what kind of regulations make you crazy when duckin

Shermie

Shermie

Well-known member
Phils post inspired this question.Since we here span the whole continent and far off places over seas...What rules or regulations drive you crazy and sometimes takes the fun out of duckin..in your home area...

here for me in nova scotia the only complaint perhaps is the lenght of the seasons are to short ,,and start to early...
no real complaints realy... they do a half decent job here with the regs...

any way lets here from all of you how are the regs in your your area???
shermie...
 
One of the most difficult birds to harvest in Ontario is a Blue Wing Teal. By the time the season opens most have moved south. An early teal season would be nice to go along with our early goose season.

We do not have an open season for Mourning Doves even though everyone around us does. That is also mildly annoying.

I really don't have a lot to complain about. We have a long season, liberal bag limits and pretty good access to public hunting.
 
Hearing some of the discussion on here--no shooting unless w/i 3' of vegetation; blind drawings; complicated rules about where you can set your boat relative to permanent blinds--I think we've got it pretty good in Maine. Long season with multiple zones, so I can hunt some kind of waterfowl from early September through the end of January.

My one complaint is one that can't and probably shouldn't be changed. The one duck limit on black ducks is a real pain late in the season. In some of the areas I hunt late in the seasion, I probably see 10 black ducks for every mallard. Once you've killed your black duck, it can be a long wait, often with many, many birds in the decoys, before you see something legal to shoot.

Which reminds me, I need some more goldeneye decoys for those times after we have a black duck in the boat!

I almost forgot--one thing that drives me crazy is no Sunday hunting here--but that's also part of why our season is so long.
 
The one Shermie mentioned, can't shoot out of boat till all motion ceases.
Anyone ever try to collect cripples with that anchor around your neck?
Probably the most ignored regulation, but subject to a summons by LE if they have a wild hair across their azz.
 
George, in Maine you can't hunt from a moving power or sail boat, but you can shoot cripples with the boat moving and even with the motor running.
 
After reading all the crazy rules & blind drawings/placement restrictions/requirements in other states, I have to say we have it pretty good in Alabama.
I can't complain.
 
Here is the citation from Federal regulation (which means it applies in every state):

No persons shall take migratory game birds:

...

(e) From or by means of any motorboat or other craft having a motor attached, or any sailboat,
unless the motor has been completely shut off and/or the sails furled, and its progress therefrom
has ceased: Provided, That a craft under power may be used to retrieve dead or crippled birds;
however, crippled birds may not be shot from such craft under power except in the seaduck area
as permitted in subpart K of this part;
 
Brad:

Thanks for the catch. I'd forgotten the rule for cripples was limited to the sea-duck zone. For me, it's rarely an issue in freshwater as I'm usually in the canoe or kayak, or hunting from shore with a retriever.
 
In Virginia, legal shooting hours starts 30 minutes be for sunrise and ends at sundown. I wish legal time would end 30 minutes after sundown. I don't know if thats just pertains to Virginia or not but I've had such little success in the afternoon because all the ducks I see flying are between sundown and dark. I hunt mostly black ducks and the one per day limit is fustrating even though its obviously necessary. And really most black ducks are the last birds to fly in the evening. Just my 2 cents.

Robie
 
Regulations? What regulations? (Just kidding)
Sad but true, except for L.I. N.Y., and R.I., where I hunt there is close to zero enforcement. Not enough state C.O.'s, I guess. I haven't seen one in years.
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WS you beat me to the punch. My thoughts exactly!

My experiences with many of the officers I do run into seem to leave me feeling that beyond the boating rules (lifevests, lights, etc) they don't care much about what the game laws are. I've actually had local enforcement turn down offers to check my birds, I'm guessing they couldn't identify the birds!!

Now of course the disclaimer, I don't think this is true of ALL of the wardens, but certainly enough of them to make it stick in my head.
 
In some places in NJ you can't set foot on land (or stand in water) with a loaded gun, but you can hunt from a boat, unless you are in a Wildlife Management Area.
 
