Four point minimum 117&121

[bearpaw]

I happened to stumble upon this message I recieved from a PA Game Commissioner that I had asked about APR when the whitetail working group was meeting. You can draw your own conclusions.


Dale,

PA implemented antler restriction in 2003. The goal was to get a  more balanced age-class of bucks.  Prior to AR Pa hunters killed 85% of all bucks before they reached 2 years old.  Remember, PA has one-million hunters in the field on the first day of deer season.

In most of the state the AR rules required a minimum of 3-points on one side.   In western PA where the habitat was so good a 1-1/2 year old deer might carry a 6-8 point rack (we count both sides), so the AR rules were raised to a minimum 4-points on one side. 

We are now considering modifying the 4-point area to a 3-on top or 3-up rule, where the brow tine doesn't count.  We found that since 8-point racks are the common configuration for mature bucks, hunters were seeing these bucks during hunting season, but couldn't pull the trigger because it was so difficult to see a brow tine. 

Our records show that 88% of 8-points have brow tines.  So this change will only result in an additional 12% of bucks being removed from the age class distribution. We do not feel this will adversely affect the age-class distribution.

Obviously not all hunters like antler restrictions, but after a few years it reached a 68% approval rate.

I hope this helps.
-Commissioner R. Martone

[Bob33]

More from PA:
www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/document/715029/handout_-_biology_and_hunting_-_antler_restrictions_-_v13_20090806_pdf

[buckfvr]

I read that link, Bob33, and am now wondering why all the negative posts regarding APR that reference Pa.  Im glad we are trying it.....time will tell.

[Sitka_Blacktail]

Bearpaw and Bob, maybe it would be worthwhile to look a little closer to what's happening in Pennsylvania since the APR was put in. 

http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=625882&mode=2

APR's went into effect there in 2002.  That year, buck harvest dropped from 203,000 to 165,000 as would be expected, but the doe harvest went from 282,000 to 352,000.  That may or may not be a good thing if they were trying to reduce the herd to protect habitat. The overall harvest that year was the all time record of 517,000 deer. Since then, harvest has steadily declined to where in 2010. the buck harvest was about 123,000 and the antlerless harvest was 193,000 for an overall harvest of 316,000. So in a 9 year span, deer harvest dropped almost 40%.  It's pretty easy to see why hunters there are dissatisfied with the way things are going there. Now I haven't looked at any of the management reports so I'm not going to guess whether or not that reduction was called for. It may be what was called for looking at their biological info. Their game dept may have wanted to reduce the deer population. Or it may just be that biological stresses reduced the herd as does are carrying less twins.  Or it could have been because of a mistake in their management strategy.  But the plan to let bucks live one more year surely didn't increase or even maintain harvest levels.  They dropped same as the doe levels did.

Now lets look at their buck situation. First off, according to link that Bob posted, "The primary goal of APRs was to increase the number of adult bucks (2.5 years of age or older)" So as muleyguy pointed out, they are equating 2 1/2 year old bucks as mature adults, not 4 1/2 year old bucks. Now that may look good if you're comparing it to previously when they were harvesting 80% 1 1/2 year old bucks. As they say, "in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king. But again as muleyguy points out, contrary to what some have been hypothesizing here, that since those bucks got a year older, they will also be a year smarter and therefore more of them will get even older, that is not the case. Here's a quote from the link Bob posted. "The increased harvest of adult bucks does not necessarily mean more “record book” bucks. Although age structure and number of adult bucks in the harvest has increased, about 75 percent of them are only 2.5 yearsof-age. In other words, most of Pennsylvania’s bucks are still being harvested prior to growing their largest antlers. They still aren't getting more bucks to REAL maturity.

