The Case of a County-Run Hunting Program

I attended Duette Park's mandatory hunting orientation last Saturday morning. Manatee County runs the show and, to my knowledge, Duette is the only tract of public land in Florida where the county designs the hunting program, within the guidelines of state law. Over 21,000 acres, the land is home to the headwaters of the Manatee River which favors healthy populations of deer, hogs, turkey and other game animals. Duette shows scars of human use from a couple generations ago and is still surrounded by agriculture and phosphate ventures. Today, it's managed with a plan to restore it to its native, natural condition - with shell roads, power boxes and fences, of course.

Part of their management plan includes this unique hunting program to keep the deer and hog herds in check. Several weekend hunts are sold through a random-draw system. The added income helps fund conservation projects such as longleaf pine restoration, and land management tools like prescribed burns. These hunts have been held every year for nearly 20 years and enjoy a loyal following. In a section of the state where public land is limited, it's valuable real estate.

And it's a lot to ask for in these days of shrinking local government budgets. These hunts aren't overflowing the coffers considering labor costs, machinery, etc. A few seasons ago the hunt program was very much in doubt as the entire state buckled under the recession. So take a tough economic climate and add the wishes of sportsmen, and the challenge for the county comes down to satisfying paying customers while keeping management plans in check with the limited resources available.

I remember the first orientation I attended. The park biologists and managers stood in front of the drawn hunters and read through the rules. Then they were verbally accosted for all manner of  supposed transgressions. Quite a few in the mob – many of whom couldn't even spell "diploma" – queried the biologists on their qualifications to enact management policy. It was known that a lot of the staff were non-hunters, though they worked closely with FWC to draw up management goals from season to season. It was as close to a public flogging as I'd ever seen, and honestly made me worried sharing the woods with these folks.

Duette Park 8-pt

I left that year thinking, "Why do they put up with this? No way can this last." 

But, to their credit, the show’s gone on. 

Since then these annual meetings have been pretty tame, and I'm recognizing the same outdoorsmen from year to year; the majority of the loudmouth malcontents have since packed sand. This year, though, I thought would attract scorn. One, there were no hunts in November, the prime rut period in this section of the state. Two, it didn't appear there'd be any doe tags this season. Three, they raised the antler restriction to 3-points on one side, up from 2.

I figured the antler rule would rile up the most derision. It was front and center in the debate 6 years back. Then, they proposed a modest increase from spike to forkie to improve the age structure and trophy potential, and Holy Jesus, you’d thought they’d been restricted to shooting fictional creatures.

It passed without a peep this year. People will surprise you. It was explained that, yes, they’d still like to improve the age structure. Not a murmur dripped from the crowd. But that’s not the most shocking point to this lack of aggression. See, it's not a free-for-all deer slaying; they work on a quota system. Usually the number of bucks that can be taken on a weekend is 4 – 6. If that is met or exceeded on Saturday, bucks are off-limits on Sunday, allowing only the harvest of pigs or does – if one possesses an antlerless tag (be there in a second). For a 100 hunters paying $80-$90 a hunt sharing a bag of 6 bucks, it's tough to swallow expectations of a whole weekend and only getting a day for that Big Buck. And Big Bucks are tough to do in a day.

Again, not an eyebrow raised, and I believe the rangers relaxed enough to uncross their legs.

As for the doe situation, the guy running the orientation this year, now confident in the calm, claimed he’d prefer no doe tags for the next five years. Nighttime surveys convinced them they’d been a little too liberal doling out these special permits in the past. Bowhunters were welcome to pop a flathead, but the rifle crowds were out.

A striking silence with hunting opportunity shrinking by the paragraph.

The final issue was a lack of hunting weekends during the rut in November, save for one Youth Hunt – youth recruitment was also a big topic this year, happily. One guy stepped forward to challenge this decision, maybe having concluded we were getting chumped out of the best time to hunt. The Man in Charge flatly told him they didn’t have the staff. The limited crew was spread out between here and several other parks throughout the county. With the holidays and influx of Snowbirds flocking south, they just didn’t have the manpower or budget to accommodate November hunts. The gentleman ghosted back into the corn.

