Four point minimum 117&121

[Archeryoutfitters]

Right now there are so many predators that a fawn is very lucky to make it to adulthood.

I see in the new proposal they want to limit the fall bear hunt, restrict the number of cougar that can be taken by boot hunters, and make it harder to legally kill a coyote.

i like to try to find good or positiveness in what there doing. we have a real predator problem here and i think bears are probably at the top of the list rite now? i saw 27 different ones last season just driving around? 4 diffident ones in one day? it would be sad to see that happen  

[Fowlweather25]

Right now there are so many predators that a fawn is very lucky to make it to adulthood.

I see in the new proposal they want to limit the fall bear hunt, restrict the number of cougar that can be taken by boot hunters, and make it harder to legally kill a coyote.

I'm with you Dale! I'm gonna start huntin in other states with you! I'm so fed up with the liberal morons in wdfw! It getting to the point that it would be worth the out of state expense to not have to put up with this crap! No matter which way you slice the 4 pt minimum, for every smart thing they do there are ten things they are bending us over for!

[huntnnw]

Right now there are so many predators that a fawn is very lucky to make it to adulthood.

I see in the new proposal they want to limit the fall bear hunt, restrict the number of cougar that can be taken by boot hunters, and make it harder to legally kill a coyote.

i like to try to find good or positiveness in what there doing. we have a real predator problem here and i think bears are probably at the top of the list rite now? i saw 27 different ones last season just driving around? 4 diffident ones in one day? it would be sad to see that happen

Where we bear hunt up in 105.... on avg in 5 days of hunting we will see 12-17 different bears and maybe a few deer...that is alot of glassing some "once" productive areas for both mulies and whiteys. Winters in this area are not bad and deer have a easy option to get down low

[huntnnw]

I dont think that would happen..alot of guys hunt for bucks only... then some want to meat in the freezer and blast a young buck on the last weekend when many would shoot a doe instead if they had the choice. ID has been very liberal with their whitetail seasons and the herd does just fine in ID..hunting pressure less? maybe alot of public land to be hunted there as opposed to a ton of private land here in NE WA

Eastman's did a survey of hunter satisfaction with western big game management, Idaho came in a distant last place.

Well what I am talking about is the northern whitetail herd.... that whole study of people was 99% pissed of about the mule deer herd and mostly southern ID

[muleyguy]

no data supports this thesis;   

I'm not sure if there is or isn't any date. but it is obvious that if a deer is a year older and out of that baby/stupid stage he will be a little wiser,

Taken from the Pennsylvania 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. Prior to the new rules, about 20 percent of the total buck harvest consisted of mature (two years or older) deer. Now, 2-1/2-year-old bucks make up 75 percent of Pennsylvania’s “mature” buck harvest.

you must be saying that whitetail deer in WA are "smarter" then Pennyslvania whitetail deer???  Do you have data to back up your claim that whitetails in WA are smarter then whitetails in PA??

Data taken from QDM and PA and Missouri Game Departments:

Pennsylvania instituted its antler restrictions largely as a result of an extremely low buck-to-doe ratio and a disproportionately low number of mature bucks. There was also some concern among hunters over the lack of quality bucks. By drastically increasing the doe harvest through increases in permits and by cutting down on the buck harvest, biologists have been able to bring the herd into better balance.

Over the past 15 years I have helped establish antlerless harvest goals for numerous properties throughout the country. In almost all cases, I have recommended goals well above those previously established. Often, shortly after my goals are announced, the room becomes quiet as the hunters quickly do the math and realize the enormity of the task at hand. Occasionally, I’ll even get the question, “I know we need to take a lot of does now, but when can we stop killing so many?” As most serious QDM practitioners realize, this day never comes.

QDM in Pennsylvania — 2002
The 2002 deer season was designed to decrease buck harvest and increase antlerless harvest.   The PGC also allocated more than 1 million antlerless licenses, or approximately 150,000 more than the previous record in 1991.

