Information provided in a recent article by DR. Kroll , indicates that due to AR, the racks on our 2.5 buck ,on average , will be smaller than the average 2.5 buck pre-AR. Note, I am not saying that there won’t be more 2.5 buck or that the percentage of bigger bucks in the harvest will not be higher, I am simply saying that the average 2.5 will be smaller because the spikes that are saved by AR take two years to catch up with the 1.5 ,6 & 8 pts. that will be harvested. Prior to AR over 80% of the spikes were harvested ,but with AR most will survive. On the other hand the harvest rate for 6 & 8 pt. 1.5’s increased as it did for 2.5+ buck when AR was implemented ,so very few 6 & 8 pt. 1.5 buck will survive. Therefore , the percentage of 2.5’s that were spikes as 1.5’s will increase significantly and they will ,on average have smaller racks , than the average 2.5 buck prior to AR.




Here is what Dr. Kroll had to say about the results of three years of his study on wild ,free ranging deer.



“From our data, if you plot the number of antler points bucks had as yearlings against the average number of points those same bucks had the next year you will see that the yearlings with the fewest antler points still had fewer points as 2-year-olds. Yearlings with two or three points on their first set of antlers averaged about eight points as 2-year-olds. On the other end of the spectrum, yearlings with eight or nine points on their first set of antlers were 10-pointers on average the next year. “

One should also note that prior to AR ,18% of our 2.5+ buck weren’t AR legal and 44% had 8 or more points. Therefore, since due to AR the average 2.5+ buck will be smaller the percentage of non-AR legal 2.5+ buck will increase and the percentage of 8+ pts. 2.5 buck will decrease..