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Would we extinct deer given the chance?

5K views 32 replies 27 participants last post by  300winmagfan 
#1 ·
Just a thought, with all the Doe harvest talk.

If the PGC closed its doors today, and anyone could harvest as many deer as they wanted, anywhere, anytime, and by any weapon, would we as hunters govern ourselves or would we extinct the deer population? Here is the criteria:

No license, fees, or tags.
Can hunt 24/7/365 even at night.
Can shoot from a vehicle.
Can use atv's and drive anywhere.
Can shoot as many as you want, either sex
No age restrictions
No weapon constrictions, you can use a rifle anytime, even a semi-auto.
What i'm saying is complete anarchy, with no rules or regulations or consequences.




I know I would shoot less. I would still make sure I had enough for the year, but I would not donate to Hunters for the Hungry any longer. I would shoot less because I know others would shoot more. So, are we able to govern ourselves, or does this have to be treated as a democratic "big-brother" watching over us?

Just hypothetical and seeing if you think we could pull together and govern ourselves as sportsman, or if we would be like ants on an ant-hill and destroy ourselves.
 
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#3 ·
seeing if you think we could pull together and govern ourselves as sportsman
I doubt it and I think a free-for-all with hunting would severely impact deer populations. In fact, I believe that is why the PGC came to be in the first place with over-hunting of all wildlife.

The funny thing about deer, when trying to eradicate them with regulation, it has been proven that it can't be done. Yet we are nowhere near trying to do that with the management plan in place here in PA and some say it has been done.
 
#4 ·
Personally my opinion (and i am entitled to it) the hung rs feeding the hungry program is for people who want to kill but not eat..if a hunter has enough venison for himself/family then filling a tag to donate is a feel good cause to justify pulling the trigger.. sorry but thats my opinion..

Now onto the question at hand. Public lands would be void of deer. But with all the posted property there would still be a few left. Big buck would all get shot off by jacklighters..
And no the hunting community would not band together for the greater good.. that should be proven by all the infighting already.
 
#5 ·
In a free for all with no regulation the deer and other wildlife would be doomed. Just think if there were no regulation and we went back to the market killing days how that would impact the herd. People would be out trying to kill as many deer and other wildlife as possible to sell to the "meat market", butcher shops,restaurants,etc would create a market for the wild game meat. This wild meat market would become very profitable for people to go out and shoot everything in sight and as the numbers of wildlife fall the market would adjust by increasing the price per pound until there was no more left to shoot.

Even without market hunting profit there would just be too many out there that would shoot as many as they could till deer would become extinct.
 
#9 ·
It is the attitude among some at pgc that we can't kill to many and too few deer does not matter that has us in the mess we are today.

Would we kill them off? Probably. They killed them off with muskets. In some areas, the predators and very little hunting are keeping the herd from growing.

No doubt. Lots of people with questionable morals would be legally shooting all they could, and extinction would be automatic if legal.

Heck, I'd be half tempted to shoot the last one myself, just so all the foolishness surrounding the deer wars could end once and for all.
 
#13 ·
There is no doubt that left up to their own devices without laws and regulation the wildlife in this state would be in deep trouble from people who would go wild with killing. I had a friend who used to ay if Delaware Bay was in PA it would be a biological desert based on the way the PA navy behaved.
 
#16 ·
Gone...adios...goodbye...no more deer...I have some yahoo acquaintances down here in Bucks County that brag about shooting 15 deer a year in Bucks County because "I can buy as many tags as I want". A few of them are constantly asking me if I want deer meat because they don't have any more room in the freezer for it. I also notice that I've heard quite a few stories from them in recent years about deer they shot but never found. Why bother looking when you can just stop at the court house and buy another tag the next day. Silly me, I shoot one deer a year with one tag and I'm content. I live in Bucks County and could buy 25 doe tags too. I just think it is stupid. They've told me they would do the same thing in the counties where their hunting camps are located if they could. These are the same guys that complain that they don't see as many deer around their hunting camps as they did in the past. Just my opinion...bring on the criticism...
 
#18 ·
Given these ops:
Can hunt 24/7/365 even at night.
Can shoot from a vehicle. Can use atv's and drive anywhere.
Can shoot as many as you want, either sex
No age restrictions
No weapon constrictions, you can use a rifle anytime, even a semi-auto.

I can't see how we wouldn't. Heck now guys say they see 1 doe and that they would kill it. 24/7/365..YEP!!
 
#20 ·
Under the right or actually wrong circumstances, hunter additivity exists.
Whether that additivity delivers extirpation or extinction or no harm is based upon where any critter exists upon a population curve.
Ignoring hunter additivity and the conditions where it can exist as a regional or local problem is selfish...and all too common.
 
#21 ·
CBB said:
Personally my opinion (and i am entitled to it) the hung rs feeding the hungry program is for people who want to kill but not eat..if a hunter has enough venison for himself/family then filling a tag to donate is a feel good cause to justify pulling the trigger.. sorry but thats my opinion..

