The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation informs us that only 16% (approx.) of all deer management permits are filled annually. In 2008, DMP’s accounted for 86,417 antlerless deer being harvested in New York State. (56,117adult does, 13,040 female fawns, 15,001 fawn bucks and 2,259 adult males). In my opinion, other than the adult does, that equates to 30,300 mistakes, or errors in judgment. Call them what you want, but you can’t convince me that hunters take to the woods with intent to shoot button bucks and fawns! When 36% percent of the DMP’s account for the harvest of juvenile males and fawns; that suggests to me that there is something terribly wrong with this state’s deer management scheme.
“In recent years, only about one-third of hunters with DMPs were successful in filling them. Hunters fill about half of those permits with adult does. Therefore, it is necessary to issue about six permits for each adult doe to be killed.” --- DEC Website
The DEC approximates that in order to fill one adult doe permit they need to issue six! In the last few years it has become possible to consign your unused permit over to another person! They are “hoping” that the tags get filled and that is NOT responsible, effective deer management. The percentages are stark when you think about them. In real terms, the DEC accounts for 30,000 (approx) mistakes annually to try and reach their doe management goals. That my friends, is NOT deer management! It is a feeble understanding of real numbers that the DEC expects to positively affect management goals. In reality, that is not good deer management at all!
A reasonable person only has to look at the way the DEC accounts for deer numbers and management needs to realize what a travesty deer management has become in New York State! The DEC proudly tells you that their primary resource for accounting for deer “number fluctuation needs” is the Citizen Task Force Groups. I wonder if the average hunter realizes how often these groups meet? The DEC website tells you these groups should convene at least every five years. Now, for example, if you go to the DEC website and look at WMU 3H, you will see that the last time a Citizens Task Force Group met was 1996. Yes, that’s 14 years ago in a management unit that has an antler restriction pilot program going on. Does anyone think that the deer population in 3H has not changed over the last 14 years? How about the landscape and its effect on an already unstable population? Anybody out there think that maybe the DEC needs to re-evaluate their protocol for managing deer numbers? I certainly do!
The premise of the Citizens Task Force Groups on paper is probably a good one. People from diverse groups throughout different communities are brought together to discuss and address deer populations and management needs, but when those groups, either don’t meet often enough or a community’s logistics change, then the value of their management goals is only as good as the last meeting. This cannot be the acceptable practice for deer management in our state. It is irresponsible to think that management needs and goals 14 years ago would be applicable today!
I will offer a solution to the ineffective system of deer management permits in New York in my next blog.
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Our state deer biologist shoots fawns when invited to hunt on high end QDMA properties so it must be good deer management.
ReplyDeleteClearly shooting buck fawns is wrong and a mistake. Add the buck fawns to the yearling bucks and 70% of the harvest state wide is 1.5 year old and younger bucks, otherwise know as immature bucks. Every hunter would prefer to harvest a mature racked buck. What’s wrong with DEC management of deer? No mature bucks.
DEC treats deer as a pest population to be controlled by any means not as a valuable resource.
As for does hunters harvest almost equal numbers of does and bucks so the hunters are doing the job when it comes to does. The DEC just need to help educate hunters in how to avoid shooting buck fawns. A few years ago the guide had some information on how to tell an adult doe from a fawn but nothing on how to tell a buck fawn! Buck fawns run up to hunters- clearly the most vulnerable deer in the woods!