View Poll Results: A poll
Voters: 36. You may not vote on this poll
Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
04-02-2008, 10:39 AM
#21
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Phoenixville, PA USA
Posts: 5,541
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
ORIGINAL: quiksilver
I've often wondered if the herd numbers really needed to be reduced quite so dramatically... For example, what would it have been like... Let's just say for the sake of argument - that a 4-point-side-minimum antler restriction would've been installed in 1980.
Do you think we'd have seen BOTH big bucks AND good deer numbers?
I, for one, think you can have your cake and eat it too.
I just don't think you have to have deer densities at 4-6 per square mile to grow a big buck - not even in areas replete with pole timber and a high browse line.
So yeah, I love the antler laws, but I think it would've worked out just fine even WITHOUT the herd reduction.
The reason PA wasn't growing big bucks was due to lack of age structure - not because they were malnutritioned.
By instituting a dramatic herd reduction, in conjunct with the AR - they certainly made it easier for a buck to get big - by virtue of eliminating his food competition - but I think there was enough food to go around - at least in MOST areas. (Not all).
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In my honest opinion - PA sports some of the best whitetail habitat on the planet - but we'll never have true "trophy whitetail hunting" until the number of hunters in the state reduces by at least 50%.
I've often wondered if the herd numbers really needed to be reduced quite so dramatically... For example, what would it have been like... Let's just say for the sake of argument - that a 4-point-side-minimum antler restriction would've been installed in 1980.
Do you think we'd have seen BOTH big bucks AND good deer numbers?
I, for one, think you can have your cake and eat it too.
I just don't think you have to have deer densities at 4-6 per square mile to grow a big buck - not even in areas replete with pole timber and a high browse line.
So yeah, I love the antler laws, but I think it would've worked out just fine even WITHOUT the herd reduction.
The reason PA wasn't growing big bucks was due to lack of age structure - not because they were malnutritioned.
By instituting a dramatic herd reduction, in conjunct with the AR - they certainly made it easier for a buck to get big - by virtue of eliminating his food competition - but I think there was enough food to go around - at least in MOST areas. (Not all).
_____________________________________
In my honest opinion - PA sports some of the best whitetail habitat on the planet - but we'll never have true "trophy whitetail hunting" until the number of hunters in the state reduces by at least 50%.
04-02-2008, 10:45 AM
#22
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: PA
Posts: 8,167
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
With deer numbers being so low in areas I feel that as soon as a buck is legal he is killed.
A 2.5 year old buck is going to be legal and with hunter #'s as high as they are and deer #'s being low as a % I think way to many quality bucks are being killed.
Call it "high grading" or what ever you want in my area 1B the best 1.5 year olds are killed and the poorer genetic bucks are given a free pass. My area could and has supported many more deer than are presently here.
I don't know the answer but protecting the best bucksis going to have to be a personal choice because of the diversity & numbers of PA's hunters.
And any of you that read the results of the DCNR meetings you should make your views known. That say deer #'s at the present are 50 % higher than the states habitat can support.
A 2.5 year old buck is going to be legal and with hunter #'s as high as they are and deer #'s being low as a % I think way to many quality bucks are being killed.
Call it "high grading" or what ever you want in my area 1B the best 1.5 year olds are killed and the poorer genetic bucks are given a free pass. My area could and has supported many more deer than are presently here.
I don't know the answer but protecting the best bucksis going to have to be a personal choice because of the diversity & numbers of PA's hunters.
And any of you that read the results of the DCNR meetings you should make your views known. That say deer #'s at the present are 50 % higher than the states habitat can support.
04-02-2008, 10:49 AM
#23
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 5,716
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
Bry - that's supposedly the gameplan - beat down the deerdensities, let the native browse regenerate - and slowly let the herd numbers rebound. But I'm just not seeing any signs of that being effective.
I spent several days in the Allegheny National Forest this year - and the browse line looks the same as it always has - nonexistent.I don't think it'll change - even if whitetails were extinct. The reason is that the tree canopy is gluttoning up an extremely high percentage of the available sunlight. Compounding the problem, we have hundreds of thousands of acres of forestland, where everything on the forest floor is being choked out by various fern species.
Until you selectively cut (or clearcut) the timber - the carrying capacity isn't going to change, because the undergrowth is choked out by the standing pole timber.
Callthe Kingcrazy, buthe thinks that we'd be seeing a lot more deer and a lot more big bucks if we'd have just implemented a simple 4-point restriction statewide - and left the doe season alone.
Over time, the buck/doe ratios would have increased - the age structure would have increased - and we wouldn't have all the whining and complaining about "not seeing any deer."
For the sake of argument: If, indeed, the herdDID exceed the carrying capacity of the land - we have two checks-and-balances already built-in: Hunters and Mother Nature.Any overabundance of deerwould quickly be exterminated by disease, starvation or predation (human predation, that is).
I spent several days in the Allegheny National Forest this year - and the browse line looks the same as it always has - nonexistent.I don't think it'll change - even if whitetails were extinct. The reason is that the tree canopy is gluttoning up an extremely high percentage of the available sunlight. Compounding the problem, we have hundreds of thousands of acres of forestland, where everything on the forest floor is being choked out by various fern species.
Until you selectively cut (or clearcut) the timber - the carrying capacity isn't going to change, because the undergrowth is choked out by the standing pole timber.
Callthe Kingcrazy, buthe thinks that we'd be seeing a lot more deer and a lot more big bucks if we'd have just implemented a simple 4-point restriction statewide - and left the doe season alone.
Over time, the buck/doe ratios would have increased - the age structure would have increased - and we wouldn't have all the whining and complaining about "not seeing any deer."
For the sake of argument: If, indeed, the herdDID exceed the carrying capacity of the land - we have two checks-and-balances already built-in: Hunters and Mother Nature.Any overabundance of deerwould quickly be exterminated by disease, starvation or predation (human predation, that is).
04-02-2008, 10:49 AM
#24
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: North Lima Ohio & Clarion Pa
Posts: 6,453
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
I'd take on a grizzly with a switch in the woods at night
But I remember you running from a black bear, like a fat kid, to a candy store when he took interest in your Deer Decoys, in fading light..lol
04-02-2008, 10:57 AM
#25
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: PA
Posts: 8,167
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
ORIGINAL: GR8atta2d
But I remember you running from a black bear, like a fat kid, to a candy store when he took interest in your Deer Decoys, in fading light..lol
I'd take on a grizzly with a switch in the woods at night
But I remember you running from a black bear, like a fat kid, to a candy store when he took interest in your Deer Decoys, in fading light..lol
That camara is the greatest. Thanks for the tip. I owe you a
04-02-2008, 11:01 AM
#26
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: North Lima Ohio & Clarion Pa
Posts: 6,453
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
Did you see todays pictures ?
04-02-2008, 11:05 AM
#27
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: PA
Posts: 8,167
RE: Is PA better hunting after the AR and Doe regulation change
ORIGINAL: GR8atta2d
No, where they at?? Glad ya like it..which one did you go with? I really like mine. Took some nice deer pics Saturday, need to upload them.
Did you see todays pictures ?
http://www.huntingnet.com/forum/tm.aspx?m=2741859
Sorry Germ 
