DEC says Increased number of deer taken and reported in 2018

[Four Season Whitetail's]

So the less hunters we had are the best hunters.


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[turkeyfeathers]

Temps with the exception of thanksgiving were never down right craptastically cold. At least here. Thus keeping people in the woods longer as not froze out.  

[Nomad]

My processor was swamped, just lines of deer and looked like 8-10 working on them ( good thing I go to the head of the line .) 

[phade]

The voluntary reporting % is up. Still flawed data, despite doing the best they can with stats projections.

[Bigfoot 327]

I don't think we had any significant winterkill in our area (western 7R) due to the unusually mild February, which gave the deer a free pass to browse wherever they wanted. The pic below was taken last January 26th. Not a skinny critter in the bunch.

[Five Seasons]

2 hours ago, Four Season Whitetail's said:

So the less hunters we had are the best hunters.


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there's an argument that could actually support that. Better skilled hunters with more opportunities not ruined by sloppy hunters.

This data sort of hurts your whole crossbow argument doesn't it?

[Four Season Whitetail's]

there's an argument that could actually support that. Better skilled hunters with more opportunities not ruined by sloppy hunters.
This data sort of hurts your whole crossbow argument doesn't it?

Not at all. I have the numbers that show the support in Xbows. More hunters picked them up and more deer were killed with them then the year before. In due time you will see the numbers rise in those category's again this year I bet. Maybe just maybe that's why the harvest is higher this year? Time will tell.


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[Hock3y24]

I think reporting % is up. I know people that never reported a deer before that started this year.

[Nomad]

For the first time , the DEC biologists went to my current processors ,to age deer, record tag numbers and so on. This is how they obtain known kills to figure reporting rates.

The processor was telling every one to report their kills, as the dec had the info .

So IF the dec increased their visits all around ,I could see an increase in reporting .

[ApexerER]

22 minutes ago, Stay at home Nomad said:

For the first time , the DEC biologists went to my current processors ,to age deer, record tag numbers and so on. This is how they obtain known kills to figure reporting rates.

The processor was telling every one to report their kills, as the dec had the info .

So IF the dec increased their visits all around ,I could see an increase in reporting .

I have never seen them there but according to my processor DEC visits him at least a couple times per season. The taxi that did the two heads I have mounted have told me the same thing. 

[G-Man]

They are still only guessing.. cant wait for town by town take to come out.. I take on a good year 10% of entire town take off my place a bad year 5%.. I know what my neighbors take and if I include them then it becomes 20% there is no way when I ask around town who got a deer that their formula is any where near accurate... 

[dbHunterNY]

45 minutes ago, Stay at home Nomad said:

For the first time , the DEC biologists went to my current processors ,to age deer, record tag numbers and so on. This is how they obtain known kills to figure reporting rates.

The processor was telling every one to report their kills, as the dec had the info .

So IF the dec increased their visits all around ,I could see an increase in reporting .

they'd be biting the hand that feeds them but if DEC didn't brush off the idea of how important it is to report we'd be doing a lot better with it. they pretend like they're fine without it but more people reporting only helps.  the first ticket would start having people reporting in a hurry.

[Five Seasons]

1 hour ago, G-Man said:

They are still only guessing.. cant wait for town by town take to come out.. I take on a good year 10% of entire town take off my place a bad year 5%.. I know what my neighbors take and if I include them then it becomes 20% there is no way when I ask around town who got a deer that their formula is any where near accurate... 

guessing isn't really fair. There are models that they use. Educated guessing is a better way of putting it I think. Similar to how they guess the size of the herd. 

[G-Man]

2 hours ago, Belo said:

guessing isn't really fair. There are models that they use. Educated guessing is a better way of putting it I think. Similar to how they guess the size of the herd. 

A guess is a guess, educated or not..the operative word is guess...

[rob-c]

7 hours ago, Four Season Whitetail's said:

Not at all. I have the numbers that show the support in Xbows. More hunters picked them up and more deer were killed with them then the year before. In due time you will see the numbers rise in those category's again this year I bet. Maybe just maybe that's why the harvest is higher this year? Time will tell.


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I agree, a bunch of coworkers have gone from vertical to crossbows and their success rate has gone up. 

[greensider]

I read just recently that only half report each year so if more report how do they know won't they just assume its half 

[nyslowhand]

^^^ The DEC plays with the statistics of deer harvest. Last I knew reporting was at ~45%. To give a more accurate total DEC uses a "fudge factor" to boost the numbers up to what they think is a more realistic annual harvest. Clearly a case of  - the numbers can lie or be misleading.

[G-Man]

Simply they are saying more people that took their deer to their processors  reported them when they checked tags there.. if processor told you make sure you report it as dec is here every other day.so you dont get fined .you probably will..

their formula is still a guess unlike many other states that have mandatory checkpoints you must bring deer to get processing tag 1st.  And still just a guess on how many people process their own deer  and never report...  hard to properly manage when using best guess method...

[nyslowhand]

^^^ exactly!

Side note, there seems to be a "push" by the DEC to not only verify legally tagged deer at processors, but if those are also reported in DECALS.

[Doc]

So is the DEC going to be able to separate out the crossbow kills on their reports? It would make for some interesting stats.

[G-Man]

7 hours ago, Doc said:

So is the DEC going to be able to separate out the crossbow kills on their reports? It would make for some interesting stats.

Should be able to as there was a spot for crossbow on tag and a seperate muzzleloader spot