Things Looking Up in PA... Monster Bucks being taken

Only for 1 or 2 years max. Your hunters tag a buck at about a 10-12% clip anyways so statistically speaking they more then likely weren't gonna get one anyways. You could even put an exemption in for monsters in case a guy sees a buck of a lifetime. At least they will still feel like they COULD shoot a buck.

They signed up for 10 years of misery but they wouldn't go for 1-2??

 

The average hunter down there is only scoring once or twice a decade by the stats so not shooting a buck for 1-2 years should be a breeze.

Hey.........you asked me for a better answer and I gave you one. Don't blame me if your orange army down there is not smart enough to understand.

 

One important piece is missing here. Thats stats aren't accurate. Its been a long standing problem in PA that hunters do not report what they kill. Not sure, but I think it was less than 40% of hunters who actually fill out and mail in harvest report cards. Therein lies the problem. The PGC has been making quite a few decisions based on faulty data.

I don't know where you're getting these numbers, but in my neck of the woods, a vast majority of hunters are taking a buck on a yearly basis, not a couple times a decade as you point out. That probably does hold true for areas north of me though, where the deer heard was decimated by HR and is just now starting to show signs of life.

As I said, its HR that is the biggest culprit here, not AR. I think your statement about us just giving the 2 1/2 year olds a pass for one year then getting slaughtered is sort of ridiculous. Thats the whole point of AR, helping them get to at least 3 1/2 before being able to kill them! Then of course, some of those 3 1/2 year old deer make it through to see 4 1/2, then, maybe, just maybe a few of those slip through to see 4 1/2. Behind them, there are new 3 1/2's joining the ranks and the cycle repeats....

 

10 years of misery? Were all saying we are HAPPY with the ARs. Gary got death threats for saying you couldn't shoot any buck that walks by any more. You tell them they can't shoot a buck at all...you'll get death promises I bet. Set in the real world, your ideas won't work, what PA has done, with ARs anyway, is working and the hunters are the proof. This thread was started because of a hunter HAPPY with the regs. I know you hate to be wrong, so you will point out a spelling issue, call me drunk, or double back on another point you think you have, but you are wrong and the people here know it. You can take this thread to 20 pages, talk about moving your 500 deer from the island to the moon, make up more things like saying we are unhappy. But buddy, we have already told you other wise and the deer in our woods and on our walls prove pa made the best move they could get away with and it has been a success.

 

On a side note.. I think this is my first 9 page post!

 

Haha that a boy! Was one for the books for sure.

 

All the more bucks that would be saved......and no one can ***** about it because its their fault. The PGC is going by the data they provide.......want better results?? Give better data.

2011 PA deer harvest report.

 

Yes........read the PA hunter survey Matt posted. The numbers speak for themselves and have been quoted numerous times.......every one of which you ignored.

 

What numbers speak for themselves? Only 22% are against the ARs in that survey. Plus, the survay was of only 6000 people, and only 61% replied, of PAs 1.3 million hunters.

 

Speak for yourself, Clarion area is pitiful. Small bucks and terrible buck to doe ratio. I hate the PGC with all my being.

 

Post 38

 

I don't know anybody personally who took a buck this archery season. I've seen plenty of pictures but of the 10 or so bowhunters I talk to regularly all struck out in archery. I didn't even see a legal buck while hunting and I put a lot of time in one stand this year. I only saw 13 deer all season as I've said before; 2 button bucks, 2 spikes, the rest does. I did see one legal small basket 8pt in my area but not while hunting.

 

Moat of the numbers you pointed out have to do with doe or the over all deer hunting. Again, only 22% were against the ARs...the rest has to do with Hrs, which this thread is not about. Only 22% not for them, that's a success. And, this was sent out to only 6000, 39% didn't respond. People are more likely to respond when they are upset and hope their voice makes a change. People who are content are more likely to throw out the paper and move on. Clearly, the people who responded are against HR, not ARs. Suck it up, you are wrong, and your 2 year program is the biggest joke of this whole thread. That will only make anything better for a couple years. As soon as everyone can kill a buck again, and there are more bucks, there will be a higher success rate due to more deer, and more people wanting to kill more then ever because thwy couldn't for some time. They will wipe out progress faster then it happened. ARs have proven to work, and will continue to do so. Move on.

