Yes, so have I. I have also heard the intimation that trophy hunting is "the problem", that because hunters don't make the massive "meat" drives of 25 years ago, we now have a "deer population problem". Let's assume that such a problem exists: I will acknowledge that some areas do have an issue with deer populations that might be above what the long term capacity of the land can support. But if such a problem does really exist, how did it get this way?

Again, let's take a trip down recent memory lane.
[ol][*]Until just a few years back (2004, I believe), many hunters statewide were forced to apply for a "hunters choice" sticker for the "privledge" of harvesting a doe with your regular gun tag. In fact, it 2004, hunters in the following units had to apply: DMUs 7, 10, 11, 16, 26, 31, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 44, 45, 49A, 49B, 50, 52, 55, 56, 57A, 58, 60A, 69, and 73D. That's a lot of units where apparently there was no real issue with population. If there WAS such an issue, why put hunters through the nonsense of applying for the sticker?[*]Until2004, hunters had to apply for antlerless tags in most units. Again, where was the crisis? If over population is such an issue, are we to believe that it occured overnight and was not as serious 4 short years ago?[/ol]
I'm not suggesting that the DNR need estimate deer population with a high degree of accuracy. My point is it is obvious that if the deer population has gotten excessive across much of the state, then the DNR deserves a big part of the blame. Deer are not like bacteria in a petrie dish; they do not multiply exponentially overnight. Such population growth takes time. So where was the DNR when this was occuring?.

Or, we can look at this another way. As I mentioned in an earlier post on this thread, in the unit I hunt, unit 61, the overwinter target has been lowered three times in 15 years, suddenly making our unit "overpopulated". Had it not been for a lot of squawking from landowners and outfitters in Buffalo County two years ago, we would still be stuck at a ridiculously low target instead of the 20 deer per square mile we have now (BTW...it used to be 25 in 1994...not sure why we needed a 20% reduction in target to begin with, but 20% is better than the 40% we were going to have). Could it just be that the whole issue of a "deer management crisis" was simply created to justify holding on to funds that the DNR might not be able to justify if they were to say things were fine?

As for 2008, even DNR spokesman Warnke admitted that the results this year are not due to lack of hunter effort. He further acknowledged that the lower harvest cannot be attributed to weather. Hmmmm....seems like that leaves a grossly erroneous population estimate.

Buckmastr, you are also right about the numbers of nub bucks that buy it. This nonsense has to stop!