Prime spot for whitetail deer
The rugged four-county southern West Virginia region that includes Logan, Mingo, Wyoming and McDowell produces an impressive sum of mature whitetail deer, many of them older-age class bucks sporting tremendous headgear.
So how is it that this area is such a big buck factory? The answer: A decades-old bowhunting-only regulation coupled with some of the toughest terrain a bowhunter will set his or her deeply lugged soles into.
For many years, Gene Thorn, a West Virginia Division of Natural Resources wildlife biologist, has assembled the agency’s highly successful Big Buck Contest, an annual event that documents the state’s biggest whitetail bucks taken with both rifle and bow.
Thorn, currently in charge of the West Virginia Wildlife Center, also spent many years as the District 4 assistant wildlife biologist.
District 4 contains the four bowhunting-only counties.
“The four bowhunting-only counties have been closed to gun hunting for nearly 30 years,” explained Thorn. “Each one of them has a history of having a gun season in the 1960s. The deer herd had declined so much that the DNR backed off and established the bow-hunting only regulation.”
There’s very little agriculture in this four-county region. The industries are timbering and mining. Vast tracts of land are in private ownership. Habitat wise, this area leans toward mature timber. There are areas of abandoned strip mines and mountain top removal, as well as natural gas drilling activity. So there’s also a mix of younger growth as well as edge habitat.
“The land ownership is over 90 percent that of corporations, land companies, timber companies, coal companies,” explained Thorn. “There are some large wildlife management areas, most notably R.D. Bailey, and also Panther Wildlife Management Area, which is pretty good sized. And there are some smaller wildlife management areas.”
For anyone unfamiliar with the region, doing some pre-hunt research, as well as taking a stepping-stone approach to initial hunts, is a key to an enjoyable and productive hunt.
“I think one of the things smart hunters that are new to the area do is to first key in on our public areas, R.D. Bailey in particular,” he said. “I’ve noticed that over the years there’s been a shift there from in-state hunters to out-of-state hunters.”
Focusing first on public lands enables hunters to get a feel for the area and how to hunt it. With a bit of experience under the belt, one can then begin to branch off into private lands, of which many furnish the more remote spots where bucks tend to live the longest.
“There’s a lot of land to hunt down there,” noted Thorn. “Many of the land companies have an open-use policy where you can just go hunting. They don’t need you to contact them for a permit. Actually, most of them don’t want to hear from anybody. Some corporations, on the other hand, have a tight hold on their land, and in some cases have gotten on the hunting-lease bandwagon.”
Thorn explained that any lands holdings under tight reins, or under a hunting lease, will be well-posted. State law, he said, states that you can hunt as long as the land isn’t posted, fenced off, or the property owner hasn’t specifically told you to stay off.
It’s possible to take a deer, including a Pope and Young class whitetail, in any of the four-county area. But he said some areas are more hunter-friendly than others.
“Pocahontas Land Corporation is a good example,” he said. “They have land in McDowell and Wyoming counties. They have thousands of acres of land that’s part of an open land policy. I always tell people that when they first come down here, hunt public land or a place like Pocahontas. But keep a couple of days reserved for exploring other areas, places that are harder to reach, and see little if any hunting pressure.”
The first step in planning a hunt is to determine the general areas to be hunted. As Thorn suggested, a wise process is to first take off some small bites of public land, or from large private holdings like that of Pocahontas Land Corp. After that, it’s a matter of acquiring maps.
“It’s possible to download topographic maps off the Internet,” said Thorn. “Another good source of USGS topo maps is Gates Supply, in Beckley. A lot of people who are coming down to bowhunt area pass through Beckley on the way.”
Beckley is located in Raleigh County, but can serve as a base of operations for a hunt located in Wyoming County. Pineville, Welch, Logan, Gilbert and Williamson are sizeable towns located within the four bowhunt counties, and can provide amenities such as motels and restaurants.
“Once you get inside the four-county area, any sporting goods store is going to be a good source of information,” said Thorn. “A lot of them will have photos of bucks they’ve checked in, as most of them are deer check stations. Every little town down there has some kind of hunting connection, if not a sporting goods store, then a gas station that serves as a check station. And most of them are willing to at least get a person started. The people tend to be very friendly.”
Jeff Knapp is an outdoors columnist for the Butler Eagle.