 

That data came from hunters that hunt Saturday mornings till 9

 

Ok, after reading the entire thread, I wanted to chime in and explain my comments above because people are giving opinions about AR without even experiencing them. The problem with PA is that the ARs they do have are different depending on the WMU and not the same statewide. Couple this with restricting the number of doe tags that can be purchased in your WMU and you've got some areas where there are an abundance of does and very few big bucks. ARs and HRs combined are both factors. Implementing an AR disguises the quality of the herd because people are seeing more deer so they they also assume that the bucks are getting bigger. But, when hunters are forced to only kill the "big" bucks, they are actually only killing barely leagal bucks which leaves the little anterled bucks to do all the breeding. That leads us to the doe tags. How PA sells doe tags is, resident hunters get first dibs and then non-resident hunters get second dibs. If the resident hunters buy up all the doe tags, non-resident hunters don't have a chance to buy a doe tag at all. Our entire street (full of cabins) is made up of a lot of Ohio hunters, so the lack of doe tags give us no opportunity to take does, so the ratio suffers. The PGC doesn't allow the hunter to decide what a trophy is, they say that a trophy is a buck, period, when to most hunters, especially in certain parts of PA, a trophy deer is one that provides quality meat for their family. People who don't understand biology think that more deer is better, but they would be wrong. In actuality, having 50 healthy does in a herd is better than having 100 unhealthy does in a herd. What people don't understand is, when the ratio is wrong, most does aren't bred with until the second or even third estrus, meaning their fawns aren't born until late in the summer or even fall the following year. These fawns are virtually runts and they affect the quality of deer in the herd altogether. If one of those runt fawns is bred with the next year, its young are going to be malnourished and of less quality just like the mother runt who had them. Instead of waiting 2.5 years to see a 6 pointer like most average bucks in most states, some PA hunters are waiting 3.25 years (late born runt) just to see a buck become a 6 pointer (in a WMU with a 4 point to a side AR, you still couldn't take this buck). We have 2.25 year old (late born runt) bucks on camera on our property that are 4 pointers when if they were born at the proper time and had the extra time to grow it could have had a chance to be a 6 or 8 pointer. This is WITH an automatic corn feeder and a mineral lick during legal feeding times, so we know it has nothing to do with the food/nutrients we provide but rather an issue with buck to doe ratio, breed timing and inadequate quality/genes (all of which are affected directly because of the AR because it's the little bucks that are breeding with does since the only decent anterled bucks are all being taken because they are the only legal ones TO take). This doesn't allow for bucks to get any bigger than barely legal. We have only taken two 8 pointers from our camp (5 hunters) in the past 10 years and on both of them the brow tines were both less than an inch long. They need to go back to the 2 weeks of buck hunting and 3 days of doe hunting and limit people to one buck tag and 2 doe tags, regardless if you are a resident or non resident. If they absolutely want to have a AR, at least make it only 3 points to a side and make it the same statewide, but I am personally against them.

 

The entire spectrum of topics was covered..........it's PA's survey not mine. When you have more hunters then not saying they are less happy and/or interesting in PA hunting you have a big problem.........again, a decade down the road and still a mess.

You've got a lame excuse for everything that doesn't go your way.........don't listen to the survey because it's disgruntled meat hunters griping...........then you point to the survey as a sign of AR validation in the next sentence.

The scary part is when you typed that it probably made sense in your head


Why don't you address your two state brothers who don't seem to share your Alt lovefest??

 

You made it to 10 pages Muzzy!

 

There's been ARs in PA for how many years now and our camp has taken less 8 pointers over this span than before the ARs were instituted...now all we have is a bad buck to doe ratio and less quality of a gene pool. People can say whatever they want, but for our area in the 2D and 2F area, it hasn't helped anything, in fact it made things worse.

