ARs must be working
 

I was at my uncles the other day, and we got talking about antler restrictions. Well anyway hes telling me about all these big buck brought in and we took a walk back to the shop and let me tell ya, he never had that many big racks back there in a season. So I guess they are working. I saw the proof.

RE: ARs must be working
 

You haven't seen anything yet. Wait till next year when the real payoffs begin

RE: ARs must be working
 

sorry guys, i think that you are both mistaken. did it occur to you that you didn't necesasarily grow anything bigger, you just had to be pickier, so of course you will see a few more racks than normal of a larger size? next year? hahaha, you aren't gaining anything. you may have a few more bucks out there that got a year older than normal. that's all. nothing more.

RE: ARs must be working
 

That's what I was thinking. It made people wait for a larger animal, which obviously paid off. Everything I've read about QDM say's it takes about 5 years to really see the benefits so it should get better.

I'm glad because just got permission this year on some nice land in Pa.

RE: ARs must be working
 

You do have a point about having to wait for a legal one, but alot of these buck have good mass... NO they arent record bucks but they are very nice ones.

RE: ARs must be working
 

When you hunt the same areas for 15-20 years and see maybe 1-2 bucks with a 15" spread...and then go to seeing 5-6 of that size, I call that working. Granted it ain't going to start kicking out 150 class bucks, but it is doing what it was meant to and getting a group of bucks to the next year of life.

This is all seen during scouting, and has nothing to do with waiting on a bigger buck in season.

RE: ARs must be working
 

Wimp, Not trying to start an argument, ok just a question. In those 15-20 years you mentioned did you whack the first buck that came around and then quit hunting?

Sorry i read through it quick and skipped where you said you saw the deer during scouting.

RE: ARs must be working
 

point is - a 2.5 year old deer is going to have a bigger rack (normally) than a 1.5 year old deer; if (10) 1.5 year old deer make it to 2.5 years of age that wouldn't have the year before, that means there are 10 more deer with bigger racks for the next year

seems pretty simple to me

I wouldn't mind those rules in NY... I think....let's wait and see after 5 years in PA

RE: ARs must be working
 

Doughboysigep - not exactly.

While you are correct that AR may have saved those 10 bucks for next year. You also have to consider how many already AR legal bucks were killed this year. For example - what if 10 legal bucks were shot.

That would mean that AR did not actually save any bucks. It allowed smaller bucks to get a little bigger while thinning out the older bucks.

RE: ARs must be working
 

It's gotten cold a few times but hey belopw zero sucks!!!:(:([:@][:@][:@][X(][X(]

RE: ARs must be working
 

All I can say I know what I saw, and what I have seen over the last 22 years. To me they look like they are working.

RE: ARs must be working
 

People are just afraid of change. They want everything to be the same as when they first started hunting. The antler restrictions are working in other states and will do what they are supposed to do here. And yes they already are working. I saw 3 small bucks this year by 9:00 am and all were within 75 yards,. One of them stood 15 yards from me watching 3 doe for a good 25 minutes. My point is is that not only are the young bucks able to age, with that age comes more smarts. It is easy to kill young deer because they don't have the experience to evade like more mature bucks. So yes in a couple more years we will have larger,wiser and more muture bucks in Pa. We won't be killing as many bucks because they will be smarter bucks.

RE: ARs must be working
 

MC

I see your point, 10 mature bucks might be taken. More than likely they won't all be taken (harder to harvest mature bucks) - maybe only 5 (?). Additionally, maybe before AR those 10 mature buck and the 10 spikes get taken. Lots of ifs and maybes, guess we'll just have to wait and see.

RE: ARs must be working
 

Agreed - i think the next 2 or 3 years should determine the result of AR.

Lots of people mentioned monster bucks this year - my guess is that most of those monster bucks would have been legal last year. I shot a nice 9pt this year - I am fairly certain that he would have had at least 3 pts on one side based on his rack. We'll see what happens.

RE: ARs must be working
 

I think a lot of people look over the fact that many deer might have been passed just due to the fact that hunters were unable to identify whether it has 3 points or not. Just because it was legal last year does not mean it would have been killed. Hunters now have to take more time to identify their target than in years past making for more lost opportunities. Also, most of the objective to AR is to harvest more does as well and that seems to be working too from I understand. Overall, the one fact that will hopefully make AR more successful in PA than it has been in other states is that hunters can only harvest one buck. I think any time you can save any additonal percentage of the buck population and build a better age structure while harvesting more does and bringing your buck to daoe ratio closer you are taking a step in the right direction. We'll see what happens in years to come....TGK