No, they couldn't get it done with high powered rifles, bait, hunting at night and shooting from vehicles. They had to stop because a guy in truck was looking at them. I hate when that happens.
Amazing that both Redding and Newtown have triple digit take, yet again, despite FLIR surveys that clearly show single digit deer densities. The hunters in those towns are incredibly efficient!!
Wait... what?? If deer reproduction can support triple digit harvests in Zone 11 despite single digit densities according to Glen, why can't the same thing occur with single digit densities in NW CT where you hunt? Curious....
Maybe it turns out that the hunters in Redding and Newtown really do know how to hunt. If there are so many deer left, that makes you wonder why the "experts" couldn't find enough to fulfill their contracted kill numbers (oh yeah I forgot, a guy in a truck scared off the hired shooter, or the deer, or something). Sometimes people try to have it both ways. I wonder if that's why White Buffalo decided to stop trying to kill them and just start tickling their nuts.
Doc - first,......you need deer to reproduce. Second,........you need to get rid of the predators. Third,......you need to reduce the tag limits so the fawns that don't get eaten can live and reproduce. I have a book for you,.....it's really interesting. :)
That’s probably it Ace. You nailed it. The hunters in Redding and Newtown are exceptional and “really know how to hunt”. So too do the hunters in the 19 other towns with triple digit harvest thus far, but not in towns with only double digits. It’s probably not that there are a boatload of deer still in those towns that can sustain triple digit harvest year after year after year. Your attempts to insult are juvenile at best. WB did not make the decision. I did. So now you are trying to insult WB for not killing more deer? That is ridiculous.
Oneeye. To clarify, WB was not hunting at all. They were lethally eliminating deer with many of the handicaps imposed on hunters lifted to make them more efficient at doing so. It is not meant to be fair chase, it is to remove deer. Bob doesn’t seem to grasp this yet. You are absolutely correct though; deer wise up fast when they watch their kin get smoked. But if your goal is deer reduction and not harvest of a single animal, precautions can be taken to insure no animals are educated to the lethal threat. Specifically, leave no witnesses. If 8 deer come in, don’t kill 2 and educate 6. Let them leave, and wait until a single or a doe/fawn pair come in and take the doe first, the fawn second, and leave 0 educated deer behind. Hunters don’t do this usually. They do excel at educating animals. Best thing a hunter can do is keep deer naïve, but it takes discipline.
Bob. I would love to see the book you have for me. But I have issue with your item #1. How are we going to insure the deer are going to reproduce? Should we open up some watering holes in Housatonic State Forest so the bucks can bring their favorite ladies? Should we mix some Viagra in corn and broadcast that into the woods? I’m pretty sure deer know how to reproduce. But I agree limiting mortality is a good way to boost population abundances.
I’m not so convinced on the deer are super wise theory. I don’t think they differentiate between being killed by a hunter as opposed to a car, coyote, etc. They may change their pattern or habits temporarily if there is a disturbance but where I hunt deer have been coming to their demise to the same baited spot for years. I am doubtful they would avoid a spot because they saw their sibling catch an arrow a month ago. Plenty of stories out there of deer walking past a dropped deer without getting super agitated so the hunter gets a twofer in one sitting.
Different deer are going to behave differently as they are individual sentient animals. Guys underestimate their negative conditioning of deer behavior. Most guys think it's random, but deer are responding directly to hunter presence. Sure, dumb deer will step over a fallen comrade to get to the bait pile, and will be dead by the end of the season for being stupid. You'd be wise to let the dumb one walk so he/she can infect other deer with their limited mental capacity making the rest of them easier to harvest.
Sure Doc, deer don't cross the same section of the road year after year because they learn it's dangerous. And they don't over breed because they learn that their food source will be depleted. And deer don't frequent waterholes because they know hunters will shoot them. And they don't smoke because they have learned it causes cancer. And they don't play the piano because they've learned that it gives away their position. They're amazing animals. All of the science is right there in the documentary film called Bambi. Can't understand how the same deer that got wounded one time is killed the second time in the same spot by the same hunter. Of cross you're trying to prove a negative by saying hunters only kill the dumb deer, not the smartest. You, the big bucks or those smart breeding doe. Hmmmmm.
