ORIGINAL: VT_Hunter1980
ORIGINAL: rybohunter
Of course the winters are probably a huge limiting factor.
Then you don't have a huge carrying capacity.
Then why is it that places like Minnesota and the northern penisula of Michigan also have tough winters, but much better deer herds?
Apparently, it wasn't always this way in Vermont. My father, and most other old timers, tell me stories of seeing up to 20 deer in a day of hunting. I usually see a doe or two every other season. What happened to result in such a downward spiral?
I know Vermont will never have the seemingly limitless amount of deer that places like PA and TX seem to have, but we can certainly accomodate a lot more deer than we have now.
My father hunted VT too during the "golden years" late 50's, and the 60's. He watched the hunting crash in the 1970's. First off,you have tounderstand that the habitat in VT was different back then. Many sheep and dairy farms had closed and their clearings started to grow into slash and sapling which offer prime deer habitat, and lots of winter browse to carry them through the winter. This allowed for better carrying capacity.This bagain in the 1940's and peaked about the mid 60's. The problem was, the deer (doe)populationswhere way too high, and the habitat started to decline rapidly. The late 60's had a huge herd die off, at least in my dads areas. Plus many of the remaining winterhabitat was decimated that did not allow for a hefty rebound in numbers, and the hunting declined. Now allot of that habitat has grown up substationally to mature forests. The same cover that could hold 25-30 deer per sq mile in 1960, may only be able to hold 4-5 deer PSM now. Its a completely different ballgame.
Deer can survive hefty winters if a quality food source is there. VT's mature forest these days cannot hold those numbers anymore. Places with cold winters like MN or even Saskatchewan can maintain high densities because the habitat is there to sustain it.