Final number are in....

The first two days of muzzy were primo weatherwise and those who saw that Monday and Tuesdays weather was gonna be rough would certainly have planned accordingly or hunted as much as they could over the weekend. Plus most hunters I know we're out of vacation and have narrowed their hunting to weekends only anyway which happens every year during this time anyway.
Why can't they just admit they set a goal to reduce the deer population to appease the insurance companies and the FB and move on!?!
They succeeded, I hardly see deer on my travels now, congrats ODNR! Mission accomplished! Now convince me to continue buying multiple deer tags each and every year! Good luck with that....it will be one a year for me from here on out! Hope you don't miss my extra $24!

finelyshedded said:

The first two days of muzzy were primo weatherwise and those who saw that Monday and Tuesdays weather was gonna be rough would certainly have planned accordingly or hunted as much as they could over the weekend. Plus most hunters I know we're out of vacation and have narrowed their hunting to weekends only anyway which happens every year during this time anyway.
Why can't they just admit they set a goal to reduce the deer population to appease the insurance companies and the FB and move on!?!
They succeeded, I hardly see deer on my travels now, congrats ODNR! Mission accomplished! Now convince me to continue buying multiple deer tags each and every year! Good luck with that....it will be one a year for me from here on out! Hope you don't miss my extra $24!

Click to expand...

Landowner buddy !!

Milo said:

Landowner buddy !!

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I hear ya! That will be the plan for deer number two if the populace around our farm is in good shape. I have a feeling they shot themselves in the foot by "cutting off one of the hands that feeds them", but imagine the insurance companies and FB will/have made it worth their while in one way or another. Hope I'm wrong but it wouldn't be the first time someone got a kickback!
It's crazy how I never see deer ony travels anymore! I guess that's what they wanted and no one wants to hit a deer with their vehicle but to eradicate them like they did and expect hunters whose money is used for conservation of the species to buy tags to hunt something that isn't there then blame them for being one of the reasons for harvest numbers being so low! Give me a break.....it's laughable!

That second to the last sentence was historically the longest I ever typed! I was a bit winded typing it! Rotflmao

Beentown said:

Come on. We had perfect weather most of the season. I can see why you want to be an apologist for the ODNR but accepting their weather theory is pure rose colored glasses. The last two days of muzzy has such a low kill it doesn't come close to any real effect in numbers.

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I'm not being a fucking apologist Beener. I didn't say anything about the season as a whole. Yes, we had damn near perfect weather this year for most of the season. I'm not an idiot. Bigslam said the weather during the last two days of muzzy was just fine for killing deer and I disagreed. I'm sorry if that makes me out to be an apologist for the odnr.

jagermeister said:

So you're saying that bitter cold and wind on the last two days of muzzleloader had zero effect on whether guys hunted or not? Hahaha.... Hilarious man. I'm happy for you and anyone else who was dedicated enough to hunt through that shit, but I bet the majority said fuck it and went to work.

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Then I guess the majority just don't have the desire and motivation.

jagermeister said:

I'm not being a fucking apologist Beener. I didn't say anything about the season as a whole. Yes, we had damn near perfect weather this year for most of the season. I'm not an idiot. Bigslam said the weather during the last two days of muzzy was just fine for killing deer and I disagreed. I'm sorry if that makes me out to be an apologist for the odnr.

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It was fine for killing deer, they were moving good in those cold temps. Hand warmers and a propane heater.

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Weather History for Athens, OH
Week of December 1, 2013 through December 7, 2013 — View Current Weather Conditions
Week of December 1, 2013 through December 7, 2013
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MaxAvgMinSum
Temperature
Max Temperature64 °F48 °F29 °F
Mean Temperature50 °F39 °F24 °F
Min Temperature36 °F29 °F19 °F
Degree Days
Heating Degree Days (base 65)412615184
Cooling Degree Days (base 65)0000
Growing Degree Days (base 50)0000
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Dew Point60 °F35 °F15 °F
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Precipitation0.00 in0.00 in0.00 in0.00 in
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Wind14 mph3 mph0 mph
Gust Wind18 mph17 mph16 mph
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Astronomy
Dec. 07, 2013RiseSet
Actual Time7:35 AM EST5:05 PM EST
Civil Twilight7:05 AM EST5:35 PM EST
Nautical Twilight6:31 AM EST6:09 PM EST
Astronomical Twilight5:59 AM EST6:41 PM EST
Moon11:20 AM EST (12/7)10:44 PM EST (12/7)
Length Of Visible Light 10h 30m
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9h 30m
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Dec 7
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Daily Weather History & Observations
2013Temp. (°F)Dew Point (°F)Humidity (%)Sea Level Press. (in)Visibility (mi)Wind (mph)Precip. (in)Events
Dechighavglowhighavglowhighavglowhighavglowhighavglowhighavghighsum
1 44 34 24 31 27 23 94 72 54 30.21 30.09 29.97 10 10 10 7 1 - 0.00
2 49 40 32 37 34 30 92 79 58 29.96 29.87 29.80 10 10 10 4 0 - 0.00 Rain
3 52 40 29 44 38 29 98 87 69 29.89 29.86 29.82 10 7 0 9 1 - 0.00 Fog
4 64 50 36 50 45 35 96 77 58 29.95 29.87 29.81 10 8 3 9 2 - 0.00
5 63 50 36 60 49 33 96 84 70 30.14 29.92 29.85 10 8 2 14 6 18 0.00 Rain , Thunderstorm
6 35 32 29 33 31 27 96 92 89 30.32 30.17 30.09 10 6 1 12 6 16 0.00 Rain , Snow
7 29 24 19 27 20 15 91 80 67 30.57 30.49 30.31 10 10 7 8 4 - 0.00


The first number is the day of the month and the next one is the daily high temp. They are telling me the rainfall was insignificant

finelyshedded said:

The first two days of muzzy were primo weatherwise and those who saw that Monday and Tuesdays weather was gonna be rough would certainly have planned accordingly or hunted as much as they could over the weekend.