Another interesting fact from looking at those harvest reports from Pennsylvania is; their buck harvest also dropped 40% so it looks like the whole herd may have shrunk by 40%.  But, there could be something else going on.  first, looking at those harvest reports, I noticed something that seemed peculiar.  Since 1985, for the most part they have harvest an equal or greater number of does than bucks. Much of the time, substantially more does, some years 100% more does. Now if males and females are born at approximately a 50-50% ratio and does are harvested in substantially numbers, it would appear that Pennsylvania would be stockpiling bucks and the buck harvest numbers would be rising as those bucks got older and grew larger antlers. But that isn't happening. I can think of three reasons for that and there may be more I haven't thought of. But one would be fawn bucks that were taken with an antlerless tag may explain the difference.  Another one would be that bucks are being poached at a higher rate than does. And the third would be that they really are stockpiling bucks, but smaller than legal bucks. In other words, taking out the bucks that are genetically inclined to grow antlers with more points, has over time, genetically altered the antler makeup of the herd. On a herd hunted as hard as the Pennsylvania herd is, it's possible that for a buck to survive it's genetically beneficial to have less antler points, even though the Penn Game Department denies it. As Bob's link points out..........  "Age structure of the antlered harvest before APRs was about 80 percent yearling bucks and 20 percent adultbucks. With the increase in survival of yearling bucks under APRs, the age structure of the antlered harvest changed to about 55 percent yearling bucks and 45 percent adult bucks."

Think about this.......even with an APR 55% of the bucks taken were still yearlings.  And they were the yearlings more inclined to grow larger antlers.  So the extra 25% of the harvest that switched from being harvested as yearlings into being  harvested as 2 1/2 year old "mature" bucks was made up predominantly of the bucks that were more inclined toward small antlers as yearlings. That is why they survived to be 2 1/2 year olds.  So these bucks inclined to smaller antlers are doing more of the breeding now, before they are harvested after the rut.  Get the picture yet? Hit the bigger antlered bucks hard.........leave the smaller antlered bucks to breed next year.  Do this for 10 years or longer and what do you think you get? I can't make it any clearer than this.

One last thought. You can manage for lots of animals to hunt, or you can manage for a nice sustained yield with a good mix of age classes, or you can manage for trophy animals, but you can't manage for all three because the methods needed for each conflict with each other. You can get a bit of an overlap with the first and the second, or the second and the third, but you never see a situation where you have many animals and trophy animals on a hard hunted herd. You might see it in a herd where hunting is void or strictly limited.  But not in a hunt where there is lots of opportunity. Pennsylvania for deer, and Sweden for moose are classic examples of managing for lots of animals to hunt.  You have a young very vibrant breeding herd and harvest about as many female animals as males. Most animals harvested are 2 1/2 or younger.  Trophies are mostly unheard of.  Personally, I prefer a good sustainable plan with a good mix of age classes.

[muleyguy]

I happened to stumble upon this message I recieved from a PA Game Commissioner that I had asked about APR when the whitetail working group was meeting. You can draw your own conclusions.

I read that link, Bob33, and am now wondering why all the negative posts regarding APR that reference Pa.  Im glad we are trying it.....time will tell.

you guys still don't get it do you???

Can you understand the big difference??

The "big" difference is that PA has an ANTLERLESS option for the hunters;

In 2010, 60% of the overall harvest was antlerless deer.

I mean, how many times do I have to point it out???

You guys keep trying to compare our regulation to theirs;  YOU CANNOT do that;  it is not apples to apples comparison;

The antlerless option "pulls" hunter pressure away from the bucks;

can you guys understand that??

Even with all this hunting pressure being pulled away from the buck population from the antlerless option, the below quote is from the PGC (penn game commission):

Where it has been instituted, either through regulations or through voluntary cooperation by clubs and individual hunters, antler restrictions have resulted in more bigger bucks in the entire population. Bigger, however, is a relative term. Data compiled by the PGC shows that while yearling bucks are indeed surviving at higher rates, most are being harvested the first year they are legal.

So EVEN though 60% of the hunters in the field are shooting antlerless animals, the bucks are just living one year older then they would have;  they are just shooting 2.5 yr old bucks;

What do you think would happen in PA if they didn't have an antlerless option, and all those hunters were focused on bucks??  (like here........)

Anyone ever stop to think that might be an important piece of the puzzle???

