Maine Deer Harvest Record

BY V. Paul Reynolds

In Maine, a state with widely varying winter weather patterns, the deer survival equation is both simple and complex. Weather always rules. Snow depths. Protracted cold snaps. Deer wintering areas and timing of the spring green up all play a pivotal role. There are adjustments that wildlife managers and policy makers can make to alter the deer numbers, but ultimately weather trumps all.

When whitetail numbers are up, wildlife regulators get the credit; conversely, when deer numbers are in the tank, the same folks take the heat.

Deer wise, this has been a very good year! In fact, the unofficial deer harvest tally before the blackpowder numbers are in stands at an amazing 52,709 deer tagged. This is an all-time high and the final number is expected to reach 53,000 plus.

According to the Bangor Daily News, the 2022 change in harvest policy that allowed the taking of both a buck and a doe in most wildlife management districts is “a key factor in the state’s record breaking harvest.” Certainly that all figures, but there is something else going on out there in the deer woods. Policy or no policy, a liberalized harvest can only deliver if the deer numbers are there in the first place.

Deer Aplenty

Let’s get anecdotal for a moment, as they say. In the 60 years that I have been hunting Maine deer, never have the deer been so plentiful, not only along the coast where I live, but also the North Woods where I hunt for a week every fall. In fact, going and coming to my hunting spots, it was a rare day not to see at least one or two crossing in the headlights. For reasons that probably only a wildlife biologist can explain, there was another unusual observation made by other hard core deer hunters who have shared their sightings with me: more young deer in numbers never before seen!

It is, I have been told, nutrition levels and mild winters that are the key determinants in the number of fawns produced by does. So it seem reasonable to conclude that yes, indeed, it was a mild winter by all accounts and the foraging conditions were above average as well.

If you are a prideful deer hunter, like me, who takes hunting seriously this was not a good year to get skunked. Despite many hours in the deer woods from September to December and with three days left in the black powder season for me, it is not looking hopeful. My excuse is that two were missed with my bow early on and I just could not bring myself to rifle a skipper for my game pole. A number of these youngsters will hopefully be around next season, a little bigger and little fatter.

What about you, if you are meatless as well, what is your excuse?

Unchanged by all of this good deer news was that the big, mature bucks seemed to me to be as stealthful, wary and elusive as ever. Some things never change, and that’s what makes hunting so downright exciting and challenging.

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