Too many does, not enough big bucks?

Posted 8/21/12

I cannot speak for the deer population in Wildlife Management Unit (WMU) 3A but I do hunt in 4W, 3H and 3M. All these areas have plenty of does on private land. The issue is a lack of bucks being …

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Too many does, not enough big bucks?

Posted

I cannot speak for the deer population in Wildlife Management Unit (WMU) 3A but I do hunt in 4W, 3H and 3M. All these areas have plenty of does on private land. The issue is a lack of bucks being seen and harvested. The ration of does to bucks is imbalanced for sure, and at most a one-buck limit for all the seasons should be implemented as part of the resolution to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).

State land is another story. It needs to have some logging done to allow better access for everyone and to improve habitat by allowing brush/bushes and new tree/browse/edge growth to come up, because old woods cannot hold as many quality deer per square mile as can a mixed habitat of farms, woods and prairie, etc. However it is my opinion that the WMUs in question may have too many bears/coyotes and considerable poaching, road hunting, trespassing and unreported game harvests, thus a need for more DEC officers on patrol.

A drastically shortened hunting season will not resolve the problem of quality and quantity of deer in a specific WMU. If the deer don’t have quality habitat we won’t have quality or quantity of deer. Think about it, what are the deer supposed to eat in January with two feet of snow on the ground in the big, tall old state land woods?

I come from Florida where, as in many states, the hunting season is about six months long. Some states have three-plus months of rifle season. Florida issues permits for many wildlife management areas to control the amount of hunters in any one area, thus limiting the deer harvest. I can tell you when I see deer in the woods the deer runs off 100 feet or so and stops and looks back, then walks off if I just stand still and drop my gaze. The pressure on the deer is greatly reduced by having a long hunting season rather than by having a barrage of hunters bombarding the woods over two weeks.

John J.P. Pasquale

Livingston Manor, NY

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