Drone Deer Recovery

[EricS]

I didn’t read all the replies. If it hasn’t been said before you can’t use thermals to scout for big bucks during deer season. Once antlers harden and there’s no longer blood flowing to them they blend in with ambient temp stuff. I support tracking with dogs. The only thing I have against some of the drone guys is they use fear of running off deer with dogs as a way to promote drones. Dogs don’t ruin your hunting spot. The 5 guy’s doing grid searches for hours yelling back and forth ruin spots.
Used as a tool to locate downed/wounded game I have no problem with.
As far as using one to scout I would say it’s cheating a little. At least as unethical as cell cams of which I have five. When used properly they make killing mature bucks easy. I just suck at using them. I’d probably suck with the thermal drone also. I have no interest in using one to help me kill my next trophy. That said if there’s something about these little ruminants that makes you want to study their behavior, movement patterns, diet etc, and you had a thermal drone you were using you were using to find list patients from a psychiatric facility, how could you not use it to study your local deer herd. That is if legal in your state.
Do deer in my area select bedding based on wind? I don’t think so but hey with that drone If like to research it. There are a lot of things like that that are taught that I just don’t agree with in the endless thick planted pines we have.

 

[colin.704]

so I am currently getting my commercial drone license. learning a lot about where you can fly these things and where you can't (and the FAA will bankrupt you if you break rules) A lot of info, and remote ID will be active on all drones this September so they will know where all drones are and have been. All I can say is if you fly you better know the rules in place. Also, drone pilots (and drone) will be visible to anyone on the ground that wants to find them thru remote ID

 

[DelaWhere_Arrow]

Expensive too, $450, + travel, + $100 of the deer is found.

Plus expenses for gas and travel overall, according to their website, at which point you’ve almost paid for a shoulder mount. I do think some guys with money to burn will take more questionable shots because they can simply call the drone guy, but your average hunter who just shot a buck and really wants to recover it (we all should want to recover deer animal we shoot) isn’t going to take bad shots on purpose then find themselves out a cool $600-700 before they even get to the taxidermist or the butcher.

 

[HuumanCreed]

Hmm....wonder if we can combine this with the POD threads and lump it all in with technological advancement.

 

[CarolinaDog]

I am a licensed commercial drone operator. The FAA requires you to have visual line of sight with your drone whether in recreational or commercial use at all times during flight. So if someone is buzzing your tower at a low level they had better be in sight. Will some people break the law? Of course but the FAA will burn them to ground for doing so.

 

[CarolinaDog]

In the videos the guy is usually set up in an open space or on a hill Im assuming to not violate the rules. The FAA has folks that scrutinize social media platforms for such violations

 

[DelaWhere_Arrow]

