At the Poplar Springs section of the WMA (the one closest to headquarters), area staff has done a tremendous amount of work during the last 10 years. Roads once impassable are now surfaced with blue gravel and can be driven on in a car. Pine thinning and burning has taken place, and numerous greenfields and other food plots are planted each year. It's an easily accessible area, so it's subject to a good deal of hunting pressure.

Topographically, the mountaintop tract has the characteristics of a plateau, its terrain flat to rolling rather than made up of the tortuously steep hillsides typical of other parts of the WMA.

Further north is the Walls of Jericho tract, divided by SR 79-N. A recreational destination popular with hikers and other outdoor users as well as with hunters, it features a hiking/horseback trail that drops into the canyon known as "the Walls of Jericho." The geological feature from which the tract takes its name, it's regarded as one of a kind in the Cotton State. The west side of this section of the WMA is closed to all motorized vehicles.

"It offers a hunting experience that is quite unique in Alabama," Allen noted. "There's a campground at the bottom of the mountain, and you can pack in with horses or mules and camp and hunt."

A few adventurous souls even backpack into the canyon with their supplies and gear and hunt for a few days, but, Allen pointed out, day-hunters visiting that part of the WMA often only hunt in the mornings. "If you go all the way down into the area, you know you have a two-hour uphill hike to get out," he said.

That part of the WMA gets very, very little hunting pressure because of its rugged terrain; ATVs are not allowed there. "Some of our best deer come from this area each season," Allen said. "We do allow successful hunters to use ATVs to retrieve a deer. But that's the only time they can be used."

Access to the Jacobs Farm area, situated in scenic Roach's Cove east of the Poplar Springs and Walls of Jericho tracts, is had by way of SR 72 and some side roads. "There is an area of this part of the WMA that is difficult to hunt without a good 4-wheeler," Allen said. "The other portion is farmland planted in row crops, with loblolly pine strips for wildlife travel corridors." He added that those plantings -- soybeans, corn, millet and sorghum -- are designed more to benefit game birds than to feed whitetails. "But," he observed, "I see a lot of deer in that area." Some winter green plots are planted as well, however.

North of the Jacobs Farm section is the Big Coon tract, perhaps the roughest landscape in the entire WMA. Its mountains and valleys are laced with a network of logging roads and 4-wheel-drive trails -- and good thing, too, as you pretty much have to have an ATV to hunt it. It offers a true "big woods" experience.

Martin-Skyline is also a site on the state's trail for physically disabled hunters. "We have five 8x8 shooting houses with wheelchair-accessible ramps," Allen said. "All the shooting houses are over double food plots, with winter green plots in one direction and summer plantings in the other."

Disabled hunters have first to register through the Montgomery office of the Alabama Division of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries and then to make a reservation to use one of the shooting houses. "We stay pretty well booked up," remarked Allen, "and the hunters on these areas harvest a good many deer."

More land has been added to the Martin-Skyline WMA this season, such that the tracts together in total come to 43,457 acres. It's big enough, and offers enough hunting dates, that you could spend nearly the season afield there.

Find more about Alabama fishing and hunting at: AlabamaGameandFish.com