Anthony:

I believe that may be rooted in trespass law--i.e., you are trespassing when you touch the bottom, but while in the boat you have the right to navigate (and up here, to also "fish and fowl"). I am told there are some test cases in Maine based on driving logs, and that "incidental contact" with shore was not trespassing, but deliberate contact was. I'm still waiting for the ruling on whether it's "deliberate" if the jig I am fishing gets stuck on a big rock.
 
It's not so much a hunting regulation, but an aspect of our state's navigable waters and public access to those waters.... In Colorado, a landowner owns not only all the land leading up to the existing waterline, but they own the banks and bottom too. The flowing water, however, is public. Therefore, it makes it functionally impossible to float through vast sections of our rivers later in the season during which time 1) birds are concentrated on these remaining bits of moving water and 2) water levels are so low that portages are required. To compound the issue, it's common practice for landowners to emplace various obstacles to impede passage. Should the boater/hunter attempt to portage around a sandbar, downed tree, or section of rebar-laiden rubble? -bammo!- ticket. I once went so far as to ask the DOW what would happen should my dog make a retrieve on said private land (she not being my legal representative...yet) and the response ranged from the assurance that I would recieve a ticket to the not-impossibility that potshots might be taken.

Inasmuch that this is restricting my little hunting plans, it's taking a real heavy toll of the summer rafting and fishing guides, as the well-heeled are snapping up stretches of riverfront and effectivly establishing pay-for-passage tolls, or simply shutting them down altogether.

All this said- we do get real long seasons, nice bag limits and lots of productive, beautiful BLM land, National Forrest as well as state land to hunt over. We too have it pretty good.
 

Gotta say we have it good here in Montana with the best hunter/angler stream access laws around....once you access a stream or river (at a bridge crossing or one of 300+ fishing access sites) you can hunt or fish up to the high water mark...no restrictions about touching the bottom and you can portage around obstructions within reason.
 
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Hunting leases, they are not a regulation but I think it will lead to the death of hunting long before the anti's do.


The way baglimits are set up. I think that baglimits could be vastly simplified by saying 5 ducks only one can be a hen, all species included. That rather than the 2 of these, 4 of these (only one can be a hen) 1 of these, 3 of these or one of these or these or these but only one of the three not one of each.
 
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I have two complaints where i live. First is the completely unclear stance the state takes on navigable water ways and what is legal or not. Even in the regulations the state goes as far as saying what they think "MIGHT" be legal but you still have to proceed at your own risk because they cant guaranty what legal right you have.

Second has nothing to do with regulations per say but the people enforcing or not enforcing said regulations. Due to the fact that i am to poor to pay to hunt a nice hunt club i resort to hunting public land. On several occasions i have had locals call the game cops on me because they take offense to my hunting to close to what they perceive as theirs(over a half mile aways from homes and only shooting in a safe direction). Even though i have always been legal and go as far out of my ways as possible to minimize conflict i have been told by LE that i should never argue with land owners i will lose, that i need to hunt some where else because if i don't they will change the rules and make it illegal, why don't you hunt there instead of here, and been all but pushed out of spots by the cops so they dont have to deal with landowners.

I have friends that traps public land for coyotes they have had a few run in with dogs(not hunting dogs) running lose even in remote areas. The owners of said dogs have removed/destroyed his traps then called the cops to complain. Even though the regulations are very clear that you cannot disturb legal trapping the cops have harassed my friends but never done anything to the dog owners. Recently he found out that at least one of the dogs belonged to a personal friend of the cop.
 
Chris K,
That sounds awful. What state do you you live in? The game and fish cops are supposed to be on OUR side....although I have noticed that in a lot of states they are no longer called game wardens, but "natural resources police" or something similar. A lot of resources agencies have forgotten who "brung 'em to the dance." I remember when I lived in Georgia and the Game and Fish Commission changed its name to the Wildlife Resources Division....I knew that other changes were coming. The game cops became "conservation officers."
 
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