Pa hunters:part II
07-19-2010, 05:28 AM
#2
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 2,262
Sure,I'll give you an answer.Yes I do venture out of 2g from time to time.I use 2G as an example because that unit has the lowest deer densities in the entire state.It's not that bad here unless you hunt in horrible habitat it it can't be any worse in any other unit.As a matter of fact,I hunted bear in 4D a few years ago.I don't know the name of the game lands but we accessed it from rt 350 in sandy ridge.I hunted with about 20 guys that day and we killed four bear on the same drive.The entire day with 20 guys pushing,we saw a total of like 6 deer.The first thing I noticed was the lack of browse.There simply was very little for the deer to eat other than the corn that was planted on the game lands.I fully expected most of the guys to be complaining about the lack of deer but I didn't hear a single negative comment.Most of them were locals and they all saw a huge decrease in deer sightings after the winter of 2004.A couple of them claimed that they found alot of dead deer during the springs of 2003 and 2004 when they were trapping beavers.If deer were dying,fawn recruitment also took a huge dive and that's all habitat related.
I also hunt in 3b and 3c and the story is similar there.Both of those units are largely private land so access is fairly restricted.My brother owns 39 acres in Wyoming county that's bordered by another 500 acres that he has access to.He's seen a big decline in deer numbers over the years and that area gets practically no pressure.I'm willing to be not three deer are killed each year on that property.Once again,tehre were huge deer numbers for a long time and now the only thing regenerating,and it's actually taking over is autum olive.
About 20 minutes north of that,my buddy has several hundred acres in Susquehanna county as does his father and brother.They shoot very few doe and let very people hunt.At one time,it was nothing according him to see 80-100 deer on the first day of deer season.He's been bugging me for years to come up and hunt with him so I've gone up twice in the apst 5-6 years.Things are alot different than they used to be up there.Alot of the fields which were once loaded with crops are now just overgrown fields.This area is all agriculture and northern hardwoods.There wasn't an oak tree to be found.All of the field edges were browsed and there was literally nothing for the deer to eat in the woods.He had some timbering done and the only thing that made it past the deer was beech and some striped maple.It was terrible habitat and the deer numbers showed it.There were still deer but nothing like 20 years ago and they were never overharvested.Funny thing is,he thinks because he has a few acres of foodplots,the habitat is good.
I also hunt in 3b and 3c and the story is similar there.Both of those units are largely private land so access is fairly restricted.My brother owns 39 acres in Wyoming county that's bordered by another 500 acres that he has access to.He's seen a big decline in deer numbers over the years and that area gets practically no pressure.I'm willing to be not three deer are killed each year on that property.Once again,tehre were huge deer numbers for a long time and now the only thing regenerating,and it's actually taking over is autum olive.
About 20 minutes north of that,my buddy has several hundred acres in Susquehanna county as does his father and brother.They shoot very few doe and let very people hunt.At one time,it was nothing according him to see 80-100 deer on the first day of deer season.He's been bugging me for years to come up and hunt with him so I've gone up twice in the apst 5-6 years.Things are alot different than they used to be up there.Alot of the fields which were once loaded with crops are now just overgrown fields.This area is all agriculture and northern hardwoods.There wasn't an oak tree to be found.All of the field edges were browsed and there was literally nothing for the deer to eat in the woods.He had some timbering done and the only thing that made it past the deer was beech and some striped maple.It was terrible habitat and the deer numbers showed it.There were still deer but nothing like 20 years ago and they were never overharvested.Funny thing is,he thinks because he has a few acres of foodplots,the habitat is good.
Last edited by DougE; 07-19-2010 at 06:47 AM.
07-19-2010, 11:33 AM
#3
Typical Buck
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: manassas va USA
Posts: 614
Well,,,im not gonna speak for any area outside the area that i hunt,,,but i can tell ya one thing for sure,,,browse schmowse,,,the area that i speak of is thousands of acres of corn,,,oats,,,soybeans,,etc..... every acre of land in that area is and always has had a crop in it,,that is not mountain ground! those deer always had plenty to eat and they never died off because of a lack of nutrition,,,,they died off because of an over abundance of antlerless tags allocated every year that those greedy hunters participated in HR,,,not only did they shoot em in hunting season but they shot em all summer long in the name of crop damage(red tagging) I grew up there,,,the 1st 18 yrs of my life,,,,i know every inch of most of that land there and never did i ever think that it would come down to this pathetic situation,,,i hunted 55 hrs on stand wide awake the 1st week of gun season last year and i saw 3 deer the 1st day,,,two small legal bucks and a doe,,,that was it,,done not another deer the rest of the week,,,plenty of habitat,,,plenty of crops,,,just a lack of deer
07-19-2010, 01:39 PM
#4
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 2,262
I never claimed that the deer died off from lack of nutrition.However,they won't be there unless there's sufficient habitat in the wintering areas.That habitat has to have high quality prefered browse.Cultivated crops do very little for deer during winter,especially when it's covered with snow.
