DougE

You specifically said there wasn't alot of pressure in your area.Despite having bonus tags,the deer population continued to rise throughout the 90's as evidenced by the increased antlered kill.I'm not trying to attack your hunting skills and I believe that you scout.However,why would you scout an area,find little sign and then hunt there anyway?I hear alot of people say that and I just fail to understand that line of reasoning.There's alot of places that I don't hunt in a given year because there's little sign.That doesn't mean that hunters killed all the deer in that areathough.

Hunters were not more choosey back in the 70's and 80's.Most killed the first legal deer they saw in their scope.That's why we killed more than 75% of our 1.5 years olds each year.The PGC now gives hunters two weeks to take their time andbe more selective.A 3 day doe season would ruin that.

There is no doubt that we have less deer today but that was the plan.We killed record numbers of antlerless deerand we had twoback to back winters that severly impacted fawn recruitment.Habitat conditions have played a huge role in our declining deer population.That problem in starting to get better so why take deer management in the other direction?

I shoot several deer every year and I'll continue to do so.I'm not one of the one's complaining about no deer though.I''ve had alot ofopening days where I only saw 5 or 6 deer.I hunted in Susquehanna county this past opening day in an area that was loaded with deer.I was on my buddy's property and they only hunt the perimeter,sitting from morning till dark.He promised I'd see deer all day but I ended up seeing one doe with a fawn.On my home that night,there were deer all over the place so just because I only saw two deer,that doesn't mean there weren't anyway.That was actually the worstfirst day I've ever had and there's 3 to 4 times as many deer out there than there is where I hunt in 2G.Sometimes you see them and some times you don't.I don't expect to see 30+ deer on the first day of deer season and anyone that does is purely selfish.

Hunters need to embrace the idea of helping the habitat instead of expecting instant gratification.