From the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission

-- It was a very good year for deer hunting in Arkansas. Hunters recorded the second highest harvest total on record. Preliminary harvest figures show that almost 183,700 total deer were checked during the 2008-09 season.

During the May 21 meeting of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, commissioners were briefed on the state’s recent deer season harvest. Brad Miller, AGFC deer program coordinator, told the commission the harvest was up over 13,800 deer from the 2007-08 season.

Hunters checked 194,687 deer in 1999, the most in a year since the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission began keeping records in 1938.

The largest increase came in the doe harvest where hunters took almost 74,400 female deer. That number was over 24 percent higher than last year. The buck harvest was down about 2 percent.