BTBowhunter

The survey is a great idea but with a major flaw. Anyone, it seems, can fill this thing out, not just hunters who hunt there. The survey is a great idea but the tree huggers could have lots of fun with the Minnesota survey because it's simply not secure enough.

Cornelius08

Btb, I think the survey would be a huge improvement of public inputconsidering the treehuggers are the only ones being heard NOW. No effort has ever been made to even want to know what hunter actually think in any meaningful way whatsoever.

The questions are hunter detailed. Obviously "treehuggers" hadnt taken over the polls as the resulting management has recieved great support among HUNTERS.

I would hope that the questionairre was used somewhat in the formation of the management scheme, and after looking it over, believe they do. But even if they didnt at all.... You gotta admit, its one helluva pr scheme that makes hunters who want to be heard believe they are being heard.

Not sure why you are concerned with US being the only ones to be heard when currently we are about the only ones who arent. And this is a way to possibly change that.

And if you are extremely concerned about security, all pgc would have to do is have space for your name and license number. If it doesnt match in their license sale database...No go.

bowtruck

If pgc did a survey it couldnt hurt as of now most hunters have a complaint or 2

BTBowhunter

Agreed.

It's a great idea and the hunting license number thought fixes the only flaw I saw in it. Ialso agree that the questions are very hunter oriented.

explorer_Jack

From what I have read on here about PA PGC and associates, It doesn't matter what you want or think.It is about the timber industry and the damage the deer are doing.So that survey would mean diddly squat to them about what you thought and wanted.Lets face it,PA hunting is to far down the toilet to change anything without a complete overhaul of the agency and how and who it works for.It's a nice pipe dream to ever think any thing will change with the yahoos you have in charge now.

sproulman

very true.

there has to be money and jobs involved in this whole thing.

our elected officials are being bought off by BIG TIMBER,INSURANCE,PETA ECO GROUPS WHO ARE INFLUENCING DECISIONS IN HARRISBURG.

look how much GRANT money comes in from these groups.

look how out of 5 groups that are going to make STUDY in pa.only 1 is against what is happening to our hunting, only 1 the USP.

i am surprised theywere even invited to participate in the STUDY.

bronko22000

Gentlemen - I agree with the mismanagement of the PA deer herd. Cannot say for sure about the timber industry. If they are complaining about the deer populations they don't have a leg to stand on. The state forests througout NC PA have acres of trees dieing of old age. Why don't they do selective harvest in these areas? Probably because it will open up the canopy to allow for new growth with will draw more deer..... its a double edged sword.

BTBowhunter

What Grant money are you talking about Sproul? Do you have knowledge of actual grants you can share with us?

BTW, at least one of those you listed is pure myth, BS , urban legend, or whatever you wanna call it and It's been proven over and over here. The insurance industry, which I retired from after 30 years never once spent a dime on deer management one way or another. I worked with dozens of Insurance companies and never once heard a peep about our deer claims in PA.

You see, insurance companies are like the racetrack or the casino. They have things like deer claims statistically figured out and anything thatcauses claims that they can figure out will make them money. Just like the casino never loses, the insurance companies never lose on things like deer claims. Big natural disasters and man made terrorist attacks only make them panic because they cant adequately plan and charge for them.

But deer claims=$$$profits$$$ for insurance companies. It wouldn't be politicallly correct for them to say it publicly but if they had a position, they'd be on the side of more deer, therefore more claims, and more premiums charged and more profits made!

BTBowhunter

Part of the problem with opening the canopy when there's still too many deer is that the deer will eat all the desirable plant regeneration and leave the junk. We now have lots of stands of striped maple, birch and other junk trees where oaks once dominated and timbering took place when too many deer were present when the trees were sprouting up. Thats not really subject to debate anywhere. The only debate lies in just how many is too many.

And it's not just about tree huggers. In many cases, we're talking about land where we, as hunters, are the guests of the timber companies hunting on their private property. They don't pay taxes and maintain that property to grow deer for us, they are growing trees as a crop like a farmer grows corn. Sure, I think we'd all love to have our own slice of this great state where we could manage it for deer as we please.

Public land is a different story. When it comes to gamelands, hunters bought em and Gamelands should be managedwith huntable wildlife as the first priority.

State and national forests are yet a different story. Hunters did not buy these all by themselves and the general public owns them. The USFS and DCNR is supposed to manage Fed and state forests for all the public, not just us. Sometimes that means selling timber interests, producing oil, gas wind generation and even leasing for cell phone towers.

With the exception of gamelands and our own private land,most of us are guests when we hunt and our hosts will always have a lot to say about the deer herd. Like it or not.

sproulman

wco told me about grant money,he is on here, i forgot his intials,i think like rwj or something.

next, i was with SENATOR,yes, i do have that influence but not as much now.

he is big insurance senator too,he backs them and his family is in it bigtime too.

he has broughtthat up many times behind closed door meetings in harrisburg.

my local state farm agent told me many times that state farm was pushing to have deer reduced in pa.
he hunts too and ALSO WANTED them kiled off.

he talked just like the DCNR boys do about deer.

you cant blame insurance co. for doing what they can to deer.

with all the FRAUD info that is given them,over 50% of wrecks that say they MISSED a deer ,never did.

they were speeding,fixing eye lases,cell phones,drunk,yelling at kids,falling asleep.

of course, you could say because you were in the insurance business, i am wrong but i feel the deer get blamed for too many accidents that they did not happen.