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I agree, even my 72 year old dad made it out both of those last two days to finish up his season. Yep, sitting on the edge of a big cut cornfield and still didn't see but 1 deer that whole muzzleloader season.

If the DOW was simply up front, open, and consistently honest on a management plan then there wouldn't be finger pointing & blame game. Why do they no longer share herd estimates? How can we move to a county by county management plan if we don't know herd numbers? What is the herd goal overall, as well as on the county by county level? I could go on because there are way more questions than we have answers for... Does the DOW lie? I guess it all depends on how we define lies. I know that there seems to be a whole hell of a lot of half truths, that when combined with withheld information about the management plan, that have caused this rift between a growing percentage of hunters & the DOW.

After giving it some more thought, I'll also say that perhaps the author of the article has chosen the perfect headline to rekindle this conversation. The DOW did indeed point to weather as a factor, but they also did mention that they had anticipated a dip in the harvest numbers. But still, you can't say something like, "Tonkovich was quick to add, however, that the smaller harvest does not prove that the state has fewer whitetails" and not expect people to call you out.

jagermeister said:

I'm not being a fucking apologist Beener. I didn't say anything about the season as a whole. Yes, we had damn near perfect weather this year for most of the season. I'm not an idiot. Bigslam said the weather during the last two days of muzzy was just fine for killing deer and I disagreed. I'm sorry if that makes me out to be an apologist for the odnr.

Click to expand...

If you can't see that you pop in and always defend the indefensible....not much I can say.

This season had the best weather to kill deer than I can remember. Snow during the peak rut? Friggin awesome!

I just wish they'd say the truth. The harvest numbers are down because there are less deer. If that's the goal they had then mission accomplished. Obviously it is the goal or we wouldn't have ridiculous amounts of tags available. That's all we are asking. State the truth.

Then say, "we are eliminating the $15 antlerless only tag in some counties because we realize that the population needs to rebound a bit." "Once we get to an undesirable population again, we may incorporate that tag again." State the truthful reason for these decisions!

It's just so frustrating because of the bullshitting that is going on in their interviews. The only silver lining here is that we, the ones out in the field, know the truth.

cotty16 said:

This season had the best weather to kill deer than I can remember. Snow during the peak rut? Friggin awesome!

I just wish they'd say the truth. The harvest numbers are down because there are less deer. If that's the goal they had then mission accomplished. Obviously it is the goal or we wouldn't have ridiculous amounts of tags available. That's all we are asking. State the truth.

Then say, "we are eliminating the $15 antlerless only tag in some counties because we realize that the population needs to rebound a bit." "Once we get to an undesirable population again, we may incorporate that tag again." State the truthful reason for these decisions!

It's just so frustrating because of the bullshitting that is going on in their interviews. The only silver lining here is that we, the ones out in the field, know the truth.

Click to expand...

I honestly wish I didn't though. It puts me in a bad mood and does exactly what the ODNR is hoping for.....makes me want to NOT go deer hunting as often, so my voice is smaller. I will not say NOT to go deer hunting at all, because yes, I have a addiction

I would prefer to think that I am not seeing deer because it was something that I was doing wrong which would drive me to increase my skills and ultimately become a better hunter/outdoorsman. In this case, I am helpless......

Jackalope said:

Per the QDMA. Ohio does not have a deer management plan. They can't share their intentions. They don't have the data to back it up. If they published one they'd be writing a check their ass couldn't cash. Instead they prefer to keep their true intentions obscure and undefined. If they came out 5 years ago and said outright what their plan was they know we wouldn't go along with it. So they set out to obscure, mislead, and lie to get their way. Hoping that by the time hunters woke up and realized what was happening it would be too late. They succeeded in that for sure.

View attachment 19639

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Great point! I think it's absolutely absurd that they say they don't have a plan, at least a published plan that is available for public scrutiny. How is there a government agency largely funded by revenue from Hunters & Anglers within the state, that is in charge of managing a public resource, that does not have a business plan for managing that specific resource? That's either a lie, or things are much, much worse that we can even imagine.

Keeping that question in mind, it's even more ridiculous that an agency is operating without a management plan for a resource that is responsible for an economic impact within this state to the tune of over $853 million dollars!!! (Hunting has a more than $853 million economic impact in Ohio through the sale of equipment, fuel, food, lodging and more, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s Hunting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation publication.)

But they do have a plan; issue tags and create new season until we run out of deer. Numbers rebound when hunters quit. Its a great plan! There is no need to actually manage, natural predator/prey relationship. With that plan in place, why do we need Mike T or the DoW? What have they done lately aside from giving lip service and collect revenue?

Beentown said:

If you can't see that you pop in and always defend the indefensible....not much I can say.

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Reread the fucking post beener. I was defending no one, just disagreeing with a post. If my "popping in" is becoming a problem, that's fine. I'll just stop popping in. Seems like anymore, anyone with a differing opinion around here gets jumped on pretty quickly.

I don't think the weather affected the kill numbers to where they would have been on par with last year, but the fold weather snap had to effect the number of hunters. Anyone who has waterfowl hunted knows there are a lot of fair weather hunters. The majority of hunters aren't hardcore hunters. Which also means they aren't on this site right now arguing numbers.. lol