Big Country

Decline in JR hunting license...

How many 12 year olds do you know of have the patience to sit for hours on end without seeing deer?
If you want to get youth involved you need to provide them with an enjoyable experience. Sitting 6 hrs. straight or walking six miles in 30 degree and below temperature without seeing any deer is probably as muchof a reason as any for kids wanting to do something other than hunt. Some days I'd rather play the Cabelas Big Game hunter video game than sit in the woods and get cold for nothing.

There were many a day back when I was that age where I sat all day, minus a walk around at lunchtime with grandpa. Many times when hunting in SW PA around home, we saw few, or no deer. Was it fun? Nope, but it taught that hunting was hunting, not a killing trip. If I had all these crazy games kids have today, who knows if I would have ever even started hunting? Of course, that would have saved me a couple hundred K to date, easy.


Instant gratification is the name of the game today. Every hunter wantsa perfectly balanced herd, that is HUGE enough to take a buck and a doe in a matter of minutes. It just doesn`t work that way.

Not every hunter and not even most want to walk into the woods the first dayand be done hunting the very same day. Statements like this show overtones of PAGC's impression Pa hunters are lazy and not willing to put any effort into hunting. Absolutely not true. However "every" one of us would like to have the ability to see deer most days we hunt.

I am not saying that the majority of our states hunters are lazy, what I will state with absolute certainty is that the VAST MAJORITY of our fellow PA license purchasers are simply not into hunting as much as some of us are. That is OK, it is up to each of us to choose his/her own path.

That said, I feel confident in stating that a full 60% or more of our rifle hunters are through with deer hunting by high noon on the very first day of gun season..........filled tag or not.

As far as seeing deer.......back when I was a boy, the northern woods were loaded with deer and turkey. Back at home, deer were more scarce, and turkey were virtually non-existant. Now we have more turkeys than you can shake a stick at. I had to resort to calling hunters with spring bird tags this year and beg them to come hunting with me so I could video them shooting a gobbler. Deer numbers today in the southwest vary by region. All area`s down this way have ample deer numbers, and some area`s are still way overpopulated. I have been told by reputable hunters that many areas in the northcentral and northeastern part of PA are really hurting as far as deer numbers go. We need someone in the PGC to take the bull by the horns and micromanage this state. Herd numbers will rebound to very good levels in two years as long as they do not get hit with unusually harse winter conditions, or EHD within that timeframe.

Some area`s in the extreme southwest corner still need more does taken. Unfortunately, it would take someone with a penchant for abuse to step up to the plate now and handle this situation.

As far as bear and coyote damage.....yes, it can be big, but we kill a large number of bear each year, and coyotes can be killed, we just need to keep hunting them.



I can remember hunting in northern PA at our family camp in the very early 70`s........it was nothing to see 30-100 deer per day. If I added up the total amount of antler on every buck sighted, I could probably come up with 50 inchs of bone. Average body weight was probably 80 pounds.

True, but the reason you are seeing bigger deer now is because the herd has been excessively reduced and there is less competition for food.

OK, so let us bring the herd up a LITTLE bit, so we can enjoy a certain amount of quality with a certain amount of quantity.


Yep, the PGC needs changes.......they need to move forward with Alts plans, which includes more and smaller management areas.
With modifications that don't include killing off more of the deer population.

I agree to a point, and addressed this above.


Get antlerless season OUT of regular buck season too.

Completely agree

Deer check stations..........there are others among us who hunt many states per year too, and as one of those people, I have talked to wardens in many states about deer management issues.

Check stations seem to be no more accurate than our report card method.

Skull measurements included in report show "accurate" age approximations. Something that should be considered since you believe Doe season should be reduced. Having stats that show the number of yearling and fawn kills demonstrates the effectiveness of our current doe allocations. Butcher shops in my area report 60% of doe kills are button bucks. Major flaw in the PAGC's "grow big buck plan". These other states have stiffer penalties for not reporting harvests, hence requiring a confirmation number or band placed on the mounted deer. More accountability, higher penalties such as suspension of following year's license if found guilty of not reporting harvests. If for no other reason this needs to be done to reduce the PAGC's guestimations of how many deer are killed. Do you believe these other states receive only 60% of the total harvests as our Game Commission"claims" happensin this state?


First off, I am not against check stations, I merely reported that kill numbers do not seem to be more accurate by other commonly used methods. Also, if the funds are available, I would think that more detailed info that check stations can provide would be a big plus.

As to the button buck kill percentage.......I killed ONE button buck in my life. How I screwed up and did that is beyond me? Including gun kills, and I quit using firearms almost 25 years ago, I have roughly 200 whitetails under my belt, and IMO, that one button buck I killed is an unacceptable percentage. We have nobody to blame but ourselves for the button buck kill rate. Again, just my opinion, but we have far too many hunters here that care for little else than getting "their" deer, and getting it now. Overall herd health is meaningless to most of our ranks.


The example was given regarding Illinois, and going to phone in system. I have seen no changes there........some folks just do not report their deer kills, regardless of reporting mehtod.

Being a lifelong resident of PA, I feel we have 2 problems here that severely hamper our ability to have the herd that PA is capable of producing..........

1. Sheer number of hunters

We had more deer when we had more hunters.

I cannot argue that point, but, the volume of deer is not directly correlated to the volume of hunters. The herd size, leaving out unusual weather conditions and natures own culling, is directly related to the number of tags available. While I will agre that the PGC went too far in many areas, the same hunters that are beotching up a storm, are in many cases the same guys that filled those tags.



2. Rampant poaching, and the apathy that surrounds it.

Total percentages of deer killed by poaching is small incomparison to what the State stocked coyotes and bears do to the fawn population.

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I don`t have stats on poaching percentages, but I do know that poaching is rampant in every part of the state I have ever hunted. When I was much, much younger, I heard about many of these incidents firsthand. Although I did not partake in this activity, I did nothing about. Wrong on my part there. Now, I do not hear of these illegal acts, because everybody that knows me.....knows that I will turn them in immediately. If they kill a good buck during their poaching escapades, they may well be talking to the wardens with one eye swelled shut.[:-]