 

You are right...2D and 2F are tough (in most areas anyway). 2F has a very large amount of public land, which doesnt help. But, so does my area. Never hunted out there myself and not close to any guys there, so not sure exactly how the land is, food is, how the heard was vs. now, and so on. I know southern, southwestern 2D is pretty decent...but again I never hunted there myself and dont know how it was. You can not fix every spot though, that needs to be remembered. Ohio, Ill, Iowa, KS, WI, and every other good hunting state/province has well known and better areas, and areas that are hit harder, or less food, or failed plans or whatever. You can not win it all. And, a lot of the issue (far from all the issue of course I am sure) is HR. I really with the state kept things county to county, could narrow down on areas that need help better that way, because it is broke into smaller units. The WMUs are a joke if you ask me. Id bet that if it was by county, they could pin point your area(s) better and be more specific on fixing the issue. No clue what type of area you hunt, but an area with a lot of public land is going to of course attract more hunters then private land heavy areas. More hunters=more deer killed...buck and doe. But say south of where you hunt, like in the care of many areas in southern 2D, you have more private land that is a bit crowded. They up the antlerless tags in the WMU in hopes to lower doe numbers in the southern part of the WMU, in a different county, hour or more from where you hunt. But them tags end up going where the bulk of the hunters are, up in the public land. That leads to a lot of antlerless killed up there, including many button bucks, and of course, poor hunting. If it was county by county, that would not happen, because the rise in antlerless tags would have happened far from youre hunting area. I can not say that is what happened in your area, Im sure it is many things, but I would guess that plays a part in it.

But again, even if that is not the case, even if I am way off and some how it is the ARs messing up your area (no clue how ARs would cause less deer sightings), again you have to remember you can not fix everything 100%. It is still clear that the bulk of PA hunters are pleased and support the regs. you can take this thread as a very very mini survey, and you will see that the number of hunters that support the ARs that hunt in PA greatly out number those that are against them. Not in any way a source you can hold any facts out of, but it does show something. If the current system was so bad (ARs not HR) then more people would be here saying so.

 

Again, this is where I have to say you are wrong. Most PA deer hunters are NOT happy with the the ARs. If they were then why is the number of BOTH resident and non-resident hunting licenses going down significantly each year? PA has lost over 100k adult resident hunters alone since the ARs have been put in place, not to mention hunters in all other categories. You are basing your data off of a survey to existing hunters, not all potential hunters (including ones who have stopped hunting). This is just like the government saying unemployment is 8% when in fact its closer to 18%-20% when you include those who have stopped looking for work, are working less than they were, or have stopped receiving unemployment benefits. Any survey or blanket assumption that most PA hunters think ARs are great and work, is completely false and inaccurate.

http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=596054&mode=2

If you read my post, it contains reason and biological facts from multiple different articles written by biologists, and they mirror what we see on our 25 acres that butts up to state game land. When you take away the hunters ability to manage their own deer, you get what I described - a total nightmare of our herd. I am an Ohio resident property owner and I don't have any AR and the deer eat the same thing as they do on our property in PA and Ohio has better quality deer and therefore bigger antlers, PA has ARs and it hurts the quality of the herd as a whole (I will repeat what I said above, again below).

To your other point, although I do agree that killing a button buck (which does happen out of mistake) isn't good, doe hunting is great. It's a necessity to manage the herd. So I think that we can agree on. But, when you say that you aren't sure how ARs cause less deer sightings, it should say that it causes less BUCK sightings. I hope that's what you meant because I don't want people confusing deer as a collective with bucks. There might be more does, but there are less shootable bucks because like I said before (which you may have missed), if people can only kill 6 and 8 pointers (depending on WMU), people are shooting bucks the first year that buck is legal. This does two things, it doesn't really help improve the quality or number of big bucks and it leaves only the small anterled bucks to breed with the does, creating a less quality herd, and therefore fewer shootable bucks for the future. This isn't an argument, it's a biological fact. The PGC has done an excellent job of taking bits and pieces of biological studies and sold it to hunters as a way to improve deer hunting, but all it has done has made people stop hunting and put a blanket deer management program on people who could have done it themselves. Don't forget, a trophy deer is what the hunter thinks it is, not what some regulatory bylaw from a government body says it is. To me, a trophy is one that I can eat, not limited to one with antlers. Either way, no one can refute the fact that there are less hunters in PA, and it all started in 2002 when they instituted the AR and there are less deer being taken because there are less shootable deer. The number of deer hunters and trend of harvest reports speak for themselves...

2009-10: 308,920
2008-09: 335,850
2007-08: 323,070
2006-07: 361,560
2005-06: 354,390
2004-05: 409,320
2003-04: 464,890
2002-03: 517,529
2001-02: 486,014
2000-01: 504,600