Doe tags

[scott]

between me and the wife we buy 4 tags, 2 each for the different units we hunt. but we only use one a year. 

[foxpro51]

600 tags is insane. I buy tags to save the doe.

[muttbuster]

600 tags, they're full of beans. Control, that's a lot of beans.
Waste and slaughter of deer, yes. I wonder what they do with the meat. Do they let it lay and rot or do they field dress 600 Doe and use they're time and money to take them to a food bank for the hungry? They spend almost $3,600.00 at the county treasurer's office buying tags to control deer. Those guys deserve some recognition, investing that much time and money just to control the deer. For who are they controlling the deer. 30 box's of ammo if they're expert marksman = another $600.00 in ammo. That's 4200.00 so far. Not to mention gas. Do you know how many sides of beef you can buy for the same price. Deer meat is pretty good but lets face it. It ain't beef. I live in Allegheny County, Pittsburgh. Unlimited doe tags as well. Lots of deer. I can honestly say, I spend more time in the woods than most people and I don't believe I've ever seen 600 doe in one season. That's a bunch of deer.

[swarter2]

They're taxidermists.  They get paid to go into gated communities in Bucks county to control the deer herds.  They've asked me a few times to help out and I say no, because I don't think its right.  When I say gated communities.  I mean there may be 7-8 houses on 500-1000acres parcels.

[muttbuster]

I'm with you swarter2, it is not right. Still, I wonder what they do with the meat. Even if they skin them and sell the hide, where is the meat.

[muttbuster]

Close to my house is the Federal Bureau of Mines Research Facility. It sits on about 25 fenced in acres. It was full of deer. We are not aloud to spot it at night or the feds come flying down the road like they are after a bunch of terrorists. It had bucks that would make you choke they were so big. All inside the fence. No trespassing sign every 20 yards all along the fence. Three years ago, they had a company come in and wipe out every deer they could find. They took over three hundred deer. Many record book bucks. I could hear all the shooting from my house. Why not open the gait and let them out? Nope, they had some BS reason why they didn't want them to mix in the local deer population. To this day, I don't know where the deer wound up. Probably in a land fill. None of the local butchers saw them. They went somewhere. This is what kills me about the anti's complaining about someone hunting a deer, a fair and ethical hunt. Something wrong with this picture.

[predator77]

My opinion on the problem isn't the number of tags rather than just the places hunters are not allowed. Meaning, it's not the number of tags hurting the population as much as the areas open to hunters are over harvested so people are gonna have to go in a take deer from these gated communities and  county/city parks. I think property owners should get a %tax break for letting hunters (not just relatives and friends) on to their property to hunt. There are enough deer and I'd like to see bigger bucks (which I have) than see a dozen doe a day. I think there should be a penalty for shooting button bucks in archery period.

[Leglifter]

I was thinking,
If you kill a button buck, you're killing one deer.
If you kill a 6 month old doe, you're killing:
her,
her 1 potential offspring next year
her potential 2 offspring the next
her potential 3 offspring the next (considering she's healthy and well fed)
her 3 again
her 3 again
Now she's 5 1/2 yrs old
her 2 again
her 1

Thats 16 deer

Not to mention, potentially, 50% of her offspring will be breeding does,
so, 8 of those deer will produce 16 more each in 7 years, and so on

Just a thought 

[foxpro51]

Game hogs kill lots of doe

[uncle buck]

Now this is what bothers me....You know all the posted land that no one hunts on...Deer core up and then you start to see the dead deer along the roads.. I always say....Now there is a buck that some 10 year old kid could have shot and felt real good about himself.

Maybe the only good thing about road killed deer now is that some people will pick it up and use it.. Then thats not to bad.

In the case of road kills...Wouldn't you have rather a hunter bagged it instead of allowing it to rot along the road?

Good thing if it gets off into the bushes... The predator will at least eat it.  That too I do not feel bad about.




Maybe.....when it comes to anterless deer hunting? It all depends on where the deer are killed? Yep...on PGL that not the place to hunt anterless deer...It's near the developments that everyone hits them with their cars..This is the place the crossbow and archer should be hunting?