My bad. You're right Bob. Deer are dumb and begging to be killed by humans. They do not take evasive action and human behavior does not negatively condition them. Carry on for the next 16 years....
Ah, can't argue against a clear, logical argument, huh Doc? I was out today and came across lots of dumb deer just begging for a well placed arrow by a marksman like myself. But I wanted to teach them that im harmless so they would tell that old buck that im looking for.
Ah, where did I say I was in Housatonic? I said I was close to home and no where near the NW corner. Try to keep up Doc. I'll use smaller words in the future.
I'm still trying to get a handle on this "logical argument." If your argument is that deer are creatures of habit, don't learn, hunters do not influence deer behavior, and deer do not communicate with one another, you are being a contrarian or you are incredibly naive.
Doc, the guys can just feel the attraction between us, I guess we didn't do a good job trying to hide it. Anyway, my logic is based upon everything you have taught us. Deer can pattern hunters over bait but not WB. If you want to eliminate the deer car problem on Staten island just put them back after you snip them,...... logical. There were thousands of deer in Redding but WB couldn't kill their quota because of a single guy in a truck. Deer learn to avoid danger but cross the road in the same place year after year. All logical arguments, in your world.
WB captured over 1000 bucks over bait in Staten Island, where they weren't restricted to 2 square miles, where hunters hadn't yet educated deer, they didn't have direct hunter interference, or participant harassment, or harassment of participant's children, or opponents trespassing on participant's land, or direct harassment of staff, or counter baiting, or a media misinformation campaign, or false statements to law enforcement. What SI politicians want to do to attempt to solve their deer problem is their call, not mine, not your's, not WB, not Glen's. If deer and vehicles coexisted for more than 100 years, yup, I would expect them to perceive a Buick doing 75 on the Parkway a threat. But seeing as they didn't coevolve with the internal combustion engine, I'd say you are not doing yourself any favors by continually broadcasting your naivety and ignorance of deer and animal behavior.
I have a slightly different theory on this. I am not questioning that deer can learn in a limited way but I think at times we overstate their cleverness. I also think there are significant differences depending on the environment. Mature bucks in the upper peninsula in Michigan or in the Adironacks have adapted over the decades to be super wary of people so if they smell a person in the same valley they are gone. Suburban whitetails in lower FF County have largely adapted in the past decades to be rather brazen and graze on the hostas while homeowners are screaming get off of my lawn. So behavior that will terminate your gene pool in one environment may proliferate it in another.
Why are Adirondak bucks super weary? Because if they weren't, they'd be dead. They have been conditioned to avoid humans through the lethal threat. A FF County mom yelling at deer is annoying, but not enough of a negative stimulus to cause harm and change behavior. If you walked into the room and beat your dog everyday for 4.5 months, he'd avoid you. If you yelled at your dog 3 days a year for being in the garden with no negative stimulus, he'd flip you the bird and do his thing. It's like training a dog. Too bad more deer hunters don't have working dogs, then they'd get it.
The thing is too, the elusive educated deer are the ones hunters do not see. But I do from the air. When all those guys were crying there were no deer left in Redding, despite triple digit harvest, even when the devil WB was operating there, 3 different agencies using different censusing techniques were estimating an uncorrected 30 deer/square mile. Hunters were baffled, called us liars, cried conspiracy, and hired a low-budget company to do a survey and count 25% of the deer to get the results they were looking for. I even broke down by property owner where the deer were and over 80% were on private unhuntable land. DEEP knows this too, which is why they won't reduce tag allotment in zones 11 or 12 anytime soon. Why are deer in these locations? Cause intense pressure from hunters over 4.5 months have forced deer to seek refuge. They're there, guys just need to knock on doors. Or the logical thing to do is claim deer are dumb, claim state government is colluding to trick the public, and complain on online message boards.
