Interested on how good of a job they do overall. What they are good at, what gets under your skin. Most of all what would you suggest to improve it.

This could get good    

Even in a populous state like Washington with limited hunting opportunities, I have to say our dept. of wildlife does a pretty good job.  It has to be a challenge with the limited budget to keep everyone happy.

As a side note, my hunting partner and I have volunteered to survey areas that may have herds of elk infected with a hoof disease.  Our department is continually trying to maintain healthy populations.

Like most agencies a very large majority of W&F employees here are hard-working, good people. Major problem here is funding, little for the Dept. of Wildlife and Fisheries and for that matter roads, education etc. We have a State Legislature and Governor who bray about what Fiscal Conservatives they are but what they have delivered in 8 years is changing a billion dollar state surplus into a billion and a half deficit.

I try to look thru their eyes.  Our department has to now work thru this drought, many hunter applications and too small game populations, fiscal constraints, and soon forest fires. I guess they do ok, but frustration at lack of tags is still there.

PA has a lot of odd laws. Several years ago, we had a guy heading the Fish and Game dept who had very good ideas. Problem is, his ideas went against a long history of retarded management. Most people didn't like the initial results of the changes that were made, so they ousted the guy before giving things a chance to turn around. I find many hunters are still unhappy with our deer population, but if you ask me, it is getting healthier. No more skin and bones deer, and the bucks have a chance to grow bigger racks because of point restrictions. Our Bear season is quite good. First week is archery only, second week is mixed weapon. some zones even have a third week after a one week break due to firearm deer season. Small game is good all around in my opinion. Trapping season is a little weird, but I don't do much of that anymore.

Colorado has some work to do.
I'll leave it at that, but let's just say they have not got it figured out.

They cannot seem to figure out how the bear and cat population is do high and the deer is do low    

I personally think the Missouri Department of Conservation does a FANTASTIC job.  They are well funded and they are well represented by qualified biologists that I trust to be capable when it comes to making the right decisions for Missouri.  However their governing Commission is subject to political influence from many angles AND they are under attack right now.  
--State legislators are proposing legislation that would severely hamper the ability of the department to function at it's current level.

--Groups of special interest residents are lobbying for changes to many of the state's seasons structures, allowed equipment and bag limits.

--There is a lot of controversy right now over the potential of allowing the use of CROSSBOWS without restriction during the regular archery season.  

--There is a possibility that the archery limit for bucks may change from two per year to one per year.  For 2014 they reduced the number of antlerless tags issued per hunter per county and for 2015 they have already reduced the number of days in the regular rifle season.  These changes have many residents upset.  

--In addition Missouri has confirmed several cases of Chronic Wasting Disease.

--Some new legislation on the floor this year includes a reduction of the 1/8th% sales tax on certain goods to 1/16th% which would cost the department 55 MILLION dollars annually.  A second piece of legislation would make hunting and fishing licenses free to all residents which would cost the department another 40 MILLION annually.  A third piece would require the Department of Conservation to reimburse automobile owners up to 500 dollars in the event of a collision with a deer.

I don't think the legislation will pass but it's scary to see the way our MDC is being attacked.  It doesn't bode well for the future.

Wisconsin, phfftt. Chicken yesteryear, feathers today.

Lou

They have no clue what they are doing here.

Ga's policies are reasonable enough and biologically sound. They have a lot to deal with.  From watching the local hunting forum, I have concluded that most GA hunters are wildlife biologists that somehow got their degrees without mastering the English language.

My main concern is our total lack of law enforcement. Aside from your own morality, there is no reason to follow a single game or fish law here. Even if you were to get caught, the fine likely wouldn't be more than what you had in your wallet at the time.

Things have taken a turn for the worse the past 10 years or so. Sportsman used to have a voice. The dept. has pulled back, no more season setting meetings, no more interaction with the biologists. It was healthy and informative. It has now become toxic.

We have Game wardens taking to the media slamming hunters, biologists disregarding thier own statistics when setting seasons, the director sending employees to seminars to "Discover who their consumers are".

I was just discussing this matter with another sportsman a few days ago. Its truly sad.

In Michigan, license sales and money generated seems to be the main focus. Science be damned. Early firearm season for does 2 weeks before archery season. Big insurance company lobbies influencing season dates and bag limits. The only real success I see here is wild turkeys.
We used to have a lot of pheasants here. I saw a rooster last week. First one in 5 years.

I live in western North Carolina.  Right smack in the middle of the smoky mountains.  Deer populations seem to be on the rise, after many many years a severely diminished herd sizes.  At the turn of the last century up through the 1940's the forest service "select cut" almost all the mast bearing trees out of most of the public land.  This is poplar country now.  Ain't many game animals that can survive on poplar stamens.  Turkey reintroduction in the '80's has been a huge success however, and we now enjoy very healthy wild turkey numbers.

One thing about deer hunting in western NC that I absolutely loathe are the doe harvest laws.  Does can be taken in bow season at any time.  Once rifle season opens up ALL doe harvests are forbidden with the exception of one or two "doe days" throughout the rifle season.  So you start with herd numbers that are already low, then every spike and scrub buck coming and going gets blasted because guys can't kill does.  This has been so my entire life.  Makes for extremely poor herd management, in my opinion.

All that said I do most of my deer hunting in central Tennessee, where I have nothing but good things to say about wildlife management practices.

Jake

The best in the USA! Great deer- thanks to 1 buck rule in 1992.

Largest elk herd east of MS and larger at 10,000+ than some western states.

Sept-Jan deer season.

Recurve only on 1st and 3rd Wednesday's of the month--just kidding about this one!!!

Sometimes I think they are managing the forests for pine tree production with no consideration for wildlife. Deer bag limits seem to be set and kept very high to please insurance companies. Granted, I don't know a lot about their methods, but I do know that a lot of us are seeing considerably fewer deer.

Used to see game on every outing when I was young, now not so much. Poor management, poaching, loss of habitat and greedy hunters are the reasons in my opinion. Some areas of the state hold good numbers, but in a lot of cases these areas have limited hunting access. I have gone a whole season with out seeing a deer more than once.......

FL isn't to bad in my opinion. Season is long, mid September through mid January here in the north. Starts earlier in the south and lasts longer to the west. A lot of the WMA's are imposing point restrictions,  usually 3 per side. This is helping us get bigger racked bucks. Does are fair game during our bow season with doe days and antlerless tags for muzzle and rifle. I don't like the idea of trappers catching wild hogs when they could have mini-seasons for hunters. They are contemplating a bear season here for the first time in a very long time.

Depends on where you hunt in Pa. you'll get different opinions. If you like bear and turkeys there are lots. If you want to see deer you probably don't want to hunt public property around here...and I think that is where most of the hunters go. The big woods as we know them upstate the deer herd has been decimated and you have the DNR and insurance companies that want all the deer dead so our game commission does just that. I would agree that our antlers are getting bigger but we also lost a quarter of our hunting population and they wonder why. Hard to keep a kid interested sometimes if he's not seeing deer. So I guess my answer would be OK. But could get better.

New York is a very diverse state so different areas have different problems. On Long island they extended our season and reduced the distance that you had to be from a house to be able to hunt with a bow which is a big plus. In our public hunting areas I think they fail the test though. Some spots they only allow two hunters and it might be 200 acres. I think they have it set for shotgun hunters and that makes sense but I think during bow season they should double the amount that can hunt these properties. Another thing is the rampant poaching and illegal baiting. Everybody know who these guys are but the DEC won't do a thing about it. The unofficial ruling is that if homeowners aren't complaining do what you want. They just want the deer population down no matter what.