An outsider view of PA
10-13-2014, 09:25 AM
#1
Nontypical Buck
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 2,358
An outsider view of PA
I quietly read the PA threads, I know PA is a big state, but it used to be one of the popular bowhunting destinations for NH bowhunters in October! You see, while we have a 3 month bow season where either sex is legal for all of it, the success rate runs below 10%, and simply SEEING a deer makes it a good day!
I used to go to PA for the first week of October bow season, went for 5 years, from before the "big slaughter" to after. In short it went from a place that was great to go to for experience bowhunting, to why bother. We stopped going about 10 years ago.
I shot my first archery deer in PA, also my first bow buck a small 8 pointer (after the point restrictions were in). The final year we went, three of us I think we saw 2 deer, no shots. As a group we decided to not return.
Well this year, based on feedback here, plus other sources, my wife and I decided to return to check it out. We were in Potter County, area 2G. Very close to the Lycoming county line. Here's my observations based on what's changed in the last 10 years. I REALLY wanted to use this trip to get her a shot at her first deer.
All of this is caveated by the following:
- We had one week to hunt, one morning rained out.
- VERY LIMITED scouting time. The lodge we stayed at the owner did some scouting for us, this helped.
- It was only a week when the weather was not ideal, very windy almost every day, rain almost every day off and on.
So, my thoughts....
- It's better than it was, but not great. We did both see deer, but not every time out. In fact I saw deer once from my stand, her twice. She did see two bears one of which stood at the base of her tree looking up at her which freaked her out pretty good.
- We did not get a deer, I had the only shot opportunity and well, I blew it.
- We had two cameras running all week, got some pictures which helped refine spots, but not tons. Nothing big on camera.
- acorns were EVERYWHERE as were beachnuts, this probably complicated it further to getting onto deer given only a week.
- we hunted primarily a DMAP area which spanned Potter and Lycoming. This tough as I did a lot of "map scouting" with topo's, the DMAP map from PA F&G site and google earth. Logging "fences" removed much of the land that looked good, majority of the untouched land was STEEP.
- Locals seem to have no problem using the fences to funnel deer. One of the spots the lodge owner showed me was a 400 yard stretch bounded on both sides by fences. As narrow as 20 yards, as wide as 150. He ran a camera in there that showed fairly consistent activity at all hours of the day. It felt "wrong" to me to hunt in this corridor.
The deer herd has bounced back. We saw many deer driving to the areas we could doe hunt, consistently saw them in 2G where I would have loved to doe hunt, but couldn't.
- My wife did see one probably legal buck, but as it was getting light and she just couldn't see it good enough to count points, but it had multiple.
I am sure given more time, or even going later in the season, say end of October, we'd have more luck. DMAP tags, while available to us as non-residents, are far from what I'd prefer, 2G tags are sold out before non-residents can apply.
So, PA has improved over the last 10 years, as I said we saw deer every morning/night while driving, actually almost got a spike, with the truck, very close call.
One thing I did notice, the size of the doe I did see has gone WAY UP from 10+ years ago. The biggest doe my group ever shot was ~85lbs in the past. The one I blew the shot on was over 100 and we saw a bunch that were big and good sized.
The one 100% legal buck we saw was just outside our cabin, at night, standing 5 feet from the truck window eating apples. We stopped, wife rolled down the window, he didn't seem to care, stood there staring at us chewing away, wife said "does that taste good?" and he just about jumped out of his skin!
I used to go to PA for the first week of October bow season, went for 5 years, from before the "big slaughter" to after. In short it went from a place that was great to go to for experience bowhunting, to why bother. We stopped going about 10 years ago.
I shot my first archery deer in PA, also my first bow buck a small 8 pointer (after the point restrictions were in). The final year we went, three of us I think we saw 2 deer, no shots. As a group we decided to not return.
Well this year, based on feedback here, plus other sources, my wife and I decided to return to check it out. We were in Potter County, area 2G. Very close to the Lycoming county line. Here's my observations based on what's changed in the last 10 years. I REALLY wanted to use this trip to get her a shot at her first deer.
All of this is caveated by the following:
- We had one week to hunt, one morning rained out.
- VERY LIMITED scouting time. The lodge we stayed at the owner did some scouting for us, this helped.
- It was only a week when the weather was not ideal, very windy almost every day, rain almost every day off and on.
So, my thoughts....
- It's better than it was, but not great. We did both see deer, but not every time out. In fact I saw deer once from my stand, her twice. She did see two bears one of which stood at the base of her tree looking up at her which freaked her out pretty good.
- We did not get a deer, I had the only shot opportunity and well, I blew it.
- We had two cameras running all week, got some pictures which helped refine spots, but not tons. Nothing big on camera.
- acorns were EVERYWHERE as were beachnuts, this probably complicated it further to getting onto deer given only a week.
- we hunted primarily a DMAP area which spanned Potter and Lycoming. This tough as I did a lot of "map scouting" with topo's, the DMAP map from PA F&G site and google earth. Logging "fences" removed much of the land that looked good, majority of the untouched land was STEEP.
- Locals seem to have no problem using the fences to funnel deer. One of the spots the lodge owner showed me was a 400 yard stretch bounded on both sides by fences. As narrow as 20 yards, as wide as 150. He ran a camera in there that showed fairly consistent activity at all hours of the day. It felt "wrong" to me to hunt in this corridor.
The deer herd has bounced back. We saw many deer driving to the areas we could doe hunt, consistently saw them in 2G where I would have loved to doe hunt, but couldn't.
- My wife did see one probably legal buck, but as it was getting light and she just couldn't see it good enough to count points, but it had multiple.
I am sure given more time, or even going later in the season, say end of October, we'd have more luck. DMAP tags, while available to us as non-residents, are far from what I'd prefer, 2G tags are sold out before non-residents can apply.
So, PA has improved over the last 10 years, as I said we saw deer every morning/night while driving, actually almost got a spike, with the truck, very close call.
One thing I did notice, the size of the doe I did see has gone WAY UP from 10+ years ago. The biggest doe my group ever shot was ~85lbs in the past. The one I blew the shot on was over 100 and we saw a bunch that were big and good sized.
The one 100% legal buck we saw was just outside our cabin, at night, standing 5 feet from the truck window eating apples. We stopped, wife rolled down the window, he didn't seem to care, stood there staring at us chewing away, wife said "does that taste good?" and he just about jumped out of his skin!
10-13-2014, 12:42 PM
#2
Boone & Crockett
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: south eastern PA
Posts: 15,436
The fact of the matter is, with the small amount of time you have to spend scouting preseason and hunting as a non resident being in PA for a week in archery season, you have no reason to expect a high degree of success. The problem is, non residents as well as residents of the state were so use to having far too many deer that it was laughable to call it deer hunting, especially in the rifle season. We are now getting back to where we should be in deer numbers and the habitat is responding to the reduction in deer numbers and slowly the herd will be allowed to expand some. However I hope I never see the number of deer and the amount of damage done to the forest habitat by those numbers again and I hope no one else ever sees it. Even after the reduction, there are more deer in the state than there were when I started in 1957 and I am very content with the nubers I have been seeing even after the herd reduction was begun. I am also seeing buck with larger bodies on the while, than I have ever seen in over 50 years of hunting in PA. There was a reason the number of hunters from the New England states came to PA to hunt deer, and that reason was nothing to be proud of.
11-13-2014, 09:45 AM
#3
Spike
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: state college, pa
Posts: 32
This archery has been hard between good acron crop and weird rut and weather. I have seen 7 Doe in 3 days hunting but on game camera seen 4 legal buck and 2 spikes (at night) I have uet to see a buck in daylight.
