ORIGINAL: livbucks
Sorry, but there you go comparing apples to oranges. Deer in Wisconsin live a far different life than those in PA. Wisconsin has far less hunters and yet far less deer. The OW loss in Wisconsin is much more a factor than in PA. Besides enduring harsher winters, the deer are prey of cougar, wolves and coyotes. As of right now, OW loss in PA has been negligable in recent history. Things can and do change though. They have already stocked cougar in the state and wolves will be next, and deer hunters in PA will be unnecessary first and extinct second.
That simply is not true. Normal non-hunting mortality rates for females in PA is 15% and for males it is 18%. The antler buck survey showed that 12% of the 2.5+ buck , the buck saved by AR,were lost to non-hunting mortality. Furthermore, you didn't address the fact that AR replaces buck for adult doe ,thereby reducing BB production.
In addition, in 2001 B. Wallinford claimed that adult male mortality increased to 28% ,which was higher than the Wisc. mortality rate. The simple fact is that AR does not add any additional legal buck to the PS herd,compared to a non-AR herd. The truth is that AR increases the number of 2.5 buck, buck decreases the number of legal buck available to be harvested.