Bluebird, didn't the PGC have some sort of bizarre "kill 'em all" policy a few years ago?
No, the Game Commission didn’t have any such type of policy. They did start reducing a deer herd that was way too high for the habitat in many areas about eight to ten years ago though.
The problem was that they waited too long to start the herd reduction and the over abundant deer herd had already severely damaged their own food supply. The increased harvests, though were very much needed, didn’t come in time to prevent the herd from crashing due to the lack of having enough winter habitat to sustain even the reduced deer numbers through two back to back harsh winters.
I mean, I'm not slamming on PA or the PGC or anything like that... I just remember hearing something about the PGC (somebody named Gary Alt?) handing out tags and doe permits like they were candy.
Actually you heard wrong and most likely from people that didn’t have enough real facts to have any idea what really was happening. The antler less license allocations have never been too high for good deer management though there have been many, many years in many areas were the number of licenses has been way too low to adequately control the deer populations and protect the deer food supply.
Doctor Alt understood that, while many hunters never did and many never will.
Then, next thing you know, PA had massive deer carnage... everybody got a deer, and/or multiple deer!
Actually the deer harvests in the areas with the least deer today did not have deer harvests that were any higher then they had traditionally been. The areas that experienced the increased harvests back then were the areas where the deer populations had been rapidly increasing and those areas still have high deer numbers. In fact the areas of the state with the most deer today are the very areas where antler less deer harvests have been unlimited for the past twenty years.
The areas of the state with twenty years of unlimited antler less license and harvests still have high deer harvests and high deer populations.
Those areas with unlimited harvests have to have sharp shooters out there killing huge numbers of deer at night just to control the populations.
Meanwhile those areas of the state were the hunters have spent decades demanding fewer and fewer license and doe harvests now have destroyed habitat, very low deer harvests and also very low deer populations.
It should be about time for the hunters to wake up to the fact that they would be a lot better off if they allowed the professionals to manage the resources instead of listening to those hunters that refuse to learn from all of the past deer management mistakes they have forced with repeatedly making the same stupid demands that are proven not to work as they think they do.
R.S. Bodenhorn