The fact is we have more older and mature bucks in the Pennsylvania deer population then ever occurred in any of our lives. And, it is probably going to get even better in the future provided the professionals can stick with scientific deer management instead of being forced back to that stupid system of management by public and political demand that has gone so far toward ruining the deer populations throughout the past.
We had more older buck in 2003 and 2004 than we have now and there is no data that shows we have more mature buck than we did in the past ,since so few buck make it to maturity because of the increased hunting pressure on older buck. Furthermore the data you posted proves that the majority of bucks harvested are 1.5 buck.Thanks.
Some people now just spend their time trying to drag management back to the dark ages of before antler restrictions because they presently can’t kill the first little buck they see the first morning and get back home, the bar or where ever they really would prefer being instead of hunting, like they had grown accustomed. Still others demand a return to the years of serious mismanagement of the deer herd when we over protected them almost out of existence in some areas of the state because they simply have no understanding of how nature really works in regards to a deer/habitat relationship.
There is no data that shows ARs have benefited the herd in any way and ARS are not recommended as a long term method for increasing the age structure of the buck herd.