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Another PA DEER Article

This is a few days old but I didnt see it on here. A long read, but more fat for you boys to chew on,,, ;)

Radio collars indicate hunters weren't finding the deer
Sportsmen have complained of a scarcity. In the Sproul study area, however, hunters passed up 90 pct. of the does.
By Don Sapatkin
Inquirer Staff Writer

If you want to turn up the volume of an already raucous debate over the future of deer hunting, equip a bunch of does with radio transmitters and follow them through all the just ended hunting seasons.

Then tell longtime sportsmen who insist almost no deer are left in Sproul State Forest that they apparently missed a whole lot of them.

Researchers at Penn State University were surprised by their preliminary finding, which showed that hunters didn't see or passed up more than 90 percent of the does in the Sproul study area. So were deer experts in other states, who said far higher doe kills would normally be required to control the population. The small sample size could be skewing results.

The top deer manager at the Pennsylvania Game Commission, a cosponsor of the continuing study, said the statistic wasn't useful and he could not infer anything from it.

The report, which applies only to the areas studied, is certain to come up for discussion and interpretation tomorrow in Harrisburg, the commission's annual public comment period after hunting season.

One question typically dominates the afternoon: Are there too many or too few whitetail deer in the Big Woods? (Everyone agrees that there are far too many in the suburbs.)

Several years ago, agency biologists began a crash program in herd reduction. They said ravenous deer had destroyed so much vegetation that some forests could neither regenerate nor supply enough food to sustain the animals through harsh winters.

Last January, tradition-minded sportsmen complained bitterly about sharp declines in deer sightings. Some blamed overzealous biologists, and predicted that disillusionment would thin the volunteer army needed to keep deer in check.

The commissioners backed down just enough to satisfy virtually no one.

A new executive director, Carl Roe, took over the agency on Jan. 1. Roe, 57, who spent his childhood around the Philadelphia suburbs, said this week that improving communication and credibility on deer issues with hunters and the general public would be top priorities.

The credibility gap is wide. Some sportsmen say the hunting was even worse this past season. License sales were down 7 percent through November, with resignation likely part of the reason.

"People are not seeing deer and they are not getting deer," said Bill Miller, 62, a mechanical engineer from Roxborough and president of the Unified Sportsmen of Pennsylvania, a constant thorn in the side of the game commission.

Miller owns a cabin on 25 acres adjoining Tioga State Forest, not far from the New York border. These Big Woods of north-central Pennsylvania rose from early 20th-century clear-cuts. The forests generated more and more deer - and hunters - as they matured over generations. People bought land; traditions were reinforced; deer boomed.

Last year's 56 percent drop in total harvest for the region hit hunters with the wallop that investors might get from a stock market crash. North-central cemented its reputation as the most egregious example in the too many vs. too few debate.

Scientists, meanwhile, began studying the interrelationships among deer, hunters, terrain and other variables that affect wildlife biologists' success in managing growth of the herd.

"What I find most interesting," said Duane Diefenbach, who teaches wildlife ecology at Penn State and is assistant director of the Pennsylvania Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, "is to see where hunters are and where deer are harvested."

How far will hunters drag a doe carcass uphill to a road? How often can deer elude them by hiding in thick laurel? What percentage of does survive from one year to the next?

Diefenbach and Christopher Rosenberry, head of the game commission's deer management team, designed a two-year, multifaceted study in the poor habitat of Sproul State Forest and, for comparison, in somewhat healthier Tuscarora State Forest to the south:

Radio-collared does would be monitored twice a week to confirm survival or estimate location and cause of death.

The movements of a small number, fitted with global positioning system devices, would be mapped in detail.

Twice a day during the main deer season, a low-flying Cessna would carry observers trained to detect the glow of hunters' orange safety vests through vermilion glasses. GPS-linked laptops would display 3-D images so hunters' locations could be charted like the target of a smart bomb.

With year one nearly completed, preliminary data for Sproul show that 54 radio-collared does were "on air" before the first hunting season, four were killed by hunters, and all the rest were accounted for.

Hunters harvested just 7.4 percent of available does.

Populations are reduced by ensuring that more deer are removed each year through mortality than are added through births. Managers estimate deaths from natural causes, then set hunting goals to make up the difference. Killing does, which produce one or two fawns a year, is most efficient.

Matt Keenan, a graduate student who is coordinating the study for his master's thesis, wondered whether traditional hunters were simply refusing to shoot does, or perhaps enthusiasm was lagging. He's noticed that sportsmen in Pennsylvania complain about deer that are far more abundant than where he's hunted in Vermont, New York and Massachusetts.

Bryon Shissler, a wildlife biologist and consultant, said the harvest rate showed that poor habitat, not hunting, was responsible for most mortality, and he questioned whether recreational hunters had the skills or commitment to kill enough deer to save dying forests.

Shissler is close to Gary Alt, the biologist who set up an aggressive deer program but quit a year ago as a hunter backlash grew. Both now say they believe the game commission's mission and structure - charged with managing all wildlife but funded largely by hunting license-sales - are incompatible: hunters wield too much power.

Diefenbach cautioned against focusing on the numbers, particularly after just one year. He said the issue is habitat survival, for deer and everything else.

"They're talking about whether there are too many or too few and skipping over the question of how many should there be?"

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