 Hunting and Trapping Field Guide