aunt betty wrote:Go hunt public on the Fox river and see just how crazy it is.
That's why I joined a club in the area. For $1,800 and $200 per year, I don't have to deal with any of that. I have a spot, I can leave my boat, if I like my blind for the week (rotate blinds weekly and can jump unclaimed blinds) I can leave my decoys out, I archery hunt there, there's a little archery range, was a great place to train the dog, fishing is supposed to be pretty good (don't fish much there), you can camp there if you want, ...
I picked up pretty quick that I don't want to deal with the public hunting around here. Between the people and the idiotic Illinois corrupt view of navigable waterways, this seemed like a dead end for a newcomer that had no connections nor any desire to beat on every door within 20 miles hoping to get access to private land.
aunt betty wrote:You got a campground on one side and a high school on the other just over the hill.
I'm in the 'burbs. My dog was chasing a wing tipped mallard through the neighbors backyard
She was young and I did not want to call her off the bird, but there was no way I could shoot it less than 25 yards from their back door
Up in the yard, back in the water, up in the yard, back in the water, this went on and on for at least 15 minutes. It would never go far enough in the yard that she could catch it. I was trying to corral it with the boat. Thought we had it and it dove under my boat. Finally, the dog lost it. I knew where it was, but she didn't, OK, we'll let it go off and hopefully die. When we packed up for the day, I sent the dog locking for it. It went skittering across the water. Oh crap, here we go again. Thankfully, while it didn't die, it did run out of gas and the dog caught it pretty quick.
I had a traffic helicopter hovering over me goose hunting one day because there was a bad car accident that I heard right behind me. Not exactly hunting in the wilderness.