You simply don't have clue what you are talking about. WMU 2G was already below it's goal of 15 DPSM in 1999 and by 2003 it was down to 12 DPSM. The reason the PGC didn't reduce the allocations in 2004 is because they wanted to reduce the herd even more, because they still weren't getting the desired regeneration of commercially valuable trees.

21001
7

Table 2. Winter deer density goals and estimated winter densities from Jan
1999 through Jan 2003 for Pennsylvania. Wildlife Management Unit (WMU) 5D
is excluded due to limited harvest data.
Post-hunt deer density estimate (Jan)b
WMU Goala 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003
1A 9 20 23 23 24 26
1B 12 22 25 25 25 25
2A 13 36 39 38 37 36
2B 10 24 26 28 28 30
2C 15 23 26 27 30 31
2D 14 31 33 31 31 29
2E 14 25 26 25 25 24
2F 17 27 30 28 27 24
2G 15 14 15 14 13 12
3A 15 23 26 28 30 31
3B 13 21 24 26 28 29
3C 14 24 27 28 28 28
3D 13 16 19 21 22 23
4A 15 25 28 28 29 30
4B 11 20 23 24 27 29
4C 12 20 23 24 25 26
4D 14 20 23 22 23 24
4E 11 19 21 22 23 23
5A 8 14 16 18 19 21
5B 5 13 15 16 17 17
5C 6 17 18 19 19 19
aEstimated population density that can be supported during winter without
over-browsing forest habitats, estimated from forest composition data.
bMinimum deer density estimates derived from simulation modeling.


Furthermore, here is what the experts had to say about the effects of the winter of 1993 when we had record snowfalls, a record 90 days of continuous snow cover and record cold temperatures.

" Deer losses were light because a bumper acorn crop last fall allowed the deer to go into winter in EXCELLENT condition. Also, deer densities have been moving closer to the goals we set. We've been particularly successful in areas such as the Northcentral, a region of historically high winter mortality."

In the same article the experts predicted the 1994 harvest would reduce the statewide herd from 29 DPFSM to 27 or 28 DPFSM.

So once again, the truth prevails and your claims are debunked.

Been to Maine -a lot.
The fauana in Northern Maine is so thick and so many miles deep in many places one could NEVER shoot it out with any allocation of permits. There are many places there where we chase the Bear dogs for miles without crossing even a log road. If you havent tried to walk through it you cannot imagine. And YES there is deer sign throughout. Having hunted most all of PA at one time or another there is no comparison whatsoever.
  Similar scenario up in Nova Scotia. There is no basis of comparison. Even in far Northern NY State the difference is recognized  by allowing one to field dress out in the woods , since it is so improbable that one could drag a deer out from the real  BIG woods. Few guys would even attempt to go to those places-cant even get your AAAYYYYTTTTVVV through that stuff. We all know most hunters dont travel more than a couple of hundred years from a road.

Retired guy, my point was that Maine regularly loses large portions of their deer herd quite often due to the harsh winter conditions. And it doesnt have anything to do with poor habitat or too high of a deer population, because for the most part maine has very low deer densities to begin with.

Poorer habitat would no doubt result in MORE mortality, but thats not been the case here. The level of mortality has been very low for the mostpart.

Only thing that has limited OUR herd in most areas is the bazillion doe tags (going over a million previously!!!!) of the past, and the fact many areas still have FAR too many.

ORIGINAL: wayne c

The Biologists and the Board of Commissioners sitting at that time were intelligent enough to know that when you are experiencing winter mortality it the deer herd telling you that there are too many deer for the existing habitat.

Wrong. First the part about the previous board being smart was absolutely hilarious. Second, In extreme years, some level of mortality is absolutely to be expected. The very young, the weak, and adult bucks worn down from the rut are the first to go. There will be some level of mortality and/or effect to recruitment is such a year and it doesnt matter if you have 10 dpsm or 30. That is true in good habitat as well. When snow lays long and is deep, its a done deal. You dont manage a deer herd for severe years weather based on minimal losses. Thats absurd. If Maine did that, they shoot every deer they had and been done with it.

I like how you pointed to the deer & deer hunting article you suggest others read, yet ignore the fact that the article basically stated that loss during extreme conditions is a normal occurrence. And certainly didnt imply that any losses, no matter the conditions, was a sign of overpopulation or exceeding cc.

 
I totally agree that in most years some winter mortality is normal and also agree that the winter affects have an influence on the annual fawn recruitment rates. I am glad you recognizing that fact since I have been trying to hunters to understand both of those points for decades.
 
I am also glad you read the “Deer & Deer Hunting” article. Even though I’m not so sure you fully understood all of the implications concerning the reasons for a population crash the article alluded to it appears that at least you understood that deer population are a normal event brought on by natural environmental conditions instead of JUST hunters shooting too many deer.
 
