Although I’ve done most of my hunting in Pennsylvania, I’ve done quite a bit of it, especially for deer, in New York State, as well.
This all started back in the 1970s when my pal, Arn, introduced me to a kind guy named Bill who had a camp in N.Y. Bill invited us to his camp for a deer hunt, we accepted and never missed a season many years to follow.
There were hunts in archery season for deer, the regular firearms season, and even some spring gobbler hunts mixed with fishing in the local streams. Since I would often leave camp for home with at least one unpunched deer tag in my pocket, I started doing some N.Y. hunting closer to home and often managed to supplement my Pa. venison with imports from the north. Living very close to the state line, I had some good opportunities to expand my days in the woods by just driving a short distance. I had lined up several decent spots on both public and private land and happily continued my hunting as seasons allowed in both Pa. and N.Y. Tom, a gracious resident of New York state, allowed me to hunt on some of his property for many years; there was hunting allowed in parts of Allegany State Park and many days you could have found me there or in the Great Valley or Killbuck areas.
The only monkey wrench in the works was the cost of the non-resident license and the firearms they mandated to be used at the time. Always being an accuracy nut and already very familiar with shotgun slug accuracy (or lack of it back then), I looked sadly at my big game rifles and started a quest for a shotgun/slug/scope combination that might give some acceptable accuracy for the task at hand.
While shooting 12 gauge slugs from a bench rest has never been my favorite activity, I felt it necessary to experiment with different brands of slugs, two different shotguns, and two different scopes. That was just to get me started in this new game.
At the time, I knew quite a few Pa. hunters who also chased deer in N.Y. as well as the resident hunters I knew in N.Y. Most of those guys used pump action guns, like the Remington 870 or the Ithaca “Deerslayer” model 37. A lot of these hunters didn’t bother with scopes, mainly because the accuracy and trajectory of the slugs limited their effective range anyway. It seemed most resident hunters always had at least one doe license in their pocket back then, so any deer was legal and a scope wasn’t needed for identification of the animal (for your first deer anyway.) And don’t forget the casual hunter who used the same gun for rabbits, grouse, squirrels and deer — just switching ammunition with the seasons.
These circumstances created an ideal situation for ammunition companies, because a lot of shells were being fired for every deer spotted, especially early in the season. This past weekend, I was visiting with a lifelong resident of N.Y. and we both recalled the “slug gun days” when, if you heard a shot, you usually heard four or five in a row. It seemed that the sight of a deer caused those guys to throw as many slugs toward that deer in as short a time as possible. In my observations, these barrages usually ended up with a lot of empty shotgun shells, but few deer hitting the ground. In any event, the overlapping seasons of the two states often created an unusual opportunity. I knew of several Pa. hunters who kept a slug gun on hand, legal for deer in both states. When the season was open in both states, these folks would hunt the border areas carrying both licenses with them. Since there were few clearly marked boundaries in the woods to divide the states, a person walking in those areas should be legal in spite of any wandering from one state to another.
Through the years, quite a few deer from north of the border made it to my freezer in Pa. I never caught a glimpse of a “trophy” buck in the areas I hunted in N.Y., but I never expected to. The additional hunting days were appreciated and the big bodied bucks and does I took provided a lot of venison for my family and friends. Most importantly, of course, are the memories provided, which I always say is what we’re really hunting for anyway.
My Remington 870 with a 4X Burris scope (ordered with post and crosshair) and Brenneke slugs accounted for many of these deer, but knowing my nature, you realize I just had to experiment with other weapons since my “regular” big game rifles were not allowed. I have carried a .54 caliber Hawken style percussion gun and a .50 caliber in-line muzzleloader and yes, I killed a deer with a 10 gauge Ithaca mag 10 and yes, it was heavy by the end of the day.
After all this, N.Y. legalized the use of centerfire rifles, which made my carefully perfected slug gun a bit obsolete and changed the shooting habits of a lot of hunters, many of them using bolt action scoped rifles which was a new experience for them in better accuracy and long range capabilities. Now I understand they recently approved the use of AR type semi-auto rifles, which may again please the ammo companies; time will tell.
Roger Sager, an Era outdoors columnist, can be reached at rogersager@gmail.com
