But my well has water and yours don't means you are a liar? I think it does compare to what they stated above.
There you go, now I can certainly seewhere and how your intelligence level can be rated.
Ireally don’t know why you would drag up a news release that says there are fewer deer in some parts of the state. That is pretty much a no-brainer. No one would even dispute that fact, but that most certainly doesn’t answer the questions about why there are those differences n deer densities. That is what I am trying to help people recognize and understand. Many people are just like you and have this mind set that any deer population reductionsmust have been created by hunter over harvestsyet they have absolutely no data to support that opinion. They don’t have data to support that opinion because that opinion is incorrect and all of the real deer data proves that over harvestopinion is actually wrong. Yet many hunter insist on hanging onto that opinion no matter what thereal facts are.
Now I will try once again to help you, and the others with your mind set, understand some of the factors of evidence that prove that hunters have not over harvested the deer and that over harvest is not the reason we have areas with fewer deer today.
First I will tell you right up front that, YES, there are differences in the number of deer across the various areas of the state. There always have been and there always will be. The variances from one area to another result from any number of variables that include differences in the soil types, the amount of forest opening, the tree species composition and where it is located in relation to other habitats, the amount of normaland annual or abnormal snow fall and also not the least of which how long the deer population was too large for the available habitat in any particular area and how much damage might have occurred to the food supply over a variable number of years or decades.
Some of those variables can be somewhat controlled and some of the previous mistakes, of allowing too many deer for too long, can be somewhat corrected. But, other differences such as the fact that some areas have rich fertile soil, to grow good plant and deer browse species, while other areas have no top soil and are covered with rocks and no plants or browse species can never be changed.With those variables people with a lick of sense should be able to figure out there will also be major differences in the number of deer the land can support, orhow many deer they will see, from one area to another. Unless we can train deer to be healthy, and produce lots of fawns, by eating rocks some areas will just never have as many deer. People should be able to figure that out by simply applying a little common sense.
And how many years prior to the above have they been giving out multiple tags? Of course the harvest will be higher over the years. But that will soon decline with multiple tags. It use to be one doe tag. Now it's 2 tags plus that hunters can recieve. So yes the dear increase will be shown. But like I said. It won't be like that long with the multiple doe tags. You will see a huge decline as you have in other counties.
Your thought process on the reasons for and what happens more tags is not at all correct either. Now I will explain how your thinking concerning antlerless license numbers is flawed.
Back just a few decades pretty much all of the state’s deer hunters had to come uphere to the north central third of the state to hunt deer because that was about the only place they could find deer. Over the past few decades though the number of deer greatly increased in the parts of the state that once had very few deer and naturally that also shifted the areas where many hunters wanted to hunt. Since there have been fewer hunters willing to travel to the north central part of the state, where once everyone want to hunt, there simply aren’t enough hunters to buy all of the antlerless licenses in any areas of the state,when hunters can only buy one antlerless license.
The number of antlerless licenses being allocated, for the counties or WMUs, has always been determined by the number of deer that need to be harvested multiplied by the number of license it takes to get one deer harvested. In some areas it takes four or more license to harvest one deer, so there are always going to be more license available in some areas of the state then hunters that can purchase them if they can only get one license. Since there are more license then hunters you have to allow hunters to buy more then one license, in some areas, or they simply couldn’t buy all license needed to reach the level of deer harvest required to keep the deer population in balance with their food supply. That has long been a problem for long time now, and one that far too many people simply fail to understand. Thatfailure to understand and accept is alsowhy we now have destroyed deer habitat and crashing deer populations in much of the more remote areas of the state.
I am going to post the antlerless deer license allocation history along with the recent hunter success rates for the northern part of the state so you can see that the allocations really haven’t increased nearly as much as people think. With the hunter success rates (number of license to harvest one antlerless deer) you can also see that the hunter success rates have changed very little over the years.