So you're basing your whole opinion on what's on a relatively small piece of Pa.I'm basing mine on what I see in three different counties in 2G,where there's supposedly no deer as well as two different WMU in the northeast part of the state.I live very close to where 2G,2E,2F AND 2D all come together.Every area has places where there's few deer and every area has alot of places on public land where there's more than enough.It all comes down to habitat.Unfortunately,once that habitat gets as degraded as it is in mnay places,it doesn't take a whole lot of deer to continually impact it.
The bottom line is,Pa had way too many deer for way too long and the habitat suffered greatly as a result.It's not even debatable.
It's interesting that you feel agriculture should be responsible to feed large numbers of deer.Obviously,if farmers are red tagging their properties,they'd rather not be responsible to fund your hobby at their expense.You want to say that deer aren't doing any damage,yet you say the farmers still feel the need to red tag their properties.
I can take you to vast areas in 2G where you'd be lucky to find a few deer tracks.It's not because there was an overharvest either.Most of these places are remote enough that you'd have a hard time finding any boot prints.The deer aren't there because the habitat is crap from decades of overbrowsing.
So you're basing your whole opinion on what's on a relatively small piece of Pa.I'm basing mine on what I see in three different counties in 2G,where there's supposedly no deer as well as two different WMU in the northeast part of the state.I live very close to where 2G,2E,2F AND 2D all come together.Every area has places where there's few deer and every area has alot of places on public land where there's more than enough.It all comes down to habitat.Unfortunately,once that habitat gets as degraded as it is in mnay places,it doesn't take a whole lot of deer to continually impact it.
The bottom line is,Pa had way too many deer for way too long and the habitat suffered greatly as a result.It's not even debatable.
It's interesting that you feel agriculture should be responsible to feed large numbers of deer.Obviously,if farmers are red tagging their properties,they'd rather not be responsible to fund your hobby at their expense.You want to say that deer aren't doing any damage,yet you say the farmers still feel the need to red tag their properties.
I can take you to vast areas in 2G where you'd be lucky to find a few deer tracks.It's not because there was an overharvest either.Most of these places are remote enough that you'd have a hard time finding any boot prints.The deer aren't there because the habitat is crap from decades of overbrowsing.
Last edited by DougE; 07-19-2010 at 01:43 PM.
07-20-2010, 11:46 AM
#5
Typical Buck
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: manassas va USA
Posts: 614
DougE:
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
07-20-2010, 03:02 PM
#7
Spike
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Long Island,NY
Posts: 37
DougE:
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
07-20-2010, 03:31 PM
#8
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 2,262
DougE:
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
I do base my opinions on a relatively small piece of Pa. and i feel that in order to magage wildlife in Pa. correctly the pgc has to base their opinions the same way! There is no way in hell that the pgc can manage deer under the current wmu's,,,their too big and way too many different habitat situations to do it that way,,,and whats more is there are way too many different types of hunters,,,hunters see things one way in one area and a totally different way in another area,,,5 miles down the road. HR was put into place to thin the herd,,and with the restrictions that the pgc put on hunters for 50+ years on the #'s of deer allowed to be taken they knew damn good and well that if they put the tags out there to be bought those tags would be sold and filled. Now,,,were in our what 8th year(?) of this so called habitat revitalization program,,,we still have no habitat and whats more,,we have no deer,,,whats eating our habitat?werewolves,,,bigfoot,,,,coyotes???? you tell me,,,,killin off the deer did **** to help anything as a matter of fact it made things a whole lot worse,,,this same area of 4d that i mention is 90% amish,,,who have a free for all deer killin season year round,,,now,,,it's the talk of the clan when they see a deer and when they do see a deer they mean to kill it.STILL NO HABITAT! I currently live in northern va. this place is unreal with deer,,,,there is NO HABITAT here,,,nothing but flowers planted around houses and this place still has more deer than i could have ever thought possible,,ever,,,,and ya know what,,i see some of the biggest,,heaviest,,and widest racked bucks a man could ever hope to shoot,,show me how your habitat theory holds up to that!
