Pennsylvania Game News - January 2023 - 23

probably mirrors that.
But biologists don't like to look at
population movement from just one year
to the next. They plot harvests over a span
of years and determine a " line of best fit "
to determine the trends. The question
becomes whether the line is increasing,
decreasing or stable.
" If the trend isn't changing, we feel
that the population is remaining relatively
stable, for that measurement, " Wallingford
said.
Such trends may not - surely do not
- reflect every individual hunter's experience
in the deer woods, Wallingford said.
That's understandable and unavoidable.
Pennsylvania is a big state, taking in about
46,000 square miles.
But large-scale deer management
based on deer health, forest health and
deer-human conflicts can't be swayed by
one impression or another.
" That's why we do that sampling,
that surveying, so we get a representative
cross-section of what's really going on out
on the landscape, " Wallingford said. " You
need to avoid those individual biases. So
that's what our program is designed to do.
" Even as a hunter myself, I can have
my own opinions, but as a biologist, I
don't have anywhere to inject those into
the process. And that's as it should be. "
That's not to say deer management is
static. It's ever evolving. Deer are being
harvested across a broader time period.
Wallingford said deer managers will need
to adapt their procedures to ensure the best
quality of data are collected.
No matter how gruesome the trail leading
to it might be.
" We need to feel we're getting the
best information we can, " he said. " We
want the best and most defendable deermanagement
program we can have. That
begins with good data. "
JANUARY 2023
EAR-TAGGING
The same photos appear every year.
There's a smiling hunter, a big buck
destined to be hung on the wall, and a
harvest tag - one wrapped around or tied
to an antler.
That's illegal.
The instructions printed on deer
harvest tags require hunters to fill them
out with a ballpoint pen, notch them to
reflect the date of harvest and - here's
where things often go awry - secure
them to the animal's ear until the deer
is processed or prepared for mounting.
Why? The information collected from
tags is foundational to the deer-management
program, certainly, but does it really
matter where the tag is attached?
The answer is yes, for multiple reasons.
The
ear-tagging rule promotes consistency,
for starters.
" That way your antlered deer and your
antlerless deer are tagged in the same
manner, " said Bret Wallingford.
More importantly, requiring ear tagging
ensures the tag stays with that head
until aging crews have the opportunity to
examine it.
That wouldn't necessarily be the case
otherwise. If antler tagging was allowed,
Wallingford said, information on bucks
largely would be unavailable, since antlers
typically leave the butcher shop with
the hunter.
Any uncertainty about a deer's origin
- resulting from the tag no longer being
with the carcass - also precludes it from
being tested for CWD, given the " huge
implications " a positive discovery brings,
Wallingford added.
Ear-tagging a deer, meanwhile, doesn't
have to mean ruining a mount. Using a zip
tie or, even better, a large safety pin to
attach a harvest tag to a deer's ear satisfies
the regulation while also eliminating
the need for a taxidermist to do any fancy
stitching later.
Deer must be tagged before the carcass
is moved.
23
Pennsylvania Game News - January 2023

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pennsylvania Game News - January 2023
