Finding Hunting Permissions?

[strangetanks]

Hi everyone, little background about me.  I live in Philadelphia, super urban area and didn't grow up with any hunters in my family.

Been pretty seriously into air rifle hunting for a few years now.  That probably sounds pretty silly to the more experienced folks here, but I enjoy the small game pest hunting.  And a pcp air rifle lets me hunt in more populated areas without having to worry about someone calling a swat team out on me.  I want to get into bow hunting larger game.

My problem is finding places to hunt, and I was hoping you guys might have some tips, especially since I'm sure this is a problem faced by anyone looking to get into it.

I'm very personable and have no problem approaching people, in fact I took a day to drive around to every golf course within an hours radius one day and ask for permission.  Tried craigslist with little result.  Tried showing up and saying hi...I would love to help with your pest animal problems with little result.  Tried emailing every farm in the area with terrible results.

Any ideas on more creative ways/places to find hunting locations? 

When I get an answer its usually one of the following...

1:  No hunting, too much liability.
2:  We don't actually want to kill our pests, can't you trap and relocate them?
3:  Get out of here, we're tired of a million hunters asking to come on our property.

On a more humorous note, I did get instant permission at this one place.  I was stoked until the guy said I had to be out by 10:00 am or so (I usually hunt at dawn) because that's when the EPA people showed up.  When I looked it up I found out the entire area had been designated as a superfund site.

[nelson96]

I'm very personable and have no problem approaching people,

There's your answer, but trying getting out to more rural areas.

Join a bow/gun club and make some friends who have connections.

[riverbend_rich]

Go out to small towns and find the local coffee shop. Get there at opening and wait. You will soon see a group of old farts come in with their own coffee cups. Find the one in overalls and a feed store hat. Next step is to gain trust and infiltrate the group.  You can do this by offering to help clean horse stalls or other manual labor. Be careful and play it cool!

No but really just get involved with a small rural community and build relationships. You may try attending some rural churches or other community groups.
 You have to remember that for most land owners it's just easier to say no than to deal with most hunters.

[strangetanks]

Well, that's one of the hard parts.

I would have to drive about 2 hours to find a small town like you describe. 

[Cedar]

On our CraigsList, I see ads quite frequently asking people for permission for hunting, or training their field dogs.

Cedar

[bdhutier]

Yeah, since you're so urban, I'd imagine a shooting club of some kind is going to be your best bet.  But don't expect results this year, and maybe not even next year.  Damn near every land wonder around here has horror stories about leasing or letting, resulting in trashed property or hoops of people they don't know running around with entitlement complexes. 

As you work your way into the circle of trust, begin helping out around the place pro bono.  It solidifies your commitment and trustworthyness in the owner's eyes, and also brings you closer to the land.

[Caveat]

Have you ever looked at PA's State Game Lands?  I have known quite a few guys who have been pretty successful at hunting bear and deer on PA game lands.  The Pennsylvania Game Commission's website is really informative.
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/state_game_lands/11363

There are about 1.5 million acres of state game lands and another 2.2 million state forest acres.
http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pgc/pa_huntingdigest1415/#/18.

Caveat

[ShannonB]

My 17 yr old daughter just got her a Type 2 games lands license, thanks to my Dad. She can fish there but not hunt with the lower end license she got. She did get a HUGE rule book in the mail. i'll look at it and maybe there is some contact info for out of state PA stuff.