First of all,you can't compare urban deer in Virginia to deer in Pa.The growing seasons aren't the smae and neither are the food sources.I live in a private residential community in 2G.It's over 14 square miles with about 1800 homes,2 golf courses and a couple of lakes.No hunting was allowed on the property up until 4 years ago(Thanks to me I might add)and the deer herd was out of control.Myself and two others formed a committee to deal with the problem and get hunting permitted on the property.The two other guys were foresters from the US forest service and DCNR.We got biologists and foresters from PSU to help us assess the habitat and the deer population.We set up 8 miles of transect lines where we do annual pellet count and browse impact surveys.Our browse imapact surveys showed that 75% of the property had no regeneration.Of the regeneration that was present,75% of it consisted of non-prefered worthless species that did no good for the deer.Fifty nine percent of that was moderately to severly browsed.That's an ecological disaster waiting to happen.Still,the deer continue to recruit fawns becasue of several reasons.One,the deer have 1800 homes to eat the landscaping from.Two,people feed them all winter.Three,we usually have a pretty good mast crop in the residential areas.Four,thousands of acres have been timbered which leaves tons of food in the form of downed tops.Still,most deer are small and fawn recruitment is poor when we have a bad winter.That isn't the case in most contiguous forested habitats.I have trail cam pictures from 2004 with almost no fawns.Once a doe loses 20-25% of her body weight,the chance of her fawns surviving is extremely low.A deer needs about 3-5 lbs of high quality browse to survive winter.Without that browse,they lose weight and theres an extremely high mortality rate for the fawns.It's all about the habitat and in the northwoods,it's all about good over winter habitat.
You claim there hasn't been improvements with the habitat and I claim you're 110% wrong.The evidence is evident all over the place.I can show you a mid level understory that never existed before in many places.DCNR IS FENCING LESS AND LESS EVERY YEAR.I can show you places where the 2-5 year old oak regeneration is so thick,it looks like mountain laurel.I can also show you dozens of exclosures where nothing grew out side the fences.I can also show you a 70 acre shelterwood exclosure where three deer got in and wiped out every single oak seedling that they could reach.I can show you another clearcut on SGL 44 that failed in 1990 and turned into a meadow.Six years later,over a dozen small exclosures were erected and now you can't walk through them.Sorry man but the deer did a real number on the habitat in Pa and it's vital to fix the problem.It's documented,proven beyond any doubt and not debatable.One thing that you have to realize is that it doesn't take many deer to devistate habitat that's poor to begin with.Put 4 cows in a lush 10 acre pasture and they may not have to be moved.Put 2 in a 10 acres pasture that's already overgrazed and you still have too mnay cows in that pasture.That's what we're faced with in many areas.On top of that,the overbrowsing was so bad in mnay areas that there isn't even a seed source anymore.Do a google on hobblebush and see what you come up with.Hobblebush was a shade tolerant shrub that was an excellent deer browse.At one time,it was all over the northern tier but the deer ate it out of existence.That's what deer do.They eat the more prefered species first and then junk starts to take over,making the problem worse. All those ferns you see,the deer are directly responsible for that.They impact the habitat on so many levels it's scary.
It would be nice to have smaller units but that really isn't possible.The reporting rate for the harvest is so poor that they can't get sufficient data to manage for smaller areas.The whole reason for larger units was so they could pull data that was insufficient because the vast majority of hunters were too lazy to mail in a self-addressed postage paid report card.
07-21-2010, 03:59 PM
#9
Spike
Join Date: Feb 2010
Posts: 30
How did The PA forest provide for a large deer population for so many years? When I first started hunting, I would see 30-40 deer a day and never saw starving and dying deer. I've hunted 4D for 20 years now and the pgc has ruined deer hunting for years to come in my area. There is food in the form of tons of acorns, honey locust pods, and other browse that deer eat. I spend alot of time in the woods at various times of the year and I see alot of food thats not getting eaten. I spent all day the first saturday of rifle walking from sun up till 3pm. Me and my brother split and used gps and walked the whole mountain. It snowed that morning and you know how many sets of tracks we crossed? 2. Thats it. How am I supposed to get my kids involved when you might set for a week and see a couple of deer? I have been preached to about the lack of food to the point where it sickens me. This is the reason there are so many angry hunters(lack of deer). Some how the forest magically sustained the population years ago. Now were told that there is no food even for a couple of deer. We are tired of all this crap. I'm happy to see a step in the right direction with 10000 less tags for my unit as well as no doe in the first week. I also would like to add that the management units are too big. 4D is a good example. What I see in my mountain is totally different from farm land around state college. The system has not worked and there is 8 years of a dwindling population to prove it.
07-21-2010, 06:05 PM
#10
Typical Buck
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Carbon County Pa.
Posts: 601
When I first started hunting in the early 70s I would never see more than 5-6 deer a season. Didn't record my first kill till several years of hunting. IMO if a kid need to see 30-40 deer a day to maintain an interest in hunting they need to find a new hobbie.