Confusion looking up stats, please help!

[Dbax129]

So, I was looking at hunting reports for special permit holders, and was looking at Vashon Murray second deer.  This is it copy/pasted

Hunt Number   Hunt Name   Hunt Area   Total
Applicants   Permits
Issued   Reports
Returned   Hunters   Hunter
Success
1352   VASHON-MAURY   DEER AREA 4013   58   51   36   17   58.8%
Anterless
Harvest   Antlered
Harvest   Total
Harvest   1 Point   2 Point   3 Point   4 Point   5+ Point
10   0   10   0   0   0   0   

Basically, that table didn't copy over very well, but the ide is this:
58 total applicants
51 permits were issued
36 reports were returned
17 hunters

17 hunters?!?!?!  I am so confused.  They say that only 17 hunters were issued 36 second deer permits?  I don't get it.  51 permits were issued actually, so to only 17 people?  Please help me understand this.  are people getting more than one, so like a 3rd deer tag?  because there are extra permits or something?

[jackelope]

51 permits were issued. Only 17 actually hunted. Of the 51 permits issued, 36 permitees filed their hunter report. Presumably 17 said they hunted, 19 said they did not.

[bobcat]

Basically I agree with Jackelope. The part that I do question is how they determine how many hunted when they have incomplete data. They are lacking 15 reports. Do they have some mathematical formula to take that into account?

[jackelope]

Basically I agree with Jackelope. The part that I do question is how they determine how many hunted when they have incomplete data. They are lacking 15 reports. Do they have some mathematical formula to take that into account?

I think they just report what they get. The other 15 may or may not have hunted, but either way they didn't fill out their reports. That's 15 guys that have to pay the penalty for not filling out their hunter harvest report, right?

[rtspring]

I for one dont believe in any hunter reports?  Does everyone tell the truth??? No!! 

[Bob33]

The data is not 100% accurate but is still useful for looking at trends and comparing units since under reporting probably occurs consistently across different hunts and time periods.

[bobcat]

Basically I agree with Jackelope. The part that I do question is how they determine how many hunted when they have incomplete data. They are lacking 15 reports. Do they have some mathematical formula to take that into account?

I think they just report what they get. The other 15 may or may not have hunted, but either way they didn't fill out their reports. That's 15 guys that have to pay the penalty for not filling out their hunter harvest report, right?

That's what is not clear to me. Out of the 15 missing reports, chances are that some of those hunters DID hunt. So are they all just counted as not hunting? Or do they have a factor they use to estimate how many hunted but did not turn in a report?

[jackelope]

Basically I agree with Jackelope. The part that I do question is how they determine how many hunted when they have incomplete data. They are lacking 15 reports. Do they have some mathematical formula to take that into account?

I think they just report what they get. The other 15 may or may not have hunted, but either way they didn't fill out their reports. That's 15 guys that have to pay the penalty for not filling out their hunter harvest report, right?

That's what is not clear to me. Out of the 15 missing reports, chances are that some of those hunters DID hunt. So are they all just counted as not hunting? Or do they have a factor they use to estimate how many hunted but did not turn in a report?

Sure some of them hunted. They are counted(or not counted really) as the ones that did not report. I don't see a category for "Did not hunt". There's applicants, permits, reports and hunted. There doesn't appear to be any estimates or anything factored to me. What's not reported is not taken  into consideration. It's thrown out the window. It's not perfect world type stuff. It is what it is.

[Bob33]

51 permits were issued. 36 of the permit holders reported. 17 of the 36 reported that they hunted. By inference, 19 of the 36 that reported checked that they did not hunt. There were 15 of the 51 permit holders that did not report. There is no information from them, and thus no information reported by WDFW. They may have hunted, they may not have. They may have harvested, they may not have. They are not included in the data.

[jackelope]

 

[bobcat]

So if that's the case, the deer and elk harvest is very likely much higher than what the harvest report indicates. Correct?

[Dbax129]

Thanks to Jackelope and Bob33.  That clears it up for me completely. 
One other question, why is it that only 51 of people were awarded permits when 58 people applied?  This hunt choice offers 100 permits, so why did 7 of those 58 not get awarded a permit?  Could this have been their 2nd choice and they drew their 1st choice? 

[jackelope]

So if that's the case, the deer and elk harvest is very likely much higher than what the harvest report indicates. Correct?

I'd say it's not an exact science.

[bobcat]

Thanks to Jackelope and Bob33.  That clears it up for me completely. 
One other question, why is it that only 51 of people were awarded permits when 58 people applied?  This hunt choice offers 100 permits, so why did 7 of those 58 not get awarded a permit?  Could this have been their 2nd choice and they drew their 1st choice?

My guess is that the 7 just chose to not buy the tag. It's nearly $70.

[Dbax129]

So if that's the case, the deer and elk harvest is very likely much higher than what the harvest report indicates. Correct?

i'm probably way less experienced at figuring this stuff out, but from what I would assume (and I think that is all one can do here) is that the 15 people that didn't return a report are probably mostly people who did not hunt.  Maybe of the people who reported and those that did not, there were the same ratio of hunters to non hunters, but I would assume that someone who didn't even go on the hunt is more likely to forget to report or fail to report.  Someone who was successfull would probably be more likely to report.  I would be more likely to count the "failed to report" folks as mostly  UNsuccessfull, therefore making the success rate lower than what is reported, not higher. 
This is basically just from personal experience, as this year I tried to report one day late and wasn't allowed to.  I procrastinated because I felt it wasn't very important since I did not harvest. (I know this was the wrong mentality and do not condone this idea).  But that is what happened.