Antlerless deer licenses allocations: 2012-2013
The Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners last week voted to issue 888,000 antlerless deer permits for the 2012-13 hunting season.
That's down from last year's allocation of 913,000.
Allocations for the individual wildlife management units are listed in the table accompanying this article.
Overall, tags were reduced in nine WMUs, increased in seven and held the same as last year in the remaining six.
Here in WMU 5B, which covers nearly all of Lancaster County, there will be a slight increase of 1,000 tags over last year.
This year's allocations for each unit are based on a series of factors calculated by the Game Commission's deer management team.
For starters, a statewide survey of residents of all stripes — that is, not just hunters — shows residents believe the deer populations in the WMUs where they live is just right in every unit except WMUs 2F, 2G and 3A.
In those three WMUs, residents believe deer numbers are too low.
Deer populations are considered by biologists to be stable in every WMU except WMUs 2D, 2G, 3C and 4B.
There, biologists say, deer populations are increasing.
Fawn-to-doe ratios — an indicator of deer health — are considered to be stable in every unit.
Nowhere in the state is forest regeneration considered to be good on the WMU level.
It's considered to be fair in every unit except WMUs 4D and 2A, where it's considered to be poor.
(Forest regeneration is not measured in the state's three urban/suburban units — WMUs 2B, 5C and 5D.)
Deer impacts on forest regeneration are considered to be acceptable in every WMU except WMUs 1B, 3C and 3D, where their impact is considered to be too high.
Deer impacts on forest regeneration are declining in WMUs 2E, 2F, 2G, 3B, 4A, 4C and 4D.
Their impacts are considered stable in every other unit except WMU 5A, which is the only unit where it's deemed to be increasing.
The goal of the allocations set for 2012-13 is to stabilize deer populations — hold them steady — in WMUs 1A, 2A, 2B, 2C, 2D, 2E, 2F, 2G, 3A, 3B, 4A, 4B, 4C, 4D, 4E, 5A, 5B, 5C and 5D.
The Game Commission wants deer populations reduced in WMUs 1B, 3C, and 3D.