North Central Region and WMU recent years antlerless allocation per square mile of land mass and recent hunter success rates:
Years………………………….license/sq.mile………………license/antlerless harvest
57-61……………………….8.08
62-66……………………….7.06
67-71………………………11.73
72-76……………………….9.93
77-81………………………12.18
82-86………………………11.68……………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.15
87-91………………………16.47……………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦2.97
92-96………………………13.49……………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.12
97-01………………………12.83……………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.12
03-06…………………….....9.24…………… 03-05…...3.07(WMU - 2G)
As you can see the number of antlerless license and harvests per license, in the old traditional deer range, has not changed much over the entire history of deer licenses, so your argument of more doe license in recent years really has no bases of validity or fact.
Since I take it, or somewhat assume, you are really more concerned that they are going to issue too many license and harvest too many does in the Southwest part of the state I will post the same data for that area as well.
Southwest Region and WMU recent years antlerless allocation per square mile of land mass and recent hunter success rates:
Years………………………….license/sq.mile………………license/antlerless harvest
57-61…………………….4.03
62-66…………………….3.82
67-71…………………….6.60
72-76…………………….7.51
77-81...........……………..9.50
82-86……………………11.85………………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.91
87-91……………………16.19………………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.32
92-96……………………19.69………………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.20
97-01……………………23.89………………⠀¦â€¦â€¦â€¦3.49
03-06……………………28.99……………03-05.…….2.88(WMU – 2A)
03-06……………………45.68……………03-05.…….4.54(WMU - 2B)
As you can see there has been a major shift in where hunters buy antlerless license today compared to just a few decades ago. There has also been a major shift in where the hunters have been harvesting the majority of the deer over the past few decades too. The hunters have been harvesting more deer per square mile around the city streets of Pittsburgh then they have in the remote areas of our public land for about the past two decades, which is about twenty years for those that don’t know how long a decade is. But, it sure doesn’t seem to be causing a decline of deer numbers in those areas. In fact hunters can’t kill enough deer there to keep up with the recruitment and many areas are now using professional sharpshooters to control the over abundance of deer because hunters can’t get enough of them.
Now just so people can see the differences between those two areas with the statewide average I will also post that data.
Statewide antlerless allocation per square mile of land mass and recent hunter success rates:
Years………………………….license/sq.mile………………license/antlerless harvest
57-61……………………………..6.62
62-66……………………………..5.84
67-71……………………………..8.64
72-76……………………………..8.40
77-81……………………………..9.43
82-86…………………………….11.08……… …………………………3.62
87-91…………………………….16.06……… …………………………3.32
92-96…………………………….17.00……… …………………………3.42
97-01…………………………….18.38……… …………………………3.51
03-06…………………………….21.68……… ……………03-05.……..3.46
Now after reviewing all of the facts surrounding antlerless license allocations and the harvest histories, across the state, I have to say that I simply can’t find one shred of evidence that supports the conjecture and opinion that there are too many antlerless license being issued or that too many deer are being harvested.
In fact, all of the evidence I can find indicate that if anything we should be issuing a lot more license and at least attempting to harvest more antlerless deer in even more areas of the state.
I know that is a shock for a lot of people to even think about. But, I have been studying this topic for about thirty years now and I simply can’t find any evidence that supports the opinion that we have or even could over harvest the deer herd any place there is suitable habitat to support more deerwhen using legal hunting methods and seasons. We have tried tooverharvest the deerin the special regulations areas of the stateso hunters there have not been able toharvestas many deer as possiblewith unlimited license and greatly lengthened seasons. They can’t even over harvest the deer, or so it seems, with the unlimited doe harvests. Now theyusesharpshooters and spotlights and they still might not be able to harvest enough to control or prevent the herd increases.
So in view of the facts why would you be worried about too many doe license?
Now if you have some facts that counter these please provide them. I have been looking for facts that would support those over harvest opinions for three decades now and I can’t find any facts that support that opinion. I must also say that opinions should never be permitted to override factual scientifically generated and supported data.
R.S. Bodenhorn