[muttbuster]

I live in the southern suburbs of Pittsburgh. It's getting harder and harder each year to find places to hunt. I bow hunt and have done well over the years taking some very nice bucks. Now, most of the places I used to hunt are posted. When the people with the big money buy up all the bigger tracts of land it becomes posted over night. They don't hunt nor do they let any one hunt. There are always road kills in front of the posted property. Everyone likes to watch the deer in their yard and don't want any hunting. My wife hit one in front of a posted sign on her way to work and did three thousand dollars in damage to her new Jeep. The insurance companies don't like deer kills by vehicles. I hit a deer with my wife's new Jeep and did twenty five hundred dollars in damage. In front of posted property. Don't you think the land owner should carry some of the liability? After all, the deer on his land belong to him. Why does a farmer receive crop damage money from the Government (paid by tax payers) when his farm is posted to the taxpayers and the people that buy hunting license's to hunt the deer that are causing the crop damage? I think that if a farmers land is posted he should not get crop damage money. I hope I'm not up setting anyone with my opinion on this topic. With all the crazy laws on the books, you would seem to think the law makers would get rid of the old no sense laws and pass some new ones that make sense. I'm sorry, i didn't mean to use the words "law makers" and" sense" in the same sentence. They have as much in common as a chalkboard and a duck.

[uncle buck]

Muttbuster I agree with you.. What is bad is there are people getting killed in car/deer accidents.  I  know of people that the person in the driver seat was decapitated by the deer coming through the window..
People that won't allow anyone to hunt the deer in the populated areas and then someone gets killed. 

Also land barons...Now that is a peculiar lot...They can do what they want since that is their land.  However many a land baron got rich because they could give a JACK about anyone else.  They don't care that peoples car are being destroyed. People that are his or her neighboor yet.


Sadly until someone is hurt real bad and neighbors start to complain will they start to allow a few hunters to take deer of some of the land.

[predator77]

Not to go to far off topic Mutt but I agree with you on the crop damage but It also ticks me off that the PGC stocks private properties with wildlife and the landowner is still allowed to say who,what and when you can hunt. I could not believe that when I seen the sign for landowner cooperation access and they wouldn't let me hunt dove there. So I called the game commission and said they have the sign up but would let me hunt and they said that they can choose how many people hunt and what species of animal they hunt. Sounds to me like one family is getting free entertainment off of our license dollars. Politics at it's best. Seems funny to pay more to hunt less. Venison is the most expensive meat on the market righ now.
$20.70 license
$6.70 doe
$16.70 archery
$60.00 butcher each deer.
$10+ gas to buy license,drive to hunt process deer.
+ equipment to harvest a deer.

[muttbuster]

Your right Ian, I still like beef more.

[Critterslayer51]

State Biologists are very smart people, which some may not believe, but they've done their time in research to know what the population of the states deer herd is to the closest determination possible. If they give 50,000 doe tags out like they do in my 5B WMU, there is a reason for it. Some people say they don't see any deer anymore, I say they need to get off the trial a bit, and set up a little farther than 200 yards off the path. The state could work on that, letting the roads open to the inner areas of the state forests, that I would have to bet rarely get seen by the public. I've seen more bucks after the antler restrictions, and that has to do with changes in how we look at deer managment in PA. I'm not saying PA has it perfect, they don't, but they dont' pull these numbers out of a hat and hope we don't kill them all. The practice is more like a balancing act, they can't say we need 1000 does to be taken out and give 1000 tags out and hope for 100%, it wont' happen. They can't say hey we need 1000 does killed, but give 50,000 tags, you will kill more than a 1000 deer. Shoot the deer folks, fill your freezers, share with friends, share with the hungry. If they give out 50,000 tags like they do in 5B, 50,000 deer aren't being killed...and the numbers that are killed, is expected by science. I personally don't think you're helping the local deer population dynamics by buying a doe tag and not using it. The goal is for the popuation to be as close to 1:1 buck to doe as possible, and there will always be more does than bucks, thats Biology, look it up sometime if you wish. The closer you are to 1:1 the healthier your remaining deer population will be in all aspects. We need to get off that your fathers and grandfathers mindset, and start thinking about the facts. By saving the does, doesn't mean you get more deer next year. I know it seems that easy, but it isn't.