Since 2004 we have been testing an Antler Point Restriction in 29 Missouri counties to see if it would reduce the percentage of does in the deer population. The APR requires a buck to have at least 4 points on one side to be legal. The restriction applied to the archery season and all portions of the firearms season except the youth portion. The expectation was that restricting the bucks that could be taken would promote a larger doe harvest. An additional benefit of this restriction would be that more bucks survive longer and grow antlers large enough to be considered trophies by hunters.

from Minnesota Game Department:

Cornicelli says antler-point restrictions work on the principle that most hunters harvest only one deer each season, no matter the bag limit. "If a hunter doesn't think they are going to get an opportunity at a mature buck, some of them will harvest a doe because they want the venison," he says.

so, as you can see, every serious APR has, at its core, a HUGE antlerless component;  this is BECAUSE it PULLS pressure away from the buck harvest;

In WA we CANNOT do this..........can you understand the problem when you leave the season length and tag numbers the same, and offer no antlerless option??

In PA, where they give out 1 MILLION antlerless tags (yes, thats 1 million.......) and hunters can ONLY shoot 1 deer, many hunters choose to shoot an antlerless animal;

In 2010 60% of PA hunters choose to shoot an antlerless over a buck;  Imagine what would happen in PA if you left the tag numbers the same, but took away the antlerless option???


More Data from Mississippi Game Department:

Has Mississippi’s antler restriction been effective at
increasing the age structure of the buck harvest? Yes! The
average age of harvested bucks before the 4-point antler
restriction was 1.8 years old. The average age of harvest-
ed bucks after the antler restriction was 2 1⁄ 2 years old

The bottom line is that protecting 1 1⁄ 2 -year old
bucks with a 4-point antler restriction on public hunting
areas did not substantially increase the harvest of older-
aged bucks in later years on these areas.

are WA whitetails "smarter" then Mississippi whitetails too???

So, lets put away this nonsense that there is "no data to support my thesis";  there is plenty of data to support it;

you guys are trying to take a management philosophy that has been used on Eastern whitetail herds and adapt it to our conditions, when, you simply cannot do that;

APR's were INTENDED to be used in conjunction with large increases in Antlerless harvests;  in fact, the primary reason in most places for the APR is NOT to decrease buck harvest (this is a secondary benefit) but to PUSH hunters into havesting more antlerless.

Also, most Eastern States with APR's also conduct their hunting season AFTER the breeding season, so at LEAST during the breeding season the age structure is not all screwed up from the APR like it is in a state like WA where the hunting season is before the breeding season.

Do any of you find it a little odd that WA is the only state where large scale APR's are in effect for whitetails and we do not have a large antlerless component???

What about Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho and their whitetail herds??  Not one APR's in those states for whitetails......

Are we to believe that a few private landowners and an outfitter in NE WA have "stumbled" upon the holy grail of management tools for low productivity whitetail herds, like we have in WA??

Once again, the legacy of APR's in this State, when you cannot massively increase antlerless harvest like Eastern states do, is that the pressure on the buck population, and particularily the mature buck population is too large, and, we certainly are not going to cut tag numbers, so what is the legacy of these decisions?

shortened seasons so at least a minimum amount of buck espcapement can happen................more hunters jammed into fewer days...

It is also fairly easy to judge from your comments that in fact, the real purpose of this rule was to drive hunter pressure out of the units with the regulation;

And, this is really a sad state of affairs for this State......when one organized group in two hunting units can bulldoze the WDFW into changing the rules in their unit so as to drive hunting pressure out of that unit onto neighboring units that can't take the pressure either. 

Your "fix" of the problem just shoved the "problem" onto somebody else's hunting unit!  If I hear one more time how this was a "local decsions, by the local stakeholders" and that the rest of us should stay out of it I am going to pull my hair out........that was pretty convenient to just use regulations to shove hunter pressure out of your units onto somebody else's.

Which causes the next problem.........APR's are like cancer in this State:

They never go away, and expand into the whole state.....they expand into the whole state because the neighboring units with no APR's can't take the increased pressure

[turkey slayer]

What ever anyone says Muleyguys has an anwser and he knows everything even if the proff is coming from back east. It's only the first year with the 4point min so we really don't know how many deer were harvested. This tread has went on for way to long with the same anwsers over and over. There has been some real good points that have came up but all so some bad ones. There really isen't any prof yet.

Sorry if I pi**ed anyone of but it's the same thing over and over again

[huntnnw]

 

WAY TIRED OF PA STUDYS!  QUIT COMPARING

[muleyguy]

WAY TIRED OF PA STUDYS!  QUIT COMPARING

then, please......explain to me what "data" was used to make this decision?   

The biologist's were against it, so it certainly didn't come from them.   

Please, somebody point me to a study, or some other credible scientific data, that shows APR's will work in the situation we have in NE WA???

who did these stakeholders who were pushing this get their biological data from to come up with this plan??