Man, I just can’t let it go: cell cams are NOT the damn kryptonite tools some of y’all think they are. I have four on my property, 80 acres, and I don’t even get pictures every day, let alone “real-time intel that I can just go use to get in a tree and kill that deer”.
Example:
I have a cell camera about 50 yards between two preset trees. I can also see directly to one of those trees from my house when the foliage is down. Sometimes I get a picture notification and I will know a deer is nearing my stand, but by the time I grab my bow, throw on some camo, head towards the woods (about 200 yards of walking or a short truck drive down the field edge), those deer are not in that same place. But let’s just say they are lazy deer and haven’t moved in the 15-20m it took me to actually put intel into action, I still have to get my body to where they are without spooking them, get the right shot opportunity in the right range, make the good shot myself, and find that deer later. Does that sound like an easy task? Let’s say I made it easier (which I did) by putting some corn around a mineral site near that camera, and this time I actually see the deer under my stand from the house after pic notification comes in, and I decide to try my luck. I will be hard-pressed not to broadcast my arrival to those deer, and by the time I get to the area they’re lickety-split or I watch nothing but booties bounding off. I have tried, selfishly but unashamedly, to use cell cams as real-time hunting tools. It’s nearly impossible, and I’d argue that anyone who says they have success this way is either lying or possibly cheating in some other less-than-legal manner, or they have their property set up for absolute ninja stealth with dumb, dumb deer. Fourth option might be that they hunt high-fence or similarly privatized property.
I actually think the biggest advantage to a cell cam is knowing when to NOT bust in there and send every deer on your property packing. It sucks a lot when you know if you’d already been in the tree you’d have a shot at that deer, but it sucks less to know you’re trying to maintain the integrity and serenity of your herd while they visit your neck of the woods.
There are always bad apples but cell cams ain’t Superman’s hunting dogs.
And as far as this notion that the way they did stuff back in the day was somehow better? Okay, maybe luring hundreds of buffalo off a cliff so you can scrap through their carcasses later without any form of regulation was more ethical. Or maybe killing sacrificial game animals to lace them with Strick-9 so they could extirpate wolf populations was more ethical. Or maybe the fact that they had to build their own guns and ammo and bows and arrows from scratch, probably wounding all kinds of game while dialing their kit in, was more ethical. Or maybe it was the scouts they’d send into the woods to observe game until the hunting parties arrived to kill all the game there there and there (old times cell cams if you ask me). No? Then was it the thousands upon thousands of wasted carcasses they left so they could strip them of fats, horns and antlers, some other key parts, then ditch the rest? Come on. Don’t believe everything you read in a book about Davey Crockett or even our fathers’ and grandfathers’ homies of the early to mid 1900s. Now, recovery rates now have never been higher, education has never been better, and kills have probably never been cleaner overall.
Now back to the subject of drones…
I think the service itself is invaluable to the idea that we do our very best to recover every deer. I don’t have the money do hire this guy, and I do think there is absolute potential for tomfoolery. But that already happens every damn day in the deer woods.

 

[Nutterbuster]

Hmm....wonder if we can combine this with the POD threads and lump it all in with technological advancement.

The rules for the deer hunting game go this way:

First, any changes to sports equipment must be agreed upon first as "ethical."

Any item is "unethical" if it appears to substantially improve success.

If the changes improve success to the degree of negative resource impact (too many dead deer) then the change is unethical.

If no negative resource impact is projected, but the change is beyond the grasp of most hunters, the change is unethical.

If a change becomes so commonplace and available as to be within the grasp of the majority of hunters, it is no longer unethical.

 

[HuumanCreed]

The rules for the deer hunting game go this way:

First, any changes to sports equipment must be agreed upon first as "ethical."
Hmm....I think this is actually very interesting. I label hunting as a 'recreational sport'. But I understand others don't. So my 'sport' equipment has standard rules and bylaws. So I guess I'm open to pod usages in regards to population management and conservation because I do not consider them a sport.

Any item is "unethical" if it appears to substantially improve success.
Would hormone additive be ethical in regards to the goal of harvesting big bucks on public lands? I may be wrong but I think most deer farmers are all using them on their 'livestocks'. I understand this is not the topic we are focusing on. But if the argument is 'substantially improve' =unethical, then I feel a lot of the things we do in life are not ethical by this standard. Like is it ethical to hire private tutor for your kids so they do better in school compared to other kids? What about radar/sonar for fishing?

If the changes improve success to the degree of negative resource impact (too many dead deer) then the change is unethical.
Dont really understand this, can you explain it?

If no negative resource impact is projected, but the change is beyond the grasp of most hunters, the change is unethical.
You are probably in the minority, but from reading the threads. Most are projecting a backlash from the animal right activitist and a shift in support against us from the general public. Public support is also a resource the hunting community needs.

If a change becomes so commonplace and available as to be within the grasp of the majority of hunters, it is no longer unethical.
This I agree with. Some things changed recently that I used to feel are not 'good' for the hunting community but I'm waiting for actual long term finds. Biggest changes are crossbow. Before it was only for people that need it, now its what I see carry into the wood most.

 

[Plebe]

so I am currently getting my commercial drone license. learning a lot about where you can fly these things and where you can't (and the FAA will bankrupt you if you break rules) A lot of info, and remote ID will be active on all drones this September so they will know where all drones are and have been. All I can say is if you fly you better know the rules in place. Also, drone pilots (and drone) will be visible to anyone on the ground that wants to find them thru remote ID

From what you’ve learned, where are no fly zones?