Please tell me in your "research" that you discussed this with the PGC people???  Did anyone even factor in that in EVERY Eastern US whitetail area that has APR's, over half of the harvested animals are antlerless, thereby pulling pressure off of the buck population??

[huntnnw]

U cant compare ANY of it to here so quit bringing this stupid study up...terrain, amount of hunters etc nothing is the same

[sebek556]

but that ruins all the arguments 

[Miles]

I gave up on this pointless argument a long time ago...

So, you guys want some more "guess the age of this buck" pictures?

[bobcat]

I gave up on this pointless argument a long time ago...

So, you guys want some more "guess the age of this buck" pictures?

Yes, post 'em up...

[Maverick]

The last buck i posted was actually 4.5. Wed been watching him for the last couple of years and my buddy has his sheds.

[muleyguy]

The last buck i posted was actually 4.5

possibly;  but not likely;  he doesn't have the facial figures of a 4.5 yr old buck nor the antler structure; 

Wed been watching him for the last couple of years and my buddy has his sheds.

post pics of the 3 sets of sheds you have

[muleyguy]

U cant compare ANY of it to here so quit bringing this stupid study up...terrain, amount of hunters etc nothing is the same

your'e exactly right, thats why I wish all the pro APR guys would stop  using these Eastern US examples of APR's as a basis for using APR's here;

Unfortunately, I have read time and again on here that when this "group" proposed this rule, they contacted and used these Eastern US APR's as a guide in proposing the APR's here;

Obviously, BP has had direct contact with them;

The APR's here will not work like they do in the Eastern US because our herds are not as productive and we do not have an antlerless option;  APR's were designed by Dr Alt in PA to deal with overpopulated, poor age structured, low buck to doe ratio herds.

There was no scientific basis for this rule in NE it was just a stab in the dark........

[bearpaw]

Blacktail I don't disagree with what you are saying for the long term. We are actually in a much different situation than PA anyway. Please remember that we have eliminated most doe harvest to try and let the herd grow. The goal is to increase herd numbers in the short term. I would like to remind everyone that the reason I was in favor of the APR now is to lower the harvest of bucks. We accomplished that goal this year. As I have said many times over, I don't know if this is a long term answer, we will need to look at the results after 5 years. I have also more or less said that we may find it is best as a short term solution.

Muleyguy, you really need to look past your personnal bias. I used to be opposed to APR too. But we are in a situation where our herd keeps dropping and something needs done, the current management of shooting any buck was not bringing back our deer (most likely due to too many predators). So we can continue to let the herd decline or we can try to do something about it by reducing human harvest.

Science is learned by conducting controlled experiments, if you don't experiment you will never learn anything new.

[Maverick]

We dont have his first tiny set. We have his 2.5. And 3.5 set. We watched  this buck for a long time. He's 4.5 years old. Id even missed the buck in 2010. He didn't grow much in a year.

[turkey slayer]

Muleyguy so what would you really like to see happen. Shut the area down keep hunting it and kill everything since you don't think this will work.

I think this is the best thing that could ever happen in this area. We have had property in the Fruitland are since 94 and have family that owns property from Fruitland to Cediona that farm a lot of the property. I tell ya what it is sure nice to finally see bucks while we are hiking and driving around. Ya they are spikes and 2 points but be for this 4 point min came into affect we never seen that. I have driving HWY 25 a lot this winter and now I can count 15 to 20 bucks from Spokane res. to Kettle Falls. Ya maybe 20% are 3 1/2 year old buck but at least we are seeing the difference finally and this was the first year.

A lot of people can't tell what a 3 1/2 year old buck looks like and we are really talking about WT so half the time to can't really judge them in less you have them on trail cam or sitting in tree stand or ground blind.You know just like I know a lot of people run and gun them and you aren't going to shot a mature buck in less you are real lucky. A lot of people will see a 4pt main frame or a 3pt with eye guards and shot it. That isn't going to change people from hunting and shotting a 2 1/2 old buck.

I really didn't want to get involved in this debate but I just had to put my  in.

Thanks Brandon