We are making headway here because I have never been able to get most of you to acknowledge that fact in the past and instead blamed any decline in deer densities on too many doe license and hunters killing too many deer.
 
Congratulations you are becoming a bit more educated in the realities of how nature works after all.
 
R.S. Bodenhorn

"I totally agree that in most years some winter mortality is normal and also agree that the winter affects have an influence on the annual fawn recruitment rates. I am glad you recognizing that fact since I have been trying to hunters to understand both of those points for decades. "

Rsb, no need for excitement. And i am and have always been well connected to the natural world and how it works, having had a very strong interest since very young, and its always gone far beyond what tree im gonna sit in. And this is no new-found revelation for me. In fact ive brought it up many times, and for many years, whenever someone points to one or two isolated incidents of previously late born fawns that were found dead in February, its not exactly sign of the apocolypse for our habitat which is exactly what pgc supporters contend each and every time it arises.

"We are making headway here because I have never been able to get most of you to acknowledge that fact in the past and instead blamed any decline in deer densities on too many doe license and hunters killing too many deer."

Actually thats far from the case. Because the allocations take into account the PREseason herd according to rosenberry. Thats what he said when asked about losses due to predation from coyotes etc... Also there is no way to overlook the effect of over a million tags previously, and the huge allocations that continue, even though the herd has been reduced.

2002/2003 and 2003/2004 are a different matter entirely though

That doesnt ring a bell. There were no two bad winters in a row at least not down here.

It also doesnt explain the modern day low herd size 7 or 8 years later.

ORIGINAL: wayne c

I guess maybe you didn’t grasp what you just read or posted about the natural deer population crashes from the “Deer & Deer Hunting” article after all, even though just a few posts prior you indicated such crashes were normal.

No i didnt. I didnt call it "crash". You're putting words in my mouth, and i didnt comment on the concept of a "crash" but instead on the basic issues of any amount of loss. Big difference chief. I referred to normal minimal losses. The only "crash" experienced in Pa was due to over a million tags. I believe crashes do occur in areas of extremely poor habitat where carrying capacity is also exceeded in localized area where that night exist, or areas with very extreme winters far worse than our own, such as those high percentage documented losses in Maine.

Isn’t this your quote from just a short time ago?

quote:


“I like how you pointed to the deer & deer hunting article you suggest others read, yet ignore the fact that the article basically stated that loss during extreme conditions is a normal occurrence.”

Yes. And i havent said anything different since. You are attempting to distort my position...To use my position as something it isnt and never had been. You are inferring the "losses" i speak of have been significant enough, and often enough to have brought our deer herd to the level it is today. That has never been, nor will it ever be my position.

"You need to make up your mind and pick a direction you want to argue from and toward. Or, are you one of those that jumps from one side of the fence to the other depending on what best suits you at the moment."

The fact you have to ASK that question after all this time says alot about the fact you havent seen me do so in the past. And im pretty certain you're aware thats not even close to the case now. What is, is your intent to decieve. Nothing new there either. You are trying to support your positon with something that doesnt... Natural mortality is only to be expected. Ive seen you on another board preach about how any deer found dead was a sign of eminent doom PERIOD, when such stories or pics etc. were posted by pgc drones... Now you admit its not the case?... Someones flip flopping alright, and it aint me. lmao.

 
Antlerless allocations are irrelevant when all you are doing is showing antlerless harvest trends as we were previously debating. However, antlerless allocations do become totally relevant if you want to see if they are influencing the reason the antlerless harvests are increasing or decreasing or look for a change in hunter success rates.
 
For those reasons and to show everyone what REALLY caused the harvest declines I am going to post the antlerless allocations, the antlerless harvest and also the buck harvest for the same years. I will also post the number of antlerless license it took to get one antlerless deer harvested each of those years. After I post that data I will point out a few of the trends I see and what they most likely mean.
 
All data is for the heart of unit 2G (Elk, Cameron and Clinton Counties) and expressed in license or harvests per square mile of landmass. Antler restrictions started in 2002 as noted by the * after the buck harvest that year. From 2003 on the data is from the WMU 2G license and harvest data per square mile of landmass.
 
