The other reason I don't like them is that in some areas you can't get doe tags or specific properties can't handle doe harvests. In those cases are we to tell a person that had limited time to hunt, that they can't shoot a deer. I don't want to alienate other hunters.
On my properties we have been hammering does and passing young bucks. Guests that visit me can take whatever they want but my family ususlly takes 3.5 bucks at the youngest. These are not large properties and I know some get shot on neighboring properties but many survive. This year I didn't get much time to hunt but I had 3 close encounters with 3 different bucks over 130" and my father took a 150". I guess 7 or so years of management has started to pay off.
Being an out of state hunter and land owner these restrictions on Does has been keeping me and my money out of NY.
STM.
I for one like the option to tag 2 bucks. While I love bowhunting, I also love gun hunting. Especially snow tracking in the Adirondacks. A one buck rule will really mess things up. For the record, I have not killed a NYS buck in more than 2 years with any weapon and have liely passed shot opportunities on over 20 bucks, both bow & gun. Further, it has been about a decade since I did in fact tag bucks with both bow & gun.
I am in favor of shorter seasons. The gun opener South should be moved at least a week later to get the bucks out of peak rut. The Northern zone season should be shortened at the tail end so that yarded bucks don't get hammered as much. Some years they migrate as much as 2 weeks before the end of the season. The high concentrations make them easier targets, especially for hunters that "drive" them from posted lands onto state land using unarmed drivers (trespassers).
Antler restrictions, hmmm, I'm on the fence. I personally have practiced this for a long time. From what I've read, it does improve the quality of the bucks. Plus, for gun hunters, they have to have more study time of the animal to ensure that its legal, instead of buck - BANG!
I question the motivation of the changes as the article almost makes it sound like its change for changes sake....
Just my $.02, I'm sure that some will disagree while others agree....
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How that is accomplished remains to be seen, as DEC whitetail biologists move forward with a “Structured Decision-Making” process that includes a survey of hunters and the creation of management regions across the state that will be used in developing deer hunting regulations.
“I anticipate there will be changes,” DEC wildlife biologist Jeremy Hurst said last month as the process moved forward. “The survey presents a ‘no change’ option but I don’t suspect that will be the case.”
In September 2013 DEC officials unveiled the plan to use the decision-making process that blends whitetail management goals with hunter desires. But the challenges will be huge; although more hunters are passing on yearling bucks than ever before in New York, there remains a solid fraternity of hunters opposed to regulations changes such as mandatory antler restrictions.
Antler restrictions – three points on one side – are now in place in 11 wildlife management units in southeastern New York, but that’s just one potential option that could emerge from the process. DEC officials said those options range from mandatory antler restrictions statewide for the entire season, to:
• mandatory antler restrictions for all of the archery deer season through the first week of the firearms season. • a one-buck harvest limit for hunters. • a shortening of the firearms season by one week in the Southern Zone and two weeks in the Northern Zone. • an active promotion of voluntary antler restrictions in which hunters are urged to pass on yearling bucks. • no changes at all, maintaining deer hunting regulations as they are. That, officials say, is an unlikely outcome of the process.
And regulations may differ from one region of the state to the next. DEC is in the process of establishing “WMU aggregates” which will be used in the decision-making process.
Early indications are the Northern Zone will be comprised of two regions – one in which Deer Management Permits are available and another in which no DMPs are issued.
The Southern Zone WMU aggregates – which have not yet been revealed – are expected to be divided along the lines of southeastern, southwestern, Finger Lakes/Lake Plains, and Central New York/Mohawk Valley areas.
Wildlife management units will remain intact for the purpose of DMP allocations.
“The WMU aggregates are a necessary prerequisite for the Structured Decision-Making process,” Hurst said. “And there’s the potential for (regulations) changes in different parts of the state.”
The decision-making process got off to a slow start last year when a key element – a survey of hunters – was delayed due to a lack of a working agreement with Cornell University’s Human Dimensions
Research Unit and the retirement of DEC wildlife biometrician Ed Kautz. A contract was ultimately signed, and Kautz’s position has been filled.
The Cornell survey, designed to help determine what “tradeoffs” the state’s deer hunters are willing to make in order to boost their opportunity of harvesting a mature buck, has been completed.
The 11-page survey, which was mailed to 7,000 randomly selected big-game license holders, and noted that “depending on the action taken to protect young bucks, hunters may have to give up some freedom to shoot a buck of any size, or give up some opportunity to hunt bucks.”
DEC staff was scheduled to meet this month to move forward with the process, with reports from the decision-making process likely by the end of March.
Proposed regulatory changes would be subject to a public comment period, and Hurst indicated a series of public meetings could also be held.
The regulatory process will be under a tight deadline if DEC officials want to have any changes published in the new hunting and trapping regulations guide, which is typically printed in the summer.
Given the creation of the new WMU regions and the prospect of some major changes in deer hunting regulations, it’s likely the department will want the decision in place in time for publication in the 2015-16 guide.
Can not even get them to allow hunting yotes all year round.
I do support one buck rule, take it with bow or gun but just one, also do like the deer must have 3 points on one side or more, let the little bucks grow up.
Guys who want a one buck rule think it will be easier for them to get a buck since Joe Hunter over the hill can now only shoot one.
Pat: "Deer quality" Ha! I have hunted Pa. hard since 1971 up until a few years ago, and not just in one place. ARs has destroyed deer hunting compared to what it used to be. Only the chosen few get a buck there now. There have always been big bucks there. ARs is a code word for cutting the population.
If ARs get implemented in areas of Western NY, and guys only have a few days to hunt they are going to shoot does like never before for the freezer. Like Pa. there goes the population. Those DMU permits will not be unfilled anymore. And the DEC will be happy that the population is pared way back.
"Protect the yearling buck" what a crock. All the pressure now will be on the 2.5 and 3.5 year olds and those great yearlings that have three on a side. How will we ever get bigger deer if this self-serving AR insanity is made into law?
If you own your own chuck of land, don't let others hunt it, plant crops to feed them sure you can get nice bucks.
Can't we just go back to hunting deer without farming for them? It's the haves versus the have nots and the haves will win because they have the money.
But just one thought. Is it possible that the mature bachelor group in your area took a while to pattern your improved, amended, and exponentially enhanced property into their traveling wheelhouse?
North Central Pa. has always had mature bachelor groups of bucks, long before toadie Alt and the tyrannical greed of the forest managers. When the alpha bachelor group shows up on your property, it may not be cause and effect from ARs...but cause and effect from your efforts. You are not giving yourself enough credit. Further...if ARs had not been instituted in Pa...you would be seeing more and larger bucks. Just my two scents.
With the implication of some of these regs the NY DEC is not re inventing the wheel, they are just modeling states that have recently been more successful in their own management practices. Take a look at where people travel to go hunt deer, it certainly isn't NY on any large scale...there is reason for that. We keep doing the same thing and keep getting the same piss poor results.
Look for announcements for regional meetings to gather "opinions". Bring popcorn; this promises to be more interesting/spirited/controversial than a TBM thread! :)
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I have two pieces of hunting property for sale. The sooner the better they are sold.
