What was 2016 deer take statewide?
Connecticut
Is there a site where the 2016 harvest numbers are available? Just curious how last year compared to prior years. Definitely seemed better than last year for me.
wow over 100 in Redding. thought they were all Gone lol
Over 100 sounds good until you look back to past years takes:
2009-343
2010-301
2011-274
2012-241
2013-156
2014-167
2015-120
All numbers taken from DEEP annual Deer Harvest reports and they also include other forms of mortality besides hunting. That being said on a personal level I don't think I'd be as quick to dismiss legitimate concerns over the health of the deer herd given that trend line. Maybe that's just me though....
Mike Was WB deer kills added to them numbers ? Steve
No, WB was not hunting. They didn't buy hunting licenses and they were paid to kill deer. It's illegal to hunt at night with high powered rifles in CT.
What year did we go to paper tags?
Keep in mind that the population in Redding, as well as many other towns in Fairfield County, were so out of whack for a while that it is really not that surprising to see decreasing trends now. This has been hashed to death over and over here. Bob, get over it, WB is gone and we know it was not hunting and its illegal to hunt with high power rifles at night, it was a study where special conditions for deer kill were approved for the study. WB has been gone for a while so its time to stop blaming WB. Please lets not have another thread turn to shit here, its getting real old.
tobywon - I think you're jumping to conclusions on this one. My intent was to answer a question about WB and the contract with the state to cull deer, and the means they were allowed had nothing to do with legal hunting harvest figures, nothing more. When I'm jerk I have no problem admitting it.
Where were you on my thread "Who got deer this year" when Doc hijacked that one? Could have used your help. :)
Mike, you can’t compare take on a portion of the current season to previous entire seasons. So here, you are comparing take from 76 days of hunting in Redding in 2016 to 138 days of hunting in previous years. That is disingenuous. Let’s wait until the final numbers are reported so we can compare apples to apples.
Here is a Redding buck from this summer.
Scott,
Actually as I was pointing to a trend over 7 years it was not disingenuous in the least; that is unless you wish to advance the argument that the trend line hasn't gone down from 2009-2015 and while it may remain flat in 2016 relative to the prior two years it is nonetheless a marked decrease from years past.
No one is arguing that the numbers now are not in better balance relative to available habitat either; the argument is that there are without a doubt fewer deer now than in the past and if memory serves you do not dispute that fact.
And to save you from trotting out the fallacy that hunters are greedy and want a deer behind every bush every time out that isn't the case; conservationists express concern when a clear trend is present and there are no signs (except in a few areas, a good trend to be sure) of abating overly generous take allowances.
For that reason, many people who post here for the past few years have been advocates of better self-discipline with regard to the number of deer taken per hunter. The major disconnect you seem to have here is with hunters who take their role as that of a conservationist and not a management tool. It isn't a indictment of your position but a reality check; your position is at odds with many here and rather than acknowledge that gracefully at times you seem more concerned with uncalled for criticisms that further alienate you from many posters here.
Now to be fair you have had to deal with an unfair share of criticism of a personal nature and that was (and is) uncalled for. I'm working very hard to keep a 2017 resolution of avoiding that pitfall and hope others here will consider doing the same.
Here is a Harwinton buck from Oct 13th of this year......
Those are a couple of nice deer in Redding Doc ;) Looks like the buck is right at the horseshoe stake. :)
Right Mike. A downward harvest trend no doubt, just like the rest of Zone 11. But let’s compare apples to apples now. The 11/30/16 report Shawn provided only reports archery, landowner, state (which is weird), and private land shotgun/rifle. The Deer Program Summaries from which you pulled the final tallies include archery, shotgun/rifle, landowner, muzzleloader, cropkill, roadkill, and other as you mentioned. So if we exclude the other sources of mortality not reported for 2016 from the Deer Program Summaries (muzzleloader, cropkill, roadkill, and other) we get data included in the attached image. And if we standardize take by figuring out the number of deer killed/number of days in the hunting season, you can see 2016 falls between 2013 and 2012. So like I said, let’s wait until the final numbers are in for the remaining 62 days of hunting before jumping to conclusions. Is it going to be higher than 2010? Probably not. But likely will be higher than a couple years presented here. 2013 is so low because guys got turned off Redding from all the negative press it was receiving here and elsewhere.
Doc - do think the press was negative for Redding hunting opportunities? On one hand it sounded like there were way too many deer and that should have attracted more hunters. I know there was a group of hunters stating the opposite, but if I heard the town was paying for the large deer herd to be culled, I'd consider asking for permission if I was into backyard type of hunting. I guess it depends on the way you read it?
WB = The Boogeyman, coming to steal all your deer in the middle of the night. It's amazing how guys think they can have an impact throughout all Zone 11 by working on 2 square miles in one town. They're like Keyser Soze.
Scott
We're almost on the same page except that your hunting days count is off for the years 2009-2014 during which there was no Sunday hunting allowed. That would drop the numbers down to 119 days for those years.
I have no issue with waiting until the year concludes either; that wasn't the point of my post-the point was merely to offer that the point we're at doesn't mean we're back to days of wine and roses and can continue limitless take, particularly of does.
The sky isn't falling but it doesn't mean we shouldn't adopt a more conservation-oriented approach.
Thanks for the feedback.
Ah. True. I was more interested in standardizing a partial season for comparison to past entire seasons. Fewer days afield would bump up deer taken/day for certain, but only for archery. I will make those corrections and repost. Funny that harvest was so low in 2015 in Redding and archery take overall in Zone 11 given the additional what, 19 additional Sundays of archery hunting? From the bill of goods I was sold, Sunday hunting was going to solve the deer "problem" and reduce human incidences of "Lyme decease" according to the Coalition of CT Sportsmen. . .