Year…….Allocation…………ant’less harvest………..buck harvest…….license/harvest 
85………..10.23………………….3.27………………….2.98……………..3.12
86………..13.16………………….3.18………………….4.11……………..4.14
87………..15.42………………….3.85………………….4.20……………..4.00
88………..17.43………………….5.88………………….4.18……………..2.97
89………..18.00………………….5.62………………….3.72……………..3.20
90………..17.38………………….5.00………………….3.02……………..3.47
91………..13.63………………….3.52………………….2.65……………..3.88
92…………6.99………………….1.96………………….2.95……………..3.57
93…………7.16………………….2.31………………….2.84……………..3.10
94…………9.02………………….3.16………………….2.99……………..2.85
95…………9.02………………….3.66………………….3.01……………..2.47
96………..10.20………………….2.38………………….2.28……………..4.29
97…………6.00………………….2.34………………….2.81……………..2.56
98…………7.65………………….2.03………………….2.63……………..3.76
99…………7.65………………….1.86………………….3.13……………..4.11
00…………7.20………………….2.65………………….2.96……………..2.72
01…………8.22………………….2.67………………….2.82……………..3.08
02………..12.90………………….4.18………………….2.42 *…………...3.09
03………..12.64………………….4.95………………….2.46……………..2.55
04………..12.64………………….2.58………………….1.60……………..4.91
05…………7.05………………….1.51………………….1.22……………..4.68
06…………4.62………………….1.12………………….1.75……………..4.13
07…………6.32………………….1.60………………….1.24……………..3.94
08…………6.32………………….2.21………………….1.63……………..2.86
09…………6.32………………….1.02………………….1.26……………..6.19
10…………3.70………………….N/A…………………..N/A…………….N/A
 
Now I am going to point out the trends I see from this data while interjecting some of the other points I am familiar with concerning antlerless allocations and their declining trends.
 
First of all it can be noted that 1986 –1991 were the years with the highest antlerless deer allocations in recent history for the area. It can also be noted that the buck harvests were at their highest during those years. That is an indication that the populations were at their peek during that time period with those indications of increasing deer populations being the reason for the increased antlerless allocations. That is how deer management is intended to work, when you see increasing population trend you take steps to allow more hunting opportunities to bring that population back into balance with the habitat. It also appears that the attempt to reduce the deer herd was working since the buck harvests had started to decline slightly from the peek years.
 
By 1991, with allowing hunters to buy unsold antlerless license (called bonus license at that time) and some hunters harvesting two antlerless deer, the public and political outcry of “stop killing all the deer” was once again becoming the rally cry across the northern tier. It worked and the allocations were drastically reduced as is noted in the years beginning and following 1992. Even though reducing the antlerless harvests and saving more deer should increase your buck harvests if indeed your deer population makes any significant increase you might notice that there was no significant increase in the buck harvests when the antlerless allocations and doe harvests declined. Instead of increasing the buck harvests remained relatively flat.
 
It can also be noted that the hunter success rates (the number of license to harvest one antlerless deer) had some significant fluctuations from easy to harvest to hard to harvest years. Often those high and low fluctuations were from one year to the next so that might very well be the influence poor hunting conditions could have on a short three day doe season creating a poor success rate that year that is made up for the next year with it being easier to find and harvest a doe once again. Another factor that can influence hunter success rates based on license sales can be dependant on how many hunters buy an antlerless license with no intentions of using it because they believe they are saving the deer herd by doing so.
 
You can also see how the deer harvest data simply crashed in the fall of 2004 following the second of the two back to back harsh winters.
 
But, in my opinion the most significant thing a person can see from this data is that reducing antlerless licenses and harvesting fewer antlerless deer, even repeatedly over nearly two decades, has not resulted in having an increase in the buck harvest or any long term increase in deer numbers. In fact all of the evidence indicates that exactly the opposite of that has occurred with naturally declining deer populations even while hunters are continuously harvesting fewer and fewer does.
 
From what I can see what really happened with fewer doe license is that hunters had fewer opportunities to hunt, businesses had fewer hunters coming to hunt because they couldn’t get an antlerless license, more hunters shifted to hunting down state where they could get a license, fewer deer were harvested, more habitat damage occurred from carrying more deer through the winter, fawn recruitment rates declined from carrying too many deer through the winter, fall deer populations remained stagnant instead of increasing and then finally in the deer population crash following the back to back harsh winters of 2002 – 2004.
 
R.S. Bodenhorn           

But, in my opinion the most significant thing a person can see from this data is that reducing antlerless licenses and harvesting fewer antlerless deer, even repeatedly over nearly two decades, has not resulted in having an increase in the buck harvest or any long term increase in deer numbers. In fact all of the evidence indicates that exactly the opposite of that has occurred with naturally declining deer populations even while hunters are continuously harvesting fewer and fewer does.

Apparently you still can't comprehend the simple fact that after several years of antlerless harvests that exceed recruitment it takes fewer tags and lower harvests to reduce the herd even more. You obviously ignored the quote I posted that said the reduced allocation in 1994 was still expected to reduce the herd by 5%. If your theory was correct the populations in the NC counties should have never increased after the crash in the late 70's, because the habitat never had a chance to recover from the severe overbrowsing by over 40 DPSM. But herd did recover and increased to over 30 DPFSM in Elk Co. That fact alone proves that your claim that the habitat is controlling the herd now at 8 DPSM is pure hogwash.