Doc, I know several guys on this site that only shoot the smart deer,..... prove to me they don't. You can't.
You say hunting from the same stand and bait over and over teaches them to avoid that area but then say a soccer mom yelling at them over and over teaches them to say f off and return every day. They're not that smart!
And using FF county as proof that hunters can't get it done is just plain stupid. The problem hunters have there is lack of access to all areas. Kill the deer in one backyard and not the other 101 and no one will reduce the herd significantly.
And if Tony D from WB is so damn smart and well respected why didn't he convince the good taxpayers of Staten island that sterilization was a waste of money? I can answer that, but do I really need?
If the FF soccer mom yelled at the deer and kicked it in the ribs on a couple occasssions, the deer would quickly associate the yelling with the negative stimulus of being kicked in the ribs. Otherwise, yelling might startle the deer on the first couple of occasions, but when there is no negative consequence, they'll just wait for her to leave and go right back.
And you are right about access, that is why it is so important to keep deer naive on the few properties that permit hunting, so deer don't learn to avoid that postage stamp when they smell the hunter's coffee breath.
Tony is a really smart guy. Who is he to say it is a waste of money? It may be in your eyes but the taxpayer-elected politicians opted to deal with their deer problem spending their money this way. It won't provide an immediate solution, but just might over time. Additionally, everyone KNOWS this won't work but no one can point to similar attempt and say "see it didn't work." Well, this just might work, but if it doesn't, hunters can point to it and say "see, it doesn't work."
Doc can`t let this go..........WB spends three years in Redding, Ct.; is paid $140,000 and can`t get the job done even with countless violations of the rules set by the CT. DEEP.
Doc wants everyone to believe it`s raining deer in Redding, CT. Doc is the only one that can start with 30 dpsm and end with 30 dpsm over 2 square miles in three years using the services of WB.
Doc has that FLIR single digit deer survey stuck in his throat and can`t get it out.
Funny how a FLIR deer survey can shed light on a situation like the ITM tick study in Redding, CT. WB has left out the figures / results of the ITM study on their web site, maybe they should include the results.
We actually surveyed 4 square miles. But you are right, there were boatloads of deer in and around HSP. WB took 51 out of there and we couldn't detect a reduction. We did over at Topstone Park though. So what does it say about densities in Redding that in addition to hunter take, 51 deer were removed from 1 square mile over 3 years and we couldn't detect a difference in density? It tells any logical person there are a crap load of deer in Redding still. Harvest data from DEEP corroborate that statement as well.
Doc - Maybe you should review the Davis Aviation films; the one you signed off on for CDC funding and the DEEP permits but never viewed, which show only 25% of what your stating. And what did the two Wildlife survey company’s state after they reviewed the Davis Aviation Deer Survey film......
Hi Glen,
I just went through and confirmed the targets you had identified for the White Birch and Pheasant areas. I saw the targets you referred to, but from the imagery presented, I was unable to identify any of the targets as either being or not being deer. This imagery is able to show hot spots which could include deer, but there is insufficient resolution to confirm. Also, it was taken at a high airspeed, further limiting the potential for a positive ID. I am sorry, but we will not be able to generate an estimate of deer density from this imagery.
Hi Glen:
I've had a chance to review the two thermal videos you sent and these are my impressions:
The image quality is very course due to the dated technology used for these flights and as a result, in my opinion...it is not possible to obtain an accurate deer count from this data. The thermal emission sources seen in these videos are excessively blocky and as a result it is not possible to accurately identify the targets which emit the heat. Whomever identified and counted deer from this data was either a clairvoyant or a fraud.
Over my career I have both done and peer-reviewed hundreds of ungulate surveys using thermal imaging. From a technology and research design perspective, this is one of the worst I've ever encountered.
