Bassackwards game management?

[Brick]

What do you think?

Since I've been in NEPA, I've seen ONE decent buck. Most of the very few bucks I see are scrub racks (you know the kind the game commission says don't shoot) and most all of the doe are tiny.

Should we be saving the big bucks for breeding stock and "harvesting" the scrub racks? Do you agree that scrub racks will remain scrub racks?

[Lycanthrope]

I've seen 6 pointers (not legal) near 20" wide and the local bucks where I hunt typicaly have a bad left antler. Sometimes it's a single spike about 12-14" long. It's now becoming the dominant gene since everythign else is shot off. When nothing else is left, scrub bucks will breed. It just depends on the hunting pressure in your area.

[BearTitan]

This evening I saw a 6 pointer that was 18" wide. The three points on each beam (no brow tines) were less than an inch each, so this deer was a spike according to the PGC. This was at least a three year old deer and went over 200 pounds easy. To Lycan's point, he ain't gonna get any bigger and he is spreading his genes every year because he is not legal.

I would have killed this deer for sure with a rifle because I would have assumed a rack that wide would have been legal. Because I was bow hunting, I got to see him close up. 8 yards to be exact.

[nijwnfi]

I just wonder how many deer are left laying in the woods because they were shot and turned out to be too small a rack to be legal. I haven't hunted in years, but I couldn't give a damn about rack size. If I got a shot at a big one of course I'd take it, but I was looking for meat in the freezer. Never shot at spike bucks, don't get me wrong, but barely legal was fine. I've found more than one doe covered up with brush during buck season.

[WMG]

As I recall it was the state of Mississippi who was the 1st to start the antler restrictions and what they tried to inform alt was at 1st it resulted in a short boom of larger racks , but then for sceintific reasons it does result in smaller racks.

[ar15jules]

I have seen my fair share of LARGE illegal bucks here in Erie and Crawford Counties where it is a four point per side area. I will say that I have been to some deer farms where racks have been displayed from animals year to year. Fork horns there seem to develop into bigger and more point racks every year, then diminish into odd racks after the five or six year mark. That is in prime condition. All the food and minerals they can get.
Jules

[JDC]

I hunt bradford county every year and I remember before the game commission started their restrictions I saw 5 bucks opening day. Now in the last 3 yrs I haven't seen squat. I think they need to go back to the 3 day doe season and lift the antler restrictions. I think they need to do a better job evaluating the different zones. I think going back to the 3 day doe season and keeping the antler restrictions will result in seeing more bucks and giving the younger ones a chance to mature.

[knight0334]

I've seen a mess load of bucks in Somerset, Cabria, Clearfield and Jefferson counties. Probably the most I've seen in years. God knows how many times I've nearly hit one of those critters on routes 36, 219, 322 and 119 in the last month. Seen 1 get hit on SR36 between Punxy and Brookville on each of the past Monday's around Coolspring @ about 5am.

[andrewmyers]

ive read up on the management a bit while in college. i took a few courses on wildlife and fisheries management. i will agree with you guys that ive seen hardly any bucks at all since the new restrictions. i live in a "3pt zone" and hardly anyone i know has shot a big one in a while. strangely my best hunting season was during the first year of it being in place. i saw more bucks that year than any other. but my only real thought or comment on the restrictions is that they are still allowing elderly, youth and disabled hunters to harvest the smaller bucks arent they? if so then those "scrub" bucks are still being shot i assume. i think having rules that arent universal isnt helping the situation. as for breeding, i think the ruts over during rifle season when most these bucks are shot. so i would think the deer have already bred. but if does are being shot in record numbers that offsets it. so the surviving does that continue on til spring are giving birth to deer with mixed genetics..no real way to conclude they only bred with the smaller bucks. i know from hunting shows that typically you only want to harvest the real mature deer and weed out the inferior genes. on occasion they seem to harvest does. but in low numbers. im not an expert but i think the game commission should take a hint or two from the larger more famous hunting reserves and see if that's feasible for the whole state. also i think archery season is when alot of the really good bucks are shot, mostly due to the high rut activity. if archers were only allowed to shoot spikes, and forkhorns we might see a boom in larger deer in a few years. sorry archers ..haha. but youd be helping the deer population as a whole.. IMHO thats a small sacrifice and something that should be looked into. *quick edit*; the rut does last a while in the state of PA, from like mid october to mid-december based on various sources...with that in mind its feasible deer are being bred beyond rifle season..i just really doubt that they are breeding during the rifle season or shortly after. with all the energy spent hiding constantly from hunters, they are probably not eating very well and breeding is the last thing on their minds..survival comes first.

[BearTitan]

ive read up on the management a bit while in college. i took a few courses on wildlife and fisheries management. i will agree with you guys that ive seen hardly any bucks at all since the new restrictions. i live in a "3pt zone" and hardly anyone i know has shot a big one in a while. strangely my best hunting season was during the first year of it being in place. i saw more bucks that year than any other. but my only real thought or comment on the restrictions is that they are still allowing elderly, youth and disabled hunters to harvest the smaller bucks arent they? if so then those "scrub" bucks are still being shot i assume. i think having rules that arent universal isnt helping the situation. as for breeding, i think the ruts over during rifle season when most these bucks are shot. so i would think the deer have already bred. but if does are being shot in record numbers that offsets it. so the surviving does that continue on til spring are giving birth to deer with mixed genetics..no real way to conclude they only bred with the smaller bucks. i know from hunting shows that typically you only want to harvest the real mature deer and weed out the inferior genes. on occasion they seem to harvest does. but in low numbers. im not an expert but i think the game commission should take a hint or two from the larger more famous hunting reserves and see if that's feasible for the whole state. also i think archery season is when alot of the really good bucks are shot, mostly due to the high rut activity. if archers were only allowed to shoot spikes, and forkhorns we might see a boom in larger deer in a few years. sorry archers ..haha. but youd be helping the deer population as a whole.. IMHO thats a small sacrifice and something that should be looked into. *quick edit*; the rut does last a while in the state of PA, from like mid october to mid-december based on various sources...with that in mind its feasible deer are being bred beyond rifle season..i just really doubt that they are breeding during the rifle season or shortly after. with all the energy spent hiding constantly from hunters, they are probably not eating very well and breeding is the last thing on their minds..survival comes first.

Some of your assumptions are based on questionable logic. While the primary rut is going on right now, many bucks will still be cruising for does during rifle season. The number of deer taken by seniors and juniors is very small. Also archers take only 13% of the deer killed (23% of the bucks).

I think that the PGC just made too many changes at one time. Killing a lot of does to bring the herd to a 1/1 balance is good management. Antler restrictions might be good for the size of the racks, but it is my opinion that they do nothing for the health of the deer. I do not care if all the deer in PA are scrubby 6 pointers, so long as the habitat can support their numbers. This isn't Texas, after all!