Bad winters in the northern tier mountains ???? What state are you talking about,Colorado or Montana ??? There hasn't been a bad winter in Pa in 20 years at least.Come'on,you gotta do better than that.Just out of curiosity.how old are you ?
Well I'm 52. And I did a good bit of snowmobiling in the McKean/Potter/Tioga county areas during the winters of 2003 and 2004. And sure as heck, Mr Bodenhorn is right about the prolonged snow and the profound effects it had on the deer. I have a bunch of pictures of deer that were yarded up during that period of time. They really had it rough right up until March. Don't know if they starved, but they surely had it rough enough to absorb or abort fetuses, which had to have hurt recruitment badly.
Unfortunately,these conditions weren't reflected in PGC Anterless allocations during theimmediate followingseasons and the herd was brought tolevels that were well below goal in many areas.And that would be my beef right there. They waited to long to cut allocations.