Back from deer forum District 9

Would you support a 4 antlerless deer (max) season limit?

  • Yes

    Votes: 54 80.6%
  • No

    Votes: 4 6.0%
  • Unsure

    Votes: 2 3.0%
  • Makes no difference to me what the doe limit is

    Votes: 7 10.4%

  • Total voters
    67

CRC

Old Mossy Horns
20 attendees.

Presentation of 2016 survey data. 17% response rate- 33,750 took the survey out of 196,770 contacted.

Most important to hunters was gun season length (basically length of general season)

Anterless bag limit was second in importance, hunters did not support changing or reducing either- sex days though 48% of hunters want deer numbers to increase. Bag limit of 4 anterless max suggested. Hunters in survey not supportive of reducing anterless hunting opportunities.

Antlered buck bag limit- support across state for 2 buck limit. 1 buck limit makes biological sense but hunters do not support 1 buck limit.

"Blackpowder" season- 1 week season is a viable trade off to improve timing of harvest relative to peak breeding.

Opening date of Gun- least important to hunters; Small shifts to open later would improve harvest timing.

Balanced options- a middle of what is biologically best and what hunters will support before they get upset

State could be broken into 5 zones- WESTERN, NORTHWESTERN, CENTRAL. NORTHEASTERN AND SOUTHEASTERN.

Polk, Rutherford and Cleveland Counties would be lumped with NW Zone.

No consensus on what to do about game lands that split deer season zones (South Mtns, Buffalo Cove)

Biggest debate and comments on bear hunting overlap with deer season changes. Will bear and deer hunters support overlapping seasons?

Suggested lengths of gun season for Western Deer Zone (balanced option)

6 weeks Saturday after Thanksgiving. Closed 1st Sunday in January. Blackpowder Saturday before Thanksgiving 1 week.

Meeting mostly focused on D-9 data and options for gun and blackpowder seasons. Not bow season. Bow seasons not really discussed as they have the smallest impact.
 
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Tipmoose

Administrator
Staff member
Contributor
Now THIS is a good post! Informative and topical for the state. More like this please.
 

pattersonj11

Old Mossy Horns
Contributor
I am certainly for a two buck limit. I would not support a limit on does, but would encourage people to use their own knowledge on that one. I just know i am seeing fewer deer as seasons go on.
 

sky hawk

Old Mossy Horns
Contributor
Balanced options- a middle of what is biologically best and what hunters will support before they get upset

I'm shocked!!! :rolleyes:



I find it interesting that some of the "proposed" options are what we used to have: 4 anterless limit, 1 week blackpowder.


Informative post, CRC.
 
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CRC

Old Mossy Horns
NC has not had a 4 doe limit.

The limit with your license has been 6 since 1997 and all tags can be used for antlerless deer.

The idea discussed would be 4 antlerless only tags and 2 antlered only tags. No bonus tags.

Now I get what you are saying (either-sex tags are primarily used on antlered bucks)

There is no clear support if NC hunters want reduced either-sex opportunities even though 48% want more deer and 31% want a stable herd (from the survey).

So I'm not sure what that means.
 
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woodmoose

Administrator
Staff member
Contributor
There is no clear support if NC hunters want reduced either-sex opportunities even though 48% want more deer and 31% want a stable herd (from the survey).

So I'm not sure what that means.



it means that hunters, like most people, want "their cake and to eat it too",,,,,,,
 

Ceehawk37

Ten Pointer
I like the buck limit where it is. I don't have an opinion of the antlerless limit one way or the other. Never limit out anyhow.

Did they mention anything about Sunday hunting regs for game lands? Been eager to hear if the state will allow us lowly public land hunters to hunt the taxpayers land on the Lord's day.
 
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CRC

Old Mossy Horns
Did they mention anything about Sunday hunting regs for game lands? Been eager to hear if the state will allow us lowly public land hunters to hunt the taxpayers land on the Lord's day.

Thats up to the General Assembly and not the NCWRC.

The change that seemed to be most favorable was a statewide 2 buck limit.
 

oldest school

Old Mossy Horns
so the NCWRC is telling us the results of the survey.

results that compare favorably with the biologist's thoughts are most likely to get proposed as new regs/seasons.

what am i missing?
 

CRC

Old Mossy Horns
so the NCWRC is telling us the results of the survey.

results that compare favorably with the biologist's thoughts are most likely to get proposed as new regs/seasons.

what am i missing?

Yes and no.

