Cougar Mag

I hunt different areas in my county and the numbers seen are down, corn or no standing corn. Not just deer seen but the amount of tracks. I've heard this from several other hunters as well who hunt in areas far from me. My opinion is Illinois needs to tighten up the "as many does as you can kill" mentality for a while, it is starting to take its toll in some areas.

kickin buck, you should also keep in mind that Jefferson County is in the top 5-6 counties in Illinois for reported deer kills, so there are a lot more deer there.

pjhunts

i forgot to add that i drive almost 70 miles one way to work eveyday and there are places where i'd normally see up to 40 deer at a time and now i'm lucky to see a dozen. now that the cold air is coming i'm sure the groups will start getting larger but i still don't think the numbers are like they were in years past

jrfrmn

I have noticed numbers are down here. I am 50 miles west of Chicago. Lasalle co near Sheridan. Where are you located? What town and county are closest to you.

Lanse couche couche

Guys,

Keep in mind that if you have areas where deer populations and harvests have been at alltime highs this past decade and people take it for granted that they are gonna see deer all the time, then it does not take much of a fall-off to seem bad. Dunno that I see that as a bad thing since the management policy over the last several years, and especially starting last year, has been to reduce numbers.

BAMAbowhunter270

Numbers have defiantly dropped down here in Alabama. In my opinion. Just not seeing as many this year, most all does....except the ones you almost hit on the side of the road.

nomorewolves

They are down in Idaho, Too many wolves!!!!

MeanV2

I didn't spend as much time in a stand this year as normal, mainly because things just happened fast, and once I was out of Buck tags the drive was not as strong.

It did seem like deer sightings were very good. I think I spent one evening in a stand when I did not see something. I also had to slow the time lapse on my trail cams down to keep from filling the card (260 pics) in less than a week.

Dan

kevin1

I live in a region that averages 30-45 deer PSM, yet this year I may have seen a dozen deer the whole year. I couldn't help noticing a large increase in the coyote numbers locally, hell they don't even run when they see you, and hearing them howl is now part of the nighttime soundscape. They're hell on fawns and poults, looks like it's time for another hobby.

early in

Seems like less deer in my area, not quite sure. I know they need to do something about these unlimited (in 5-D) antlerless tags!

Cornelius08

Numbers way down here, and most of Pa from most reports.

Have been for longer than this year, thanks to Pa's very extreme miserably failed environmentalist deer plan.

Id say this year the herd is probably even a bit lower than the last couple.

Funny thing is, we are supposed to be in stabilization mode, yet have 10,000 more tags in this unit than we did when we were supposedly in reduction mode!