ORIGINAL: Buck Magnet
chickory,
A majority of the 1-1/2 year old bucks are being saved (something like 85% of the previous buck harvests were 1-1/2 years old). Now, guys are after 2-1/2 to 3-1/2 year old bucks which have been around the block and learned a few things from their first year.
Which is harder to kill, a 1-1/2 year old buck or a 3-1/2 year old buck?
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight, thats some classic internet voodoo.
A % of every harvest in pa for 100 year has been older deer. We see pictures of them everyday posted. Biggun shot down in Lancaster county this fall, he weren't too smart. He waddled out of a cornfield in front of a hunter who no problem splinking him. He-he-he you are grasping at straws when you claim that pa hunters just aren't smart enough to shoot deer after we did it for 100 years with zeal.
And by the way there are other states who practice AR and HR and they do not blame thier lowered harvests on bucks just getting smarter, they are smart enough to know they lowered as the herd got smaller (ie:Arkansas).
Talk about folkllore and hype..... people are now going to extraordinary measures these days to try and make excuses for less buck being taken. The moon, the stars, the wind, the bucks are now hiding.
How about the fact, that the Pa deer management plan is to reduce the herd a few % each year until it reaches a habitat friendly level and with less deer there will be less buck seen and harvested. And for your sake I will remind you that no one except you and one or two others has fogotten our harvest stats for the last few seasons.....
203,000 2001
165,000 2002
142,000 2003
13X,000 2004?
....and for the record the doe harvests have dropped accordingly also.
So you can spin some tale of aliens, moon beams, ESP for bucks, but the bottom line is that in the smaller herd there will be smaller harvests. It is no mystery.
Its called "the plan" ..... learn it, live it, looooove it.