During Pennsylvania’s 2014-15 seasons, hunters harvested an estimated 303,973 deer – a decrease of about 14 percent compared to the 2013-14 harvest of 352,920.
Hunters took 119,260 antlered deer in 2014-15 – a decrease of about 11 percent over the previous license year, when an estimated 134,280 bucks were taken. Hunters harvested an estimated 184,713 antlerless deer in 2014-15, nearly a 16 percent decrease compared to 218,640 antlerless deer taken in 2013-14.
“We put these numbers out each year and, whether there’s an increase or decrease in the harvest, people want to know why,” said R. Matthew Hough, Game Commission executive director. “While it’s impossible to provide explanations with certainty, there were a couple of factors over the 2014-15 deer seasons that seem to have contributed to a decreased harvest.”
Some of the decrease is by design, Hough said.
Last year the Commission reduced the number of antlerless licenses available in nearly every Wildlife Management Unit with 59,500 fewer antlerless licenses issued statewide.
Reducing the allocation within a WMA allows deer numbers to increase. Also, weather during the two-week firearms deer season was less than ideal for much of the state.
Harvest estimates are based on more than 24,000 deer checked by Game Commission personnel and more than 100,000 harvest reports submitted by successful hunters. Because some harvests go unreported, estimates provide a more accurate picture of hunter success. However, in 2014-15 the rate at which successful hunters reported their harvests increased slightly.
The 2014-15 harvest contained its highest percentage of adult bucks in decades. Of the antlered deer taken, 43 percent were 1 1/2-year-old bucks, with the remaining 57 percent aged 2 1/2 years or older.
The antlerless harvest included about 61 percent adult females, about 20 percent button bucks and about 18 percent doe fawns. The rates are similar to long term averages.
The antlerless success rate remained about 25 percent for the licenses issued.
The 2015-16 antlerless deer license allocation recommendations will be voted on at the April 10 meeting of the Board of Game Commissioners. John Dunn, interim Game Commission Bureau of Wildlife Management director, said that in addition to harvest data, staff will be looking at deer health measures, forest regeneration and deer-human conflicts for each WMU.
For additional information on Pennsylvania’s 2014-15 deer harvest, visit www.pgc.state.pa.us, click on “White-Tailed Deer” and then select 2014-15 Deer Harvest Estimates under “Deer Management.”