Who has hunted the cranberry wilderness in WV.

Deer, bear, and turkey.

I might head down for a little trout fishing scouting excursion this spring and check it out.

How about spring gobbler?

I hear the weather can be most anything after Oct...

Wonder hows the grouse down there? My setter came from WV a Mt. dog Ryman Setter long and tail and fast.LOL

Very few deer. Big woods that are in dire need of management that would inspire hound succession. But, it been mostly locked up with federal land designation so there he none of that. Bear numbers are way down. Turkey too. It just a habitat thing.

Fishing used to be good. Not anymore. Out fitters take fisherman behind the gates and place them in huge tents. Change them out every three days or so. They pack everything on horse and buggy. Last time I was there fishing, about a decade ago, I pedaled my bike 7 miles up the mountain to find 28 trout fisherman in one of the outfitters camp. Beer cans every where. They had fished the river out.

Honestly, it's a good example of what happens to public land when "protected" by the givernment. God Bless men

Don't waste you time Shade. Place has turned into a circus regarding trout fishing. There is no "wilderness experience" in there anymore. There is a guy that hauls people in there by horse drawn trailers. Cases of BEER stacked three foot high and camps set up for a dozen people every several miles. Even the catch and release area has his camps. Rest of the crowd is on mountain bikes.

Hunting is poor. The big blizzard back in the early 1990's killed a lot of the game out. Never recovered. Most of the mass trees have aged out and no brouse. It's nothing like it use to be back in the 1980's. Spent many a day in that place as a young man. Kinda sad now.

Shade, I thought you were speaking of the Ocean Spray facility in South Jersey. The Cranberry bogs stretch for many miles. TLM

Glen. Right here is the toughest, meanest, WV grouse dog you will ever lay eyes on.

Had him out in the southern coalfields (old strip mines) the other day. Ole Henry went on point and didn't budge. We moved in to find him nose to nose with a denned up black bear under some logs. Henry held steady to shot as the bear ran by him sounding like a D9 running down the hollow.

I only feed him raw meat and gun powder.

That's a shame to hear. I used to go down there quite often when I was working in the state of Ohio. Some beautiful, rough country.

I used to catch a lot of nice trout right below that great old big rock just inside the gate.

Thanks for the info... I Thought maybe a couple of you guys from WV would know. Thanks for the heads up.

And I agree that is a shame.

Been going there since the late '60 s . I've backpacked , hunted and fished just about all of it. But sad to say the outfitter that somehow got a permit has ruined the fishing. What WV Mountaineer and Stickbow 21 stated sums up the hunting outlook. I used to take my boys and some of their friends on 4-5 day fishing trips. They would catch fish and on week days you would see very few other fishermen. Back in the day you had to walk and carry your stuff 4-8 miles to get to the prime fishing spots. Not to many people carrying a couple cases of beer and corn-hole boards. Now you can climb up on a mule drawn wagon and ride in to a tent city. If you run out of anything they will haul it right to the camp. If I could get a permit I would consider running a concession wagon up and down the road during the peak fishing season and sell hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, soda pop and Snicker bars.....Sad.... Sad....Sad. Thanks for letting me vent. ( took me 1hr 17min to hunt and peck all this stuff)

That's the beauty of the 'wall, saves a lot of time & leg work. I remember reading here about a big bowl in New Mexico loaded with bear, near a big telescope or something. Anybody remember that? I've never forgotten that, & would like to see about hunting it

Your right Dave.

Although I don't mind a little leg work. The Cranberry is about a 6 hr drive from here, so that would have been a real bummer.

I usually check things out for myself, but cranberry isn't exactly somewhere I'd go for a Sun drive to.

I feel for you guys that hunted and fished it and watched it go down hill.

That's a shame. Sounds like it isn't much of a wilderness anymore :(

Shade, you could try going north to the Adirondacks, to Cranberry Lake on NY state land. DEC still manages the park and does a pretty good job at keeping it as wilderness as it can be in the east anyway, with so many people in relatively close proximity. There aren't huge numbers of deer but they are there, and the fishing is okay and improving, and bear and turkey are doing pretty good in the north country. Ya might even see a moose. You wont see any comercial outfitters operating mule drawn wagons filled with beer. Its byob... Who needs it in the wilderness anyway. I use it to escape civilation when Im in it, not in the wild country. Dont want to forget anything I do there. :^)

some regional newspaper Outdoor editor would love to write about that situation, Or take it up with some Of your sportsmen who are activists>

trapperkayak....I'll be fishing there this summer, But not at cranberry lake.

The questions in shade mt's OP have been accurately answered. But if I may I would like to address the " Wilderness ". 2 sections, the "wilderness", and the " backcountry " covers 70,000 acres. ( Some publications say more some less.) What I was crying about in my earlier post was the fishing on the Cranberry River. A gated Forest Service road parallels the river for 16 miles. This is where you will see all the people. Get away from that and a true wilderness experience can be had. 135 miles of hiking trails plus many abandoned logging roads. Years ago backpacking these trails I would occasionally meet a few hikers. The trails would show signs of use. The last few years I have noticed less use of the more remote trails and areas. When I pretend to be hunting in the fall I am actually exploring and hiking trails. I know my hiking days are getting short so the last 3 years of our Nov. hunting trip I probably wondered around in the "wilderness" 25 days and never saw another soul. Our lazy life style may have made it more wilderness than it used to be. I love the Cranberry Wilderness but I'm not hanging out on the river...... Longest post I've ever done...." good grief "

Must add to my last post that you may see some hunters during the deer rifle season. Thanks

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