RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

it sounds obvious to me bb

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

Are you now trying to say that lower deer numbers resulted in a reduced breeding rate for the adult does? Why would that be when all adult does should be bred if you have a suitable buck/doe ratio? How about explaining just how that works for us.
I seems to me that you are simply grasping for straws to support your conjecture.



And since then we have had lower deer numbers and lower harvests.

Besides we were talking about record book bucks. Besides if you take those couple of years out of the recent years you end up with an even higher rate of record book increases during the years since antler restrictions.

R.S. Bodenhorn

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

It is rare indeed to have all of the adult bred in a wild herd. QDM managers are often satisfied with an 85% breeding rate. Breeding rates and productivity decreased because we have a much lower percentage of mature doe in the herd due to HR.

The number of record buck bucks will be proportional to the number of older bucks in the herd.Until 2007 we were still benefiting from the high deer numbers from 2000 to 2003. It takes 3 years for the full effect of HR to decrease the buck harvest. That is why we harvested fewer 2.5+ buck in 2007 than we did in 2002 ,before any 1.5 buck were saved by ARs.

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

[quote]ORIGINAL: bluebird2











BINGO!! less pressured, more covered,worse hunting weather, fewer hunters etc, etc.















Additionally; over 10,000 3.5 year old buck, YOU say, taken in 2007?!? Sounds like a great year.

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

If that were true then there have been a lot of 5.5 and older buck taken but there were only ,2,402 4.5 + buck harvested in 2007 and that is pathetic,when you consider less than half of the 2.5 buck were harvested.

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

thats sounds good on paper anyway bb

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

The Freedom of Information Act
5 U.S.C. § 552, As Amended By
Public Law No. 104-231, 110 Stat. 3048

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

Before AR 90% of the antler harvest was 1.5 years old. How did we kill 50K plus 2.5 year olds in 02.

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

I checked in 2002 pa killed 165,000 antlered deer. If over 50k were 2.5 years old that would mean 1 out of every three bucks harvested were 2.5 is that right?

RE: Pa Antler Restrictions
 

First of all for you to say that the perceived decline in the breeding or reproductive rates is the result of younger does is simply not founded on facts or even logic. All of the data you are comparing is for adult does and quite simply if fewer of the adult does are being bred or their reproductive rates really are declining, as you insist, there is an obvious problem. That problem doesn’t have anything to do with the age of the does in the samples since they were all adult does being compared for each of those years.

Furthermore I would have to say there is absolutely no reason for anyone. QDM or not, to be satisfied with an 85% breeding rate for adult does unless they have an out of balance buck/doe ratio and are willing to accept that fact. If they do have an 85% breeding rate for adult does they need to make every attempt toward fixing it because there is an obvious problem with either the buck/doe ratio unless the habitat is very seriously lacking in it ability to support the existing deer population.

If the breeding and reproductive rates are really declining in the wildlife management units within Pennsylvania, as you and the other Uninformed Silly People insist, then should we go ahead and fix it or say it is ok as it is?

If we are to fix it, even though I don’t think it is declining, then the logical solution would be to have a better adult buck/doe ratio or fix seriously lacking habitat with even fewer deer. To fix the buck/doe ratio we can either increase the number of bucks we keep through the season, reduce the doe population or a combination of the two. Which of those options do you figure to be the best way to fix this perceived problem you insist is looming out there? If you figure the problem is with the habitat then obviously we need to harvest more deer. Is that a direction you think we should take? How you think your fellow Uninformed Silly People will feel about those options for fixing this problem you figure you have disclosed?



That is nonsense at its finest.

If what you just said were true then the buck harvests would not have declined in 2004 and then again in 2005 since we certainly had more deer back in 2001 and 2002 which would have been the three years you claim it takes to decrease the buck harvest.

The reason the number of 2 ½ year old bucks harvest declined in 2007 was because we had seriously reduced fawn survival in the spring of 2004 and 2005 when the fawns born died of being born under weight following those two harsh winters. Those fawns that died those two spring should have been the 2 ½ and 3 ½ year old bucks that hunters would have been harvesting last year. But, hunters will never get to harvest deer that died as fawns.

R.S. Bodenhorn