Basically the NCWRC used the results of the survey to focus on 5 metrics:

Length of gun season (overall)

Length of blackpowder season (overall)

Opening timing of gun season

Antlered buck bag limit

Anterless deer bag limit


They showed 3 options for each attribute:

Hunter preference
Biological optimum
Balanced option


"This balanced option would increases the number of biological objectives met for a "well managed herd" from 33-50% to 66-100% while minimizing negative trade offs to hunting opportunities and traditions."


The timing of the bow season opener, as of now, would not change. The focus was solely on gun and blackpowder.

Also according to the survey 88% of hunters hunted on tracts of land less than 1000 acres. Smaller the tract of land, the harder to manage. 1,000 acres was considered the minimum size by biologists to manage your land effectively.
 
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TravisLH

Old Mossy Horns
If they roll with this, I'd be happy, the changes could have been much more drastic


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

CRC

Old Mossy Horns
The only "drastic" thing I noticed was consideration of doing away completely with blackpowder season but hunters did not/do not want that at all.
 
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Frostcat

Twelve Pointer
6 weeks Saturday after Thanksgiving. Closed 1st Sunday in January. Blackpowder Saturday before Thanksgiving 1 week

How would this change the western bear season?
 

woodmoose

Administrator
Staff member
Contributor
I have always heard (but not seen as I have not taken time to deer out our mountains) that the rut was in December out that way,,,,so this proposal at the Western deer meeting should work well out that way,
 

Downeast

Twelve Pointer
Interesting. But regardless of what they decide I'll probably just do what I've always done and shoot whatever I decide too. ;)
 

cheapdate

Eight Pointer
Interesting. But regardless of what they decide I'll probably just do what I've always done and shoot whatever I decide too. ;)

Fine, just remember your comment if you ever decide to come on here and complain about lack of big bucks, lack of does, etc. ;)
 
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DRS

Old Mossy Horns
I'm curious as to what percentage of surveys were returned, broken down by region.

I also remember filling out this survey and the limited answers to the questions seemed to guide this survey in a skewed direction.

I do not support a limit of 4 antlerless deer, there are areas were doe harvest needs to be more and some less. Lowering the limit will limit how a local deer population can be lowered, if needed.

I really don't see the majority of hunters in the eastern season going for a 2 buck limit.
 

nccatfisher

Old Mossy Horns
Contributor
I'm curious as to what percentage of surveys were returned, broken down by region.

I also remember filling out this survey and the limited answers to the questions seemed to guide this survey in a skewed direction.

I do not support a limit of 4 antlerless deer, there are areas were doe harvest needs to be more and some less. Lowering the limit will limit how a local deer population can be lowered, if needed.

I really don't see the majority of hunters in the eastern season going for a 2 buck limit.
It was, and that was why it wasn't completed here.
 

CRC

Old Mossy Horns
I'm curious as to what percentage of surveys were returned, broken down by region.

I also remember filling out this survey and the limited answers to the questions seemed to guide this survey in a skewed direction.

I do not support a limit of 4 antlerless deer, there are areas were doe harvest needs to be more and some less. Lowering the limit will limit how a local deer population can be lowered, if needed.

I really don't see the majority of hunters in the eastern season going for a 2 buck limit.

According to the survey they said a majority of hunters supported a 2 buck limit across the state They do have county level data as well I think there is a good chance 2 bucks statewide is coming up for 2018 hearings
 
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Downeast

Twelve Pointer
A 2 buck limit is actually a 1 buck limit. Who is going to be running around without a buck tag in their wallet? They will shoot the first one and wait the rest of the season praying for something bigger.
 

UncleFester

Old Mossy Horns
A 2 buck limit is actually a 1 buck limit. Who is going to be running around without a buck tag in their wallet? They will shoot the first one and wait the rest of the season praying for something bigger.

Been a 2 buck limit out here and that's not what I do. If I see it and want to shoot it I don't care what it is as long as I have a tag for it.
 

shadycove

Twelve Pointer
Thats up to the General Assembly and not the NCWRC.

The change that seemed to be most favorable was a statewide 2 buck limit.

Wrong again CRC.
There are alot of NCWRC game lands that are not "public" land [not under NCGA control]. A short 'net search will show you which GL's are owned by "public" entities and which ones are privately owned.
Further, the NCWRC already allows some GL hunting on Sunday.
 
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LanceR

Six Pointer
Contributor
Well, speaking as someone who is only half moved to North Carolina from New York the biggest thing that jumps out at me is the very low response rate compared to what I'm used to seeing. I'll have to take the time to look into the sampling methodology used. Her in the People's Republic of New York they usually do three mailings or emailings and then follow up with enough phone call surveys to be able to accurately gauge whether the non-respondents have a different set of responses and priorities than the respondents do. 35-40% is more the norm on response rates. For each type of important policy question they ask a corresponding and opposing one one. For example, if they ask about the willingness to accept some sort of restriction to protect yearling bucks they will also have a question asking how important having the freedom to take any currently legal buck is.