Let's stop kidding ourselves.......the people pushing this went right to QDM and Eastern US whitetail examples to justify this rule;  it is as simple as that;  earlier in this thread BP even showed us an email he sent to the PA game commission!

The bottom line is that there is NO data supporting what they are doing...........did they hire some private biologist to render them a professional opinion on this???  Or did they just come up with it on their own?? 

So, impress me, where did they get this idea to implement an APR???

The idea had to come from somewhere.......

Don't kid yourself..........they used APR's in Eastern States and QDM philosophies to justify this rule.............and, unfortunately, they didn't even do their homework properly because anybody with any professional training or experience would understand that our whitetail herds are vastly different;

We ALREADY know how APR's work in this State when you don't have an antlerless option, and, you don't cut tag numbers.............

The result is permantly shortened seasons with no better hunting, no better herds, poorer mature bucks, but, the avg buck harvested being 2.5 yr old instead of 1.5 yr old;

Thats the legacy so, you don't have to go far to understand how its going to work;  you guys act like there is something magical in 117 and 121 with Unicorns running around crapping skittles or something, and that unit is special and the APR's are going to magically "save" the herds, when that hasn't been the case in any unit in the state with muleys or whitetails.

Sorry, there is nothing special about those units;  and the APR's are going to work there they same they do in the rest of the state;  you are going to have high hunter satisfication because harvest age goes up by one year;  which means you will never get rid of it;  and, over time you will end up with a shorter and shorter season;  and, you will have no better buck to doe ratio, no better herd numbers (because how does a few extra 1.5 yr old bucks in the population help the herd) and most likely poorer numbers of 4.5 yr old or better animals.

You want to fix the herds in NE???   Save the mommas and help them make more babies.........adding a few extra 1.5 yr old bucks into the population, or coming up with goofy regulations to force hunting pressure into other units is not the long term answer. 

[BOWHUNTER45]

Right now there are so many predators that a fawn is very lucky to make it to adulthood.

I see in the new proposal they want to limit the fall bear hunt, restrict the number of cougar that can be taken by boot hunters, and make it harder to legally kill a coyote.

I'm with you Dale! I'm gonna start huntin in other states with you! I'm so fed up with the liberal morons in wdfw! It getting to the point that it would be worth the out of state expense to not have to put up with this crap! No matter which way you slice the 4 pt minimum, for every smart thing they do there are ten things they are bending us over for!

This is my way of thinking too!!! seriously I am about to cut back on how much I hunt in Washington and just take one or two weeks and go else where.....Some of the sheet I am reading lately is really pi$$ing me off.... The state of Washington needs serious game management lessons...and for the record P.a has studied Whitetails for many many years and it is hard to compare Washington Whitetail to P.a s whitetail because they have way more hunting pressure than we do BUT they still survive ...When I came out here and hunted whitetail I kinda laughed because most of the deer I seen here just stand and look at ya ...In P.a good luck with that  :chuckle:Alot different shooting at a whitetail standing than doing mock 10 threw the hardwoods.....think you can run a rifle  Go give it a try !!!!! I may be a little rusty at it now but not much

[Miles]

You know the saying.  The grass is always greener on the other side.

It seems like every state specific forum you go to, it's all the same.  Everyone complaining about how bad their state is managing game, and how great the other states are in comparison.


I will say this, some of you guys don't know how good you have it.   A bad day of whitetail hunting in Washington beats the hell out of a good day of hunting in northern New Hampshire. 

[huntnnw]

no crap MILES.....some dont get it.  They complain of overhunting....dont think most hunters in this state have seen real pressure   I can go on ANY given day in the general elk or deer season and find a great place to hunt without every running into anyone

[Fowlweather25]

no crap MILES.....some dont get it.  They complain of overhunting....dont think most hunters in this state have seen real pressure   I can go on ANY given day in the general elk or deer season and find a great place to hunt without every running into anyone

Or any elk or deer! Sounds like hoot!

[bearpaw]

WAY TIRED OF PA STUDYS!  QUIT COMPARING

then, please......explain to me what "data" was used to make this decision?   

The biologist's were against it, so it certainly didn't come from them.   

Please, somebody point me to a study, or some other credible scientific data, that shows APR's will work in the situation we have in NE WA???

who did these stakeholders who were pushing this get their biological data from to come up with this plan??