Now onto the question at hand. Public lands would be void of deer. But with all the posted property there would still be a few left. Big buck would all get shot off by jacklighters..
And no the hunting community would not band together for the greater good.. that should be proven by all the infighting already.
Right there is the exact answer to the question.

People will complain of no deer in their area, but buy doe tags and shoot every one they can.
Fortunately, those of us with private land, protect the resource and regulate how many deer can be shot, or supported on our land. That will keep the deer herd alive.
And.. yes, the poachers/jacklighters will still be active shooting into private land... and at night, as they are now.
 
#22 ·
DDX said:
Passanger Pigeon, Great Awk, eastern elk, eastern Mt Lion, woods bison all hunted to extintion.
Actually, what did the passenger pigeon in was habitat loss. I just read a few days ago that the loss of the American Chestnut was a bigger factor than hunting. I'd like to see that from an additional source before I take it as fact, but it is consistent with the fact that historically, habitat is the number one thing that influences wildlife populations.

Let's keep in mind while we think about the question the OP raised is that he's talking about unregulated hunting, yet it was hunters who saw the need and lobbied for regulations. So in the North American conservation model it was hunters who saved wildlife. That doesn't mean every hunter was on board with it, but if hunters had not stepped up to regulate themselves we would not have the wildlife or the access to wildlife we have today.

My answer to the OP's question is that yes, we could hunt deer to extinction in PA because at one time we were on the way to doing it.

Steve.
 
#23 ·
Everyday Hunter said:
DDX said:
Passanger Pigeon, Great Awk, eastern elk, eastern Mt Lion, woods bison all hunted to extintion.
Actually, what did the passenger pigeon in was habitat loss. I just read a few days ago that the loss of the American Chestnut was a bigger factor than hunting. I'd like to see that from an additional source before I take it as fact, but it is consistent with the fact that historically, habitat is the number one thing that influences wildlife populations.
The notable decrease of passenger pigeons started when professional hunters began netting and shooting the birds to sell in the city markets. Although the birds always had been used as food to some extent, even by the Indians, the real slaughter began in the 1800s.

There were no laws restricting the number of pigeons killed or the way they were taken. Because the birds were communal in habit, they were easily netted by using baited traps and decoys. The birds were shot at the nesting sites, young squabs were knocked out of nests with long sticks, and pots of burning sulphur were placed under the roosting trees so the fumes would daze the birds and they would fall to the ground. Hundreds of thousands of passenger pigeons were killed for private consumption and for sale on the market, where they often sold for as little as fifty cents a dozen.

By 1850 the destruction of the pigeons was in full force, and by 1860 it was noticed that the numbers of birds seemed to be decreasing, but still the slaughter continued.

One of the last large nestings of passenger pigeons occurred at Petoskey, Michigan, in.1878. Here 50,000 birds per day were killed and this rate continued for nearly five months. When the adult birds that survived this massacre attempted second nestings at new sites, they were soon located by the professional hunters and killed before they had a chance to raise any young.

From the Smithsonian website.
 
#24 ·
Yes, I know what the Smithsonian says. And I'm not saying they're wrong -- I'm just saying what some experts now believe. Often, even the experts change their minds.

From www.damninteresting.com -- yes, a very interesting read):
When the first European settlers arrived at St. Augustine, Florida in 1565, it is believed that between 3 and 6 billion Passenger Pigeons darkened the skies over eastern North America. This vast host was supported by nearly continuous chestnut, birch, oak, maple, and pine forests the size of Western Europe. The pigeons feasted on the bountiful nuts of those trees and nested in their thick branches.

Passenger Pigeons were unique in the world not only because of the vast numbers, but also because of the manner in which they roosted, nested, flocked, and migrated. The great American naturalist John James Audubon wrote this account of the passing of a flock of what he later estimated to be more than 1 billion pigeons in the Fall of 1813....
Think of the food that it would take to feed a billion pigeons. And from what I've read, the chestnut was a major source of mast -- prolific crops year in and year out. With their loss, we don't have nearly the mast we once had. It's likely that the passenger pigeon could not survive today in significant numbers on the comparatively sparse mast crops we have.

There are other websites that speak of the dependent relationship the passenger pigeon had with the chestnut. In fact, some people think they were interdependent; the decline of either one would mean the decline of the other.
Passenger pigeons, for instance, visited the primeval forests in enormous flocks, dependent on the nut crops which a certain tree produced reliably every autumn. ... The great tree which sustained the passenger pigeon each year and abundantly dominated the eastern forests is the subject of this article
Without a doubt, the chestnut was critical to their habitat. I'm not defending market hunting, but market hunting may not be the only blame. Science often revives arguments that seemed settled.

Steve.
 
#25 ·
As far as the original question, I think so. If any of you have noticed the last couple of years, deer have become nocturnal. Even in September, I had a large amount of pics of deer but all in the middle of the night. Due to the hunting pressure of the past 10 years on deer, they are a more of a nocturnal animal than they orginally were. Unregulated hunting has done away with some fantastic game in this state and mans mentality, even today, I need to get the last one before someone else does.
 
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