Confusing Deer Population??

[Deposit]

So I dropped my doe of at the butcher off of Rt 30 in Amsterdam last Sunday. I could not believe the deer he had stacked up and how big many of them were. I chatted with him a bit and he told me that he thought it was generally a good year? I explained how hard it has been over the hill and in many area's of the state. Another observation he made was the number or big bucks he has proccessed. In fact he mentioned that an average year he capes out 12 to 15 bucks total a season. This year he has done over 20 already! Its kind of crazzy when I think about it, when just over the hill I believe the population is down. I am not sure where alot of the deer he is processing come from but it seems weird to me that there is such a drastic change from one area to another in close proximity with population and size. I know there are a lot of factors that influence deer population. Just seems unbelievable with amount of deer that was there (and even more when I picked up my meat).

By the way, this guy does a very good job and I love his sausage!

[upstatehunter]

Part of it was the winter in 2008. The storms were swirling so that they dropped a lot of snow in one area and literally up the road they had little to none. I saw it in March of 09 when we were looking at new jobsites for delivery's. One would have four feet of snow, and 20 miles up the road they had none on the ground. Even here, Halfrack is really only 35-40 miles from me maybe even less as the crow flies. He has a good population and we have little. Yet over the mountain from him where my son has been going with his uncles and grandfather they are down a lot in numbers. Some of it had to do with the large acorn crops in areas, and none in others. Did some more research today on deer feeding tendencies. They will travel up to 20-25 miles out of their core areas to get to preferred foods like acorns. They need that protein to be able to turn it into fat. What I find a little confusing with that though is I would think the car kills would go up as the deer try to move those distances. I didn't see that this year here. I'm also wondering if the midges didn't get a lot of them last summer late. We all know with the coyote, and crow and raven populations you would be lucky to find a corpse. Plus the bobcat and fisher are rising a lot so they would clean up an area real well. They say the midge will effect pockets of deer, like the blue tongue. Just guesses, but your right it is perplexing. Wish now I had transferred to a school for biology. But wouldn't matter if you work in NY they aren't going to use your findings if they go against the grain of making money.

[Deposit]

What you say makes a lot of sense upstate. Here last year we had 47 inches of snow while just down the hill there was very little. But we have had a large crop of acorn here this year (while at my grandfathers they have none). Initailly I had thought the acorns were what was keeping the deer out of my plots in the late season. We moved our stands and hunting spot accordingly to try and capitalize on the acorns but with very limited results. While I agree it would be difficult to find corpses with winterkill and midges I would still think with the amount of area my buddy and I cover here we would have found some bones. I don't know I guess. This is only my 3rd season in this area and I have a lot to learn about it yet and a lot of work with the food plots to try and improve the situation if I can.

[stka]

I'm no biologist, but I think there are three main factors and fortunately I only have one of them where I hunt. I think hunting pressure is the biggest reason, with limited hunting access the areas where people take a lot of deer are thinned out easily. Where there's no pressure a mile away there are a lot more, but can't be touched. In my experience does usually don't move much when there's a decent food source around. The second is the lack of food, not a problem I encounter but in old growth forest there can't be much browse and acorns are fairly seasonal and obviously fluctuate year to year. The problem I think I have is people feeding the deer in their back yards. If their being fed daily they won't travel far to bed but just stay right there 24/7. I think that's why I see more bucks than does on my trail cameras. My friend that owns the property I hunt went to a feed store to get duck food and saw 50lb bags labeled "deer feed". He asked the guy there working what it was for and the guy looked at him funny and said "well, to feed the deer". He was promptly told it was illegal, and said they had never heard that before?? Because the populations vary so much in small areas there isn't much they could do but limit tags in large areas, and we know that won't happen. What they should do is make some sort of tax break for allowing hunting by unrelated people to try to open more land and spread the hunting pressure out more. I don't disagree with the snowfall effecting the winter kill, mature bucks are among the first to die because of the weight they loss rutting.

[venisonman]

What you say makes a lot of sense upstate. Here last year we had 47 inches of snow while just down the hill there was very little.

I doubt even 47 inches would have any impact. Deer don't start having a problem with snow depth until it reaches 20 inches for more than 20 straight days. We typically get over 100 inches over the course of the winter with little to no impact.

[joe snag]

My area was better thisyear than last not only our party but many bucks were killed near where i hunt,but up north of me very few were killed thisyear,Why the big and early winter and then the massacure in the deer yard in 2008 where most of the deer from this area go,and north of here the Hunting gangs that hunt allweek long and usally kill 15 bucks
only shot a few this year and hardly any lastyear,the State ,don't forget shot over 20 spring deer looking for cronic waisting disease in that area just north of me,
Hopefully the population will be back to normal in a few years here..

[upstatehunter]

The snow depths aren't all that detrimental if they have food sources. As well as low predation. We have little food except cedar and hemlock, and the coyote population, and bobcat population both were very high. I've seen a drastic reduction in coyote sign this fall from the last two. Seems the deer population does have an effect on them. Areas of high snow but in conjunction to larger areas of agriculture do have less winter kill. I'm also writing a couple of guys who work for DEC. I want to know just how much feeding impacts the deer. I know two years ago, at the end of the winter I found 11 dead deer in an area very high in people who feed.(corn mostly) I did contact DEC at that time to have them check to see if predation, coyotes killing just to kill or the deer were not able to digest the corn so starved with full belly's. It will come back I'm sure, camp populations around here fluctuate a lot according to the deer herd. When the guys aren't seeing any or shooting any, they don't come up as much.
Hopefully a mild winter, and good spring and summer plus the lower hunting pressure will help.

[hunts2long]

I agree with Joe. The 2007 and 2008 late ML season did a number on the deer herd. Way too many does and small deer were taken out of a very small area. Alot of them were  button bucks. Last year I did not see a deer in 40 days of hunting. This year I have seen 21, so far. They are coming back. We need another mild winter. The bigger bucks being taken this year are the ones that made it in '07 and '08...hunts2long