Let's stop kidding ourselves.......the people pushing this went right to QDM and Eastern US whitetail examples to justify this rule;  it is as simple as that;  earlier in this thread BP even showed us an email he sent to the PA game commission!

The bottom line is that there is NO data supporting what they are doing...........did they hire some private biologist to render them a professional opinion on this???  Or did they just come up with it on their own?? 

So, impress me, where did they get this idea to implement an APR???

The idea had to come from somewhere.......

Don't kid yourself..........they used APR's in Eastern States and QDM philosophies to justify this rule.............and, unfortunately, they didn't even do their homework properly because anybody with any professional training or experience would understand that our whitetail herds are vastly different;

We ALREADY know how APR's work in this State when you don't have an antlerless option, and, you don't cut tag numbers.............

The result is permantly shortened seasons with no better hunting, no better herds, poorer mature bucks, but, the avg buck harvested being 2.5 yr old instead of 1.5 yr old;

Thats the legacy so, you don't have to go far to understand how its going to work;  you guys act like there is something magical in 117 and 121 with Unicorns running around crapping skittles or something, and that unit is special and the APR's are going to magically "save" the herds, when that hasn't been the case in any unit in the state with muleys or whitetails.

Sorry, there is nothing special about those units;  and the APR's are going to work there they same they do in the rest of the state;  you are going to have high hunter satisfication because harvest age goes up by one year;  which means you will never get rid of it;  and, over time you will end up with a shorter and shorter season;  and, you will have no better buck to doe ratio, no better herd numbers (because how does a few extra 1.5 yr old bucks in the population help the herd) and most likely poorer numbers of 4.5 yr old or better animals.

You want to fix the herds in NE???   Save the mommas and help them make more babies.........adding a few extra 1.5 yr old bucks into the population, or coming up with goofy regulations to force hunting pressure into other units is not the long term answer.

Muleyguy I think you are argueing for the sake of argueing. Antlerless hunting has gone from thousands of permits and numerous wide open seasons to very little antlerless hunting in the NE. Most of us are in agreement on reducing antlerless harvest. One reason for the point restriction is to save some of the bucks to breed those does efficiently.

There is very little data specific to NE WA, and you likely know that, WDFW doesn't even have good data to support the style of management they have been employing. The whitetail working group insisted on better data collection and to their credit I see WDFW has upgraded their data collection.

I have presented data showing a continual decline of the whitetail herd and the need for a new style of management. Nobody knows what will work best for the herd that is why we need to try strategies different than the status quo which was not working. Science is learned by conducting controlled experiments, if you don't experiment you will never learn anything new!


http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/scientific%2Bmethod?q=Scientific+method

scientific method
a method of procedure that has characterized natural science since the 17th century, consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses: criticism is the backbone of the scientific method

[6x6in6]

Thought this mildly applied to the APR decision.

Montana has explored many population management tactics and adopted a few that work here, Thompson said. In the 1990s, FWP considered limiting mule deer hunters to racks with three points or more. The idea was to preserve more of the yearlings and fork-horns that would grow up and sprout bigger racks.

"The allure of the point restriction was it doesn't limit the number of hunters," Thompson said. "But the assumption it grows big bucks isn't what happens. If you force all the hunting pressure on the bucks that have three or four points or more, you're truncating the population at an age structure."

On the other hand, setting up trophy hunting districts with tiny permit quotas has proved effective here. As Thompson put it, "It's darn hard to draw a tag, but when you do, you've got something to hunt for."

From here and near the end of the article:
http://missoulian.com/news/local/montana-has-plenty-of-white-tailed-deer-but-not-with/article_3c6d1e1a-4fbe-11e1-83b7-001871e3ce6c.html

[BOWHUNTER45]

no crap MILES.....some dont get it.  They complain of overhunting....dont think most hunters in this state have seen real pressure   I can go on ANY given day in the general elk or deer season and find a great place to hunt without every running into anyone

I agree with ya their.... Not saying I can not find places to hunt without running into other hunters... thats how I run ... I see someone near me I beat feet to higher ground  its the game we are lacking .... not people .....for the amount of land we have in Washington we should see alot more game ... not saying we do not have any but we should have alot more with alot opportunity to harvest game ... Just like over here on the wetside ...blacktail numbers are down BUT as soon as they open it wide open to logging then we will see the blacktail numbers start to rise .... when logging was going well in the 80s and early 90s we had blacktail everywhere... now they are very spotty , at least where I live !!!