I didn't say the herd was devastated. Here is what I said.
Actually it was a combination of the severe ice storm in the late 70's ,which killed thousands of deer, plus the antlerless allocations which limited the ability of the herd to increase.
The data shows the buck harvest decreased by 23 % from 1976 to 1981 and that decrease was directly related to the ice storm.
After that the antlerless harvests kept the herd at those reduced levels and prevented the herd from increasing to the MSY carrying capacity of the habitat.