Alarmist??? More like Human Nature. Just look at society today.

I think you are correct Uncle Nicky.
I can only speak of MD since that's what I'm familiar with. I recall 20 or 30 years ago considering myself lucky if I SAW a deer during hunting season. Now hardly a day goes by that I don't see at least one deer and there many seen during hunting season. There are no doe tags here but if you kill a buck you need to kill 2 does before you can kill a second buck. The bag limit is very liberal. Sunday hunting (we're actually talking about 6 days during bow and rifle seasons) started about 4 years ago and every year since then the harvest numbers have remained high. This past season was the 4th highest. This year Sunday hunting accounted for approximately 6% of the total deer kill.

Yes, it really does depend on the management. Uncle Nickey, I thought you were older. I remember seeing twenty deer the first day before 10:00. Fifty to sixty a day was more like it. Yes, in Maryland too. Herds of 15-20 going past.
So what will two more days matter? In Pa that is how they manage the herd. Tag numbers are a secondary "Management tool". Pa has always used the amount of hunting days to manage the deer herd. I saw in the regulation book that the amount of days doe was open in some areas was dropped by a week this year. I live in 5-C and there were thousands of tags left over this year. Doe is open an extra month down here. Just selling tags by the thousands does not mean anyone is buying them. It is the extra days that kill the doe off.

The majority of deer are shot in PA during rifle season the first 3 days, Monday-Wednesday. I can't find any hard statistics on the internet to back this up, but if somebody can prove me wrong, I'll eat my camo hat.

You will never find anything "Hard" on that. The numbers are estimated, remember? I bet you have not done any mountain hunting in a long time. I would bet there are more doe killed after the first 3 days of deer gun opening. I have hunted AFTER the first 3 days in the mountains for years. This year I was forced to hunt mostly down here because of lack of time. (I guess I should whine for Sunday hunting) My buddies and I shot 5 deer and only one was shot the first week. It is a trend I have been seeing for a couple years now. Get out the salt and pepper, you might be eating that hat. I had no idea that many guys hunted in 5-C until the first day this year. it sounded like a war around my house for about the first two hours. The thing is, I only know of one guy that got one that morning. You may hear a lot of shooting, but maybe not much gettin'.

No deer in Maryland 20-30 years ago? You think we went there every year and paid big dollars for a license to watch the wood peckers? What BS.

LOL...you seem like a nice guy, just a little opinionated. I wouldn't want to take your $$....

I don't work for the PGC, I'd be willing to bet they DO keep figures on what days the most animals are killed. Maybe someone else cares enough to find this, IDK.

Anyway, don't get your tighty whites in a bunch, you can't hunt deer on Sunday in PA right now anyway. And when it finally does pass, nobody will be forcing you to go on Sunday, stay home and watch the game if you;d rather do that.

The Game Commission does not keep figures like that. The whole deer report is bogus. The law was changed, I believe in the 80's, to go over to an estimation of all deer kill results. I remember seeing one of their black and white deer kill maps for crop damage in the 80's. (They used to print them in the Game News) The whole state had a little over 500 deer killed. That was when HR was just started. What a laugh. There were 500 deer killed for crop damage in a 10 mile radius of my house. So much for hard statistics. That first 3 day kill is a left over from by gone days.

Haycock mountain does not count as a mountain. You stated earlier you hunt special regs.

I mainly hunt special regulations area, if I don't kill a buck in archery, I'll make a trip up to Luzerne or Bradford county during gun season. I also own a camp in Allegany County, NY...which I bought for weekend hunting and as an investment. Do you want my name, rank, & serial number as well?

Do you work for the game commisssion?

Take a chill pill. What you paid your big dollars for is your business. I'm merely recollecting my observations from the 60's, 70's, and 80's, sir.

A picture is worth a thousand words.