r/Hunting

I am a travel nurse in southeast Alaska and I plan to go on a deer hunt in August before I return to the lower 48. The thing is I will be driving back through Canada. I am already thinking of taking the salmon I catch with me, so taking any deer meat sounds like a hassle and potentially more headache with Canadian border patrol. Does anyone know the best ways to ship meat then? Is this a service that hunting guides do for their patrons and if so something I could ask of them? I would be shipping it to Oregon or Nevada and I would have people there that could pick it up immediately. Any suggestions help and thank you.

Hey I don’t know the best place to post this but I figured this was a good start. I’m looking to book a hunt or find a good place to go pig hunting later this year. I’m looking in the Arkansas Louisiana Oklahoma Texas area. I would realistically like to shoot more than 1 pig, I’ve seen some places that say 1 pig limit. I appreciate any help or recommendations.

Rifle: Tikka t3x Lite with 20" stainless barrel

Caliber: .308

Optic: Leupold vx5HD 3-15x44 Gen 2 vs. Maven Rs 1.2 vs. Nightforce NX8 2.5-20x50 F1

Rings: Unknown Munitions Medium Tikka Scope Rings

This is what my weeks of research has led me. I'm looking for what is the Toyota Tacoma/Glock 19/USA Fender Stratocaster of a hunting rig. Industry standard with high end components. Jury is still out on the optic - My main interest is durability and warranty support if something goes wrong. I don't want to think twice about it.

Since I've only hunted upland birds and waterfowl, this is a totally different territory. I want one rifle to rule them all (for North American game.) I don't know if I'll ever want to hunt bighorn sheep, for example, I have zero interest, but I don't want to have to get a new rig for it if that day ever comes. I never thought I would want to hunt elk but here we are.

Thoughts?

Imagine you are hunting deer in the woods, when you come across two similar sized bucks are duking it out for mates. You decide to watch the event, because why wouldn't you. When the fight is over, its time to take your shot and they both stuck around within clear and clean sight.

Do you shoot the winner or loser? What affects your decision?

Edit: Lets say you only have 1 tag left, so you cant just take both.

Some info that's relevant: I'm in New Hampshire, so all of my hunting is woods hunting. I'm planning on mostly hunting out of the saddle, but some spots are good spots to sit on the ground (they're naturally elevated). I have a muzzleloader and a rifle, so in NH that means I'll get 11 days (Oct 31 - Nov 10) of muzzleloader hunting plus 27 days (Nov 11 - Dec 6) of rifle hunting. So a total of 38 days in my season. I plan to hunt almost daily, and I'd be pretty happy with 25 hunts in the season (some of them might be on the shorter side, but I'd rather be in the woods as much as possible). I will also be hunting from a tree. Either climbing it in my saddle or sitting at the base of it.

I'm only a few years into learning hunting. This will be my second year with rifle and my first year with muzzleloader hunting. Previously I was archery hunting, but I'll likely concentrate my allowable hunting time this year to muzzleloader and rifle. Every year I review lessons learned and what I want to do next season, and one of the big items in that list was doing a ton of scouting.

I've done quite a bit of winter and spring scouting. In the winter, I was finding deer tracks, and I found a handful of deer yards which was exciting. And I've been focusing my scouting lately on food sources. For NH woods, it seems like autumn food sources is primarily oak and beech. So I've become somewhat proficient out of identifying these trees and have found some really good oak and beech stands that I'm excite about.

That's a long-winded way to get to my question. At this point, I've got a list of 9 plots of land and 24 spots to sit across those pieces of land. Across all 24 spots I've noted the ideal winds. So whatever the wind is that day, I'll be able to narrow the list down to a few spots.

With that being said, I'm wondering if this is "enough" land and spots to hunt. I still have about 5 months left before the season so I want to use this time as best as I can. I have to spend quite a bit of time at the range still with the muzzleloader to experiment with different powders and bullets, but what else should I be doing in the deer woods? Continue to scout other plots of land and if they are better than any current spots I have on my list then have them replace?

I just don't want to end up with 20 plots of lands and 50 trees I could hunt from, and obviously I could never use them all in a single season. I'm new to this and wondering if there's a smarter approach for the remainder of the year than unnecessarily gathering even more land to hunt.

Thanks in advance!

#Uncomfortable Facts About Hunting

1. Your rifle cartridge doesn't matter as much as you think.

2. Does taste better than bucks.

3. Camouflage clothing doesn't do much.

4. The animals you see at night on trail cameras are nowhere near there during the day.

5. 2 MOA is fine unless you are shooting 400 yards on a windy day... and you're not.

6. Your expensive call isn't "working," the animals are just curious about the weird noise.

7. The scent animals pick up on is your breath, all that scent remover isn't fixing that.

8. Opening day is "lucky" because more people are out driving the animals to move.

9. The only person who cares about your trophies is you.

10. What will haunt you isn't the shot you didn't take, but the shot you shouldn't have taken.

Like the title says. April 1st of 2027 to the 7th I'm going to South Africa. I won a safari for 4 and everyone already cancelled on me. I'm still going. I've never hunted outside of North America and I really don't know what to expect. I know I can watch YouTube videos about it but that doesn't really match someone's first hand accounts. Any advice would be appreciated. If I don't get anyone to join me I was considering taking strangers so I'm not traveling alone lol

Currently using .308 for whitetail in TN. Moving to Alaska soon trying to figure out, what type of gun (cartilage) would be good for big game hunting.

Does anyone on here still wear ASAT camo and gear or has it fallen to the wayside with more modern patterns and gear? I know the quality of their house brand gear isn’t the greatest. Everyone I’ve shown it to who’s never heard of it either calls it “stupid” or comments how “it doesn’t look like the environment it’ll never work” what’s your opinion?