The Davis Aviation IR film could reasonably be seen as nothing other than an attempt to secure federal funds by deception; certainly it appears that the deer numbers were greatly exaggerated over the actual on-the-ground reality at an expense to the taxpayers of $29,306.06.
Having received these professional reviews it is now crystal clear why Scott Williams continues to post one misrepresentation after another; this is a man who knows he has been caught in a lie and that the game is over, plain and simple. Like any pathological liar the saddest part is he probably believes a good portion of what he says; and equally sad is that he is incapable of admitting that he's lied, even when it's so painfully obvious to everyone reading these threads.
Glen, all you have to do is listen to the news reports over the last year and it's clear that people in government positions do whatever the hell they want, and screw the people they serve! This is just a small scale example of that.
Doc is friends with Tony D from WB and will always look for a way to twist the facts to make things sound normal. He's said it to us before, "Hunters are ignorant." That's exactly how he thinks, so it should come as no surprise that he thinks he can mis-represent the facts and expect us to say, "Oh I see now, thanks for correcting me."
After about 3 years of going back and forth with Doc I STILL have no idea why he's on this site.
Ok Glen. First, I didn’t sign off on the funding because I was not the Principle Investigator on the project. How can you say I didn’t view the Davis video when it was me who provided them to you? The videos do not show “25% of what I am stating,” what I am stating is that a certain FLIR firm only detects 25% of deer in forested landscapes. And anonymous reviews of someone else’s survey posted on an internet message board are hardly credible. Who are these “two Wildlife [sic] survey company’s [sic]” anyway? In the amended DEEP permit, it required an aerial survey before sharpshooting began. There was no snow, so we hired Davis to satisfy the terms of the permit. Which it did. Then we flew over snow and did our survey, again which was in line with Davis’s results, our 3 previous aerial surveys, and DEEP’s for Zone 11. So 6 surveys all in the 30-35 deer/square mile uncorrected ballpark. Remember when you guys suggested that because only 60% of DEEP’s transect was in Redding, only 60% of the reported density for that transect should apply? We all had a good chuckle over that.
Let’s look at a state where there are actually single digit densities, specifically central Maine where densities are on the order of 5-8 deer/square mile documented. In 2016, harvest rates/square mile were around 0.5 deer harvested/square mile of land area. In Redding, CT in 2016, reported harvest was 4.3 deer/square mile. That is a 9-fold difference. Are you going to now tell me that Redding hunters are far more skilled than Maine hunters?
You have accused me of being a felon in the past and now you are accusing me of being a pathological liar. I know right, it has been very challenging all these years keeping my lies straight. I am glad I was able to weasel my way out of the fact that Davis was flying over Fairfield and not Redding. PHEW. That was a close one. So is it logical me and DEEP and Davis and everyone else is lying about deer densities, or does it make more sense that a certain firm has a flawed technique that detects a quarter of the deer on the ground and has been called out on it several times before?
12:20 pm. Are we doing this? Seriously? Read the letter Glen. That's not me "signing off" on the Davis survey, that's me officially informing DEEP that we satisfied their terms of the Volunteer Authorization so we could proceed. Anyone who can read can determine that for themselves.
We paid Davis to fly and present us a final report. I'd have to say that I'd trust the report from the guy that actually did the flying with the equipment he's familiar with than anonymous reviews of his work. I know I'm certainly not qualified to come up with estimates based on those data.
You're attempting to validate the low-budget survey you paid for by discrediting me, WB, DEEP, and Davis Aviation and calling all of us liars. I think the readership can agree how transparent that it.
Doc oh Doc, sending a letter to the Director of Natural Resources stating that the survey was completed as required tells my that you are authorizing the culling to proceed based upon the requirements being met. That has nothing to do with stating the results of the survey, only that you agree that the survey has been completed.
If you had sent that letter me, I would use that as documentation that Dr Scott has provided authorization for the culling based upon the survey being completed. That to me would be a "Sign Off"