All in all, I was impressed with the crowd. Though the added money is critical, hunting is not a priority on this property and this group seemed to understand. Or maybe it was hot and they were lazy, who knows? The County certainly doesn’t need the hassle but has put together about as fine of a quality deer hunting program as you could expect, given the variables. 

The major attribute I see in this success is the communication. The park employees ask hunters to volunteer input on season dates, recommendations for the park, and ways to improve the program. And they appear to be listened to, in some form. A few years back it was suggested to open up the park in the summer for hog and predator hunts. The hogs are rampant here and need serious thinning, a point on which the biologists and hunters always agree. This year they obliged, and it was a superb hunt. As an added bonus, the proceeds of the weekend went to the United Way.

One last remarkable part of this program that other state agencies would do well to notice – the place gets quite a bit of traffic from equestrians, hikers, birdwatchers, butterfly gazers, etc., and there appears to be little conflict, though the park is closed to outsiders during hunt weekends. Beyond the game animals, Duette is also home to endangered scrub jays and indigo snakes and other special species such as gopher tortoises all living in delicate ecological environs. If in nearly twenty years the sanctity of the park’s mission to protect and restore this vestige of native Florida landscape was threatened or conflicts arose with other user groups, I think us hunters would be shown the door in hurry.

Thankfully that’s not happened. It’s a rare piece of property in this state and a fine example of not only assimilating hunters and sound land management practices, but also allowing various populations of outdoor enthusiasts to enjoy the land. We need it in Florida. 

Think folks understand that, too.

Recap of 1st 2011 Bowhunt

Finally made my first bowhunt of the season. It’d been a long time coming – the longest I’ve had to wait in like 12 years. Per tradition, I failed to sleep the night before and had high hopes I’d bust that bruiser buck. The lock-on stand was in a prime location; I expected wheel back to the check station like a pro.

I’m not going to repeat the last couple of years and write about every unsuccessful hunt I embark upon. No need. Who wants to really read about someone NOT shooting something? Heck, anyone can do that! Even if I have just about mastered futility with a bow, that doesn’t mean I need to share with everyone.

Still, there are always lessons to learn, stuff to report, and experiences to chronicle. When the time is right, it’s probably OK to relate a few of these expeditions. So I do want to review last weekend’s hunt at Duette Park in Manatee County, though I once again came home with a full quiver and a cooler full of excuses.

- I know better, I know better, I know better than to take unproven gear afield. My regular release – the one I’ve used and loved for ten years – crapped out on me Wednesday. Long story short, I broke open the package to the new one Saturday morning and tested pulling back the string before I headed off to my stand. While lowering the string, I don’t know if my finger or a leafy flange off my suit tapped the trigger, but the string popped that dull, hollow thunk of a dry-fire. Panicked I’d jumped the string off the cams and ruined the hunt, I noticed my peep sight had come free. The release needed to be tightened – and was eventually. It could have been disastrous, however.

- A cold front that was supposed to push through the state hung up over south-central Florida. The switching winds made deer sightings in my hammock rather improbable. But my scent control really shined through. First, a very large boar splashed and rumbled out of the swamp and fed behind me. Later, a spike walked practically under the stand. Finally, a button buck fed unalarmed in front of me for 30 minutes while a wind blew on my neck and up his nostrils. Say what you will about small, young, dumb deer, the hog proved something was working. I’d argue they have the best olfactory senses in these parts.

I showered with scent-eliminating shampoo and washed my clothes in scent-eliminating detergent. I wore camp clothes on the ride down with the hunting garb in a trash bag. After suiting up, I sprayed down with Scent Killer and put one of those delicious Scent Wafers on my ballcap. You can’t always control the weather and wind but you can go a long way towards minimizing its attempts to scatter your stink throughout the woods. It's not fail-safe but worth the efforts.

