RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

Are you claiming you don't have a significant percentage of pole timber, or are you claiming pole timber should have significant browse available?

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

Here we have had our share of bad winters.. Although I can not speak alot of what you folks have for issues in PA. I can say here as well as most places deer yard up to survive the winter months. They will have a network of trails to move around in. They will find food when time is needed. When we have snow that has crusted over with hail or ice the deer willsuffer greatly. The predators such as coyotes and bobcats can get the jump on them. As the deer try to run threw the crusted snow it cuts them on the leggs. While the predators run on top of this stuff making it easier to catch healthy deer and not just the sick ones some choose to believe. As most on here know deer are at it worst time during the winter months and last year was a very hard time for them up here in parts of this state. After all we had record snowfalls on most of the state. But it was a fluffy snow and coyote numbers dropped. They couldn't get around in that either. Alot of deer did make it threw the winter months but didn't have a good fawn production in the spring so this is another area that should be concidered when think how hard the winter months can be.. That's my 2 cents on this subject..

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

I'm simply claiming that where there should be sufficient browse,there isn't and that's because the deer ate it.If there isn't browse,we certainly shouldn't be expecting many deer or do you disagree with that?

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

I ask two simple questions and the fact that you won't answer them proves how biased you are or how little you know. Claiming there should be sufficient browse is a totally meaningless statement. Should there be sufficient browse for 15 deer,20 deer ,25 deer or 50 deer?
Should there be as much browse in pole timber as there is in a clear cut?

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

deer are also smart they find food and adapt i have pictures of them in my feed buck
eating cornlage and haylage
i think a bad winter would be ice covering ground and trees branches bushes

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

Would it matter what the answer was, I think you have your mind made up. If you think the DCNR is pulling the strings ask them.

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

I don't believe it is as much food or temp as it is ability to move. Hard crust on deep snow is a killer due to immobilization and subsequent predation. Deer also can go long periods with limited food provided they aren't exhausting their reserves by running and evading predators. I have seen deer stand in the same spot for days during ice events on the hillside across from my office. They simply stand there and conserve energy. If something harasses them they get depleted quickly. Ever hear that you shouldn't bother deer when they are yarding?

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

You could have provided some useful information , but like RSB you chose to alienate another PA hunter. The simple fact is that the herd should not be managed based on the extremes in our winter weather. No one could predict the ice storm that decimated the population in several NC counties in the late 70's.. Those deer didn't die due to lack of browse , they died because they couldn't get to the browse. The same is true when there is 3 or 4 ft. of snow cover. It is not that there isn't enough food for the deer, it is that the deer can not access that food.

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

I agree Greg. Conditions that make it hard, dangerous or deadlyfor them to move around are the most devastating. When the deer cant get to food or escape predators, it's pretty much over in short order.

RE: what is considered a bad winter for deer?
 

in 47 years out in CLINTON COUNTY,snow up to my neck, i never saw a deer starve,NEVER;)