As most states find when they do that NY has a majority of hunters who state that they would accept some degree of restrictions on what buck they can take in order to protect yearlings. And we also have a majority who state that the ability to take the buck of their choice is the most important thing to them. Both of those have been a little over 50% in a couple of statewide surveys and both are always within the margin of error of each other. Clearly the idea of yearling buck protection is important in the abstract but is less important when faced with reality in the field.

So we then have folks who support things like antler restrictions claiming that a majority of hunters want ARs without pointing out that a majority also claim that they want free choice in what they take. And it doesn't matter whether we are discussing habitat management on state land, fish stocking policies or wildlife. Unless one looks at the underlying existing deer management policy, they methodology and the entire survey it is going to be tough to put it all in context. As has been said for many years: "There are lies, damn lies and statistics!"........

I'll be at the meeting in Graham on the 24th and know I have a lot of reading to do to get up to speed before that.

My thanks go out to all for this informative discussion.


Lance
 

oldest school

Old Mossy Horns
Well, speaking as someone who is only half moved to North Carolina from New York the biggest thing that jumps out at me is the very low response rate compared to what I'm used to seeing. I'll have to take the time to look into the sampling methodology used. Her in the People's Republic of New York they usually do three mailings or emailings and then follow up with enough phone call surveys to be able to accurately gauge whether the non-respondents have a different set of responses and priorities than the respondents do. 35-40% is more the norm on response rates. For each type of important policy question they ask a corresponding and opposing one one. For example, if they ask about the willingness to accept some sort of restriction to protect yearling bucks they will also have a question asking how important having the freedom to take any currently legal buck is.

As most states find when they do that NY has a majority of hunters who state that they would accept some degree of restrictions on what buck they can take in order to protect yearlings. And we also have a majority who state that the ability to take the buck of their choice is the most important thing to them. Both of those have been a little over 50% in a couple of statewide surveys and both are always within the margin of error of each other. Clearly the idea of yearling buck protection is important in the abstract but is less important when faced with reality in the field.

So we then have folks who support things like antler restrictions claiming that a majority of hunters want ARs without pointing out that a majority also claim that they want free choice in what they take. And it doesn't matter whether we are discussing habitat management on state land, fish stocking policies or wildlife. Unless one looks at the underlying existing deer management policy, they methodology and the entire survey it is going to be tough to put it all in context. As has been said for many years: "There are lies, damn lies and statistics!"........

I'll be at the meeting in Graham on the 24th and know I have a lot of reading to do to get up to speed before that.

My thanks go out to all for this informative discussion.


Lance

Lance- roll into graham and tell everyone how it is done (surveys and such) in New York. You will be the hit of the evening. :)

Just kidding. I understand your post and it seems that New York hunters are exactly as we are here divided : on what needs to be done (or not done) with deer harvests.
 

sky hawk

Old Mossy Horns
Contributor
The biggest thing wasn't the methodology, it was the questions themselves. They could have easily isolated individual options, but instead gave a bunch of questions that only had multiple (loosely related) regulations grouped together. As such, many of us felt forced into choosing predetermined sets of regulations rather than dealing with them one at a time.

Even if they are able to ask enough questions to isolate the individual variables, which I doubt, it seems convoluted to the survey taker. It would have been much more straightforward to ask about a specific regulation and then give several multiple choice answers that could be ranked in order of preference.

As it was, I think hunters felt like they were not able to specify their preference accurately.
 

nchunter

Twelve Pointer
The biggest thing wasn't the methodology, it was the questions themselves. They could have easily isolated individual options, but instead gave a bunch of questions that only had multiple (loosely related) regulations grouped together. As such, many of us felt forced into choosing predetermined sets of regulations rather than dealing with them one at a time.

Even if they are able to ask enough questions to isolate the individual variables, which I doubt, it seems convoluted to the survey taker. It would have been much more straightforward to ask about a specific regulation and then give several multiple choice answers that could be ranked in order of preference.

As it was, I think hunters felt like they were not able to specify their preference accurately.

Yep, felt the same way. Seemed agenda driven.
 

wturkey01

Old Mossy Horns
Contributor
The biggest thing wasn't the methodology, it was the questions themselves. They could have easily isolated individual options, but instead gave a bunch of questions that only had multiple (loosely related) regulations grouped together. As such, many of us felt forced into choosing predetermined sets of regulations rather than dealing with them one at a time.

Probably easier to tabulate results.........regardless of hunter's opinions!!:p
 
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