- Speaking of the deer. This is the spike. It’s hard to see since I recorded this on the iPhone. And the video quality really ate it when uploaded to YouTube. He’s actually a little 3-point – naturally, Duette has a 4-point minimum. You can tell he caught me moving while I fiddled with the phone. He did calm down, circled back in front of me and ambled away feeding. By the way, I’m shaking because I’m turned around trying to film. It is NOT Buck Fever.



- And here’s the button buck. This guy was legal but he might have weighed 50 pounds. The Rage would have cut him in half. As badly as I want to fill a freezer, I gave him the pass. What a swell guy I am. Note he’s eating on the gallberry bushes. This is important...



- ...because there are very few acorns down here this year. I haven’t been kicking around too many properties yet this fall but noticed the same thing in Sarasota County earlier in the week. It is gonna be another one of those crazy years, I feel. Anyone else want to offer up an acorn report? Still time to adjust stand locations – but not much time.

- Saturday morning I felt something crawling up the inside of my facemask. I figured it was just another bat-sized mosquito that slid through the Therma-Cell’s defenses. I swiped it away and that was that. A couple minutes later the same sensation returned on the right side of my face. I slapped it harder this time and was rewarded with a sharp, burning pain behind my ear in that spot people put seasickness patches. I struggled to free myself of the mask as a scorpion fell onto my lap, tail lifted and jabbing, claws extended. I flicked him off - I hope he fell to his death and is burning in Arachnid Hell.

Scorpion stings feel like someone extinguished a cigarette on your skin. It burns and aches for about 20 minutes; then, thankfully, peters out. Being a marvelous physical specimen, I am not allergic to these bites. If you are, an Epi-Pen or antihistamine or notepad and pencil to record your last will and testament should be in your daypack.

- The biologist at the check station said the deer are just a tick off from a full-blown rut. Hunters have reported bucks seeking does, but few have been brought to the check station during archery. Dad did say one young man took a fine buck a couple weeks ago. Smaller bucks were taken this weekend. By the time I return with a muzzleloader, it should be on like Donkey Kong.




Hopefully we’ll have a success story, then.

Florida Deer Journal 2010 - Blackpowder Bummer

Of all the things great and small I do not understand in this world, from the appeal of NASCAR to why women hate Rachel Ray so much when Kelly Ripa lives and breathes fresh air, I’ll fail to explain the doldrums that has been my Florida deer season thus far. Weather great. Proven stand location. Maximum effort in the tree. Acorns aplenty. No deer, minus the does I saw opening morning of bow season. Null and void.

It’s seems to be a down year at Duette park in Manatee County. From what I've been told, nothing big has really squeaked in to the check station over the first four hunts that covered the pre-rut and rut. A bunch of hogs, but deer hunters were mostly left wanting. I may forgo my dues next year and take my talents back to South Georgia.

The muzzleloader hunt on the weekend of the 13th was most disappointing. I don’t really get excited until I can put the stick and string away for something that goes “boom!” And I enjoy hunting with this setup – a .50 Cal. Knight Disc Rifle with a Bushnell Banner scope firing a 250 grain Barnes Expander MZ served over 100 grains of Hodgdon 777 pellets. Kaboom! Accurate and dependable, it has made muzzleloading a corn feeder’s worth of fun.

But alas, nada. Just two big ol’ gobblers that showed up Saturday around two and poked their heads about before feeding into the palmetto flat. Dad saw a bunch of hogs and some gobblers, and that was that.

Duette met their quota of four bucks by Saturday evening, though the biggest was a small six. Twenty-some hogs met their maker. Dad hunted Sunday and saw nothing while I was on my way to North Carolina hoping the deer drought would not follow.

In all honesty, and I've made excuses in a previous post, I think it's just one of those years. The weekends allowed did not coincide with when the deer were moving, I guess. Successfully hunting deer in FL requires more time spent in the woods than I've been able to offer. I made the most of my innings but appear to be striking out.

I have other hunts in FL. One in Levy County. One in Sarasota. Two at Upper Hillsborough. Looking forward to it. Taking a FL buck is always a challenge I will put the work in for.