 

[Jammintree]

I have very mixed feelings about drone use in any arena; its a double edged sword tool.

Someone made a great point that there is no fair chase relationship between hunters and their intended prey. We might consider that fair chase is more about attempting to maintain some modicum of equal access to hunting opportunity. I realize that this is only a theoretical concept and that people with greater means will always have the ability to increase their odds for success. All that said, Should some boundaries be created so that people with the greatest means can't always stack the deck in their favor; do we wanna create a playing field where everyone always has some chance at harvest the buck of a lifetime? This question may seem silly to those of you who live in states with high deer density, but for those of us in low deer density regions the competition for mature bucks is pretty steep. Frankly, I don't really know where I stand.

 

[Jammintree]

Another thought: I have a friend who is an incredible drone pilot. He wears a panoramic helmet that allows him to see incredibly well from the drones eye view; he can fly right through the woods at a pretty fast pace. If he was to couple that tech with infrared heat sensing, he could easily locate target deer and then fly down at them and push them. This would make it possible to to drive deer out of locations where its not possible / legal to hunt. It would also allow hunters / anti hunters to drive deer away from other hunters.

 

[colin.704]

From what you’ve learned, where are no fly zones?

any airspace other than G (although you can get permission in some cases) national forests, wilderness areas...on and on lol. actually there is a lot that is restricted. As I said the FAA will bankrupt you with fines. The license verifies you know how to read charts, obtain info, and understand the airspace that planes, helos, airports, etc use. A lot of good info and I'm glad I'm learning it

 

[colin.704]

Another thought: I have a friend who is an incredible drone pilot. He wears a panoramic helmet that allows him to see incredibly well from the drones eye view; he can fly right through the woods at a pretty fast pace. If he was to couple that tech with infrared heat sensing, he could easily locate target deer and then fly down at them and push them. This would make it possible to to drive deer out of locations where its not possible / legal to hunt. It would also allow hunters / anti hunters to drive deer away from other hunters.

that would be a very short lived exercise

 

[BTaylor]

The rules for the deer hunting game go this way:

First, any changes to sports equipment must be agreed upon first as "ethical."

Any item is "unethical" if it appears to substantially improve success.

If the changes improve success to the degree of negative resource impact (too many dead deer) then the change is unethical.

If no negative resource impact is projected, but the change is beyond the grasp of most hunters, the change is unethical.

If a change becomes so commonplace and available as to be within the grasp of the majority of hunters, it is no longer unethical.

I had a response all typed up and then re-read your post and decided I am not sure where you are going with your post.

 

[colin.704]

Look at it this way, it could give info on harvesting 7 year old deer instead of 3 YO deer, allowing much better herd management, longer deer lifespan, would still not be harvesting "more" deer, just older deer. Mike @ DDR doesn't seem to have a lot of time to hunt, if you see how busy he is in his videos. I like deer hunting, but I'd get just as much out of being involved in the process and seeing where it leads. I think it's good to discuss it, but currently the FAA controls it. If people think others are gonna be allowed to act up out there doing it they will be in for a rude financial awakening.

 

[Plebe]

any airspace other than G (although you can get permission in some cases) national forests, wilderness areas...on and on lol. actually there is a lot that is restricted. As I said the FAA will bankrupt you with fines. The license verifies you know how to read charts, obtain info, and understand the airspace that planes, helos, airports, etc use. A lot of good info and I'm glad I'm learning it

Thanks.

Seems like there would be a lot of G still. I thought the Forest Service flyer is interesting, having provided guidance for hobbyists.

 

[EricS]

If I hire a helicopter to take me scouting is it still cheating?

 

[colin.704]

If I hire a helicopter to take me scouting is it still cheating?

if you hunt the same day it is

 

[Noonespecial]

I think this is the best thing for finding wounded deer hands down. I hope states start allowing this!