Apparently you still can't comprehend the simple fact that after several years of antlerless harvests that exceed recruitment it takes fewer tags and lower harvests to reduce the herd even more.

Thats too easy deerfly. How can you apply common sense and simplify it in such a way, when we all know it takes a rocket scientist to figure this all out? lol.

To Summerize
1. We should listen to the PGC biologists----Except when RSB tells us something different in which case we are to believe him
2. We should believe in the science and research----Except when it counterdicts what RSB is telling us.
3. The Deer Management Plan contains good factual information------except when RSB says it is useless and means nothing
4. The PGC says as many as 23,000 deer died as a result of the winter of 1994. It was the worse since 1978. RSB says the reason we had so many deer in the 90' was all the good mast and real mild winters through the 90's.
5. The PGC did mortality counts each year on 855 miles of stream bottoms for decades to build scientific data of relative severity of winters and their impact on the deer herd. Wildlife Biologists Bill Sharp said the surveys are used as indicators of total mortalities.
6. RSB says they are useless and won't bother to post them even though they could confirm everything he has been claiming and embarrass some posters on here who are calling him untruthful.
7. Why would RSB miss an opportunity like that?

ORIGINAL: deerfly

But, in my opinion the most significant thing a person can see from this data is that reducing antlerless licenses and harvesting fewer antlerless deer, even repeatedly over nearly two decades, has not resulted in having an increase in the buck harvest or any long term increase in deer numbers. In fact all of the evidence indicates that exactly the opposite of that has occurred with naturally declining deer populations even while hunters are continuously harvesting fewer and fewer does.

Apparently you still can't comprehend the simple fact that after several years of antlerless harvests that exceed recruitment it takes fewer tags and lower harvests to reduce the herd even more. You obviously ignored the quote I posted that said the reduced allocation in 1994 was still expected to reduce the herd by 5%. If your theory was correct the populations in the NC counties should have never increased after the crash in the late 70's, because the habitat never had a chance to recover from the severe overbrowsing by over 40 DPSM. But herd did recover and increased to over 30 DPFSM in Elk Co. That fact alone proves that your claim that the habitat is controlling the herd now at 8 DPSM is pure hogwash.
 
I figure it is you who can’t seem to comprehend the reality of the matter.
 
If the deer population hasn’t increased with twenty years of significantly reduced antlerless harvests I would think any logical person would have to conclude there is something other than hunter harvests playing to the BIGGER picture.
 
R.S. Bodenhorn

ORIGINAL: S-10

To Summerize
1. We should listen to the PGC biologists----Except when RSB tells us something different in which case we are to believe him
2. We should believe in the science and research----Except when it counterdicts what RSB is telling us.
3. The Deer Management Plan contains good factual information------except when RSB says it is useless and means nothing
4. The PGC says as many as 23,000 deer died as a result of the winter of 1994. It was the worse since 1978. RSB says the reason we had so many deer in the 90' was all the good mast and real mild winters through the 90's.
5. The PGC did mortality counts each year on 855 miles of stream bottoms for decades to build scientific data of relative severity of winters and their impact on the deer herd. Wildlife Biologists Bill Sharp said the surveys are used as indicators of total mortalities.
6. RSB says they are useless and won't bother to post them even though they could confirm everything he has been claiming and embarrass some posters on here who are calling him untruthful.
7. Why would RSB miss an opportunity like that?

I expected a little more class, S-10.

Ironhed

What you can’t think of anything intelligent to post you just launch into a personal credibility attack?

I figure I have defeated your position if that is all you have left in your battle plan.

RSB, Thats not what ive seen at all... In fact he was basically calling you out so you would provide something you claim exists to actually back your position for a change, yet you refused to do so.

Now these posts calling out s-10 are nothing more than diversion tactics to avoid addressing the real issue. Typical.

-Btw, what happened to my pic?

    You guys turn every post on this entire Forum  into the exact same fight with the same people saying the same stuff about PA and each other over and over and over and over and over-- Im DONE--Made no difference what post I put this on cause its the same few doing the same thing on them all- Could be talking about frogs in Minnesota and in a day or so same old same old.
   BTW where does it say reserved for PA anywhere on the Forum -no wonder nobody else is involved- its disgusting.
    Dont see how the heck most of you can possibly enjoy Hunting,  or anyone with you for that matter -- Therapy boys -lots of it too.

He has said the same or worse on every board I've ever seen him on to anyone who questioned his claims so I guess there is no reason to expect anything different from him on here. By his reasoning the village must be the size of New York. I've yet to get a broken bone from having a word thrown at me so I figure it's just a poor reflection on the person making the statement.