Are there really more deer in Michigan?

[Terry Lee Grams]

The Michigan DNR publishes a lot of information that contradicts their claims that deer culls are useful in managing deer. It takes a lot of work to find the information because this agency proliferates a lot of publications. For example, they continue to claim culls are needed to control deer populations while publishing this "LANSING, Mich. (WJRT) - The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is reporting a significant drop in deer harvest numbers for the 2023 hunting season. Hunters reported taking slightly less than 275,000 deer last fall, which is about 9% less than the more than 300,000 deer culled during the 2022 hunting season". At the same time According to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, approximately 590,000 people obtained a deer tag in Michigan in 2023, which is 1% more compared to the previous year. So, deer tag sales were up 1% and the harvest was down over 9%. Does this indicate to you that there are more deer?

[XLFD]

From the Dec. 23, 2023 edition of the Ludington Daily News, and several other MI newspapers as it was directly from the public information officer of the MI DNR, John Pepin, their spokesman:

"Reviewing license sales numbers through the end of November 2023, overall, for the state, about 590,000 people obtained a deer tag, which is 1% more compared to last year at this time.  The total number of deer tags sold was 1.3 million which is 2% more than last year. Nonresident hunters continued the decade-long upward trend totaling about 25,000 which is up 3% over last year."

"Reported deer harvest in Michigan as of Dec. 5, 2023 (all deer seasons) decreased compared to the autumn of 2022 by 26% in the Upper Peninsula, 16% in the northern Lower Peninsula and 7% in the southern Lower Peninsula."

So, I don't like to disagree with you, Terry, but there were overall 2% more deer tags sold last year, and in our area (the northern lower peninsula), the deer harvest was down 16%.  

Put in simpler terms using rounded numbers that aren't far off from reality, if 6000 deer hunters in our county went out and bagged 4000 deer in 2022, we would expect 6120 deer hunters to bag 3360 deer in 2023 in this county.  Put another way, each average hunter in 2022 was likely to get 0.67 deer during the course of hunting, in 2023, they would only get 0.55 deer.  

Our Ludington leaders told us earlier that the deer are smarter than many of our children and able to look both ways when they're crossing streets, that's why you don't see a problem with car/deer crashes in the city.  Now, by hysterically saying we need a deer cull when numbers of deer are obviously cycling downward by these statistics, are they telling us the deer are smarter than many of our hunters?

Great catch, Terry, and I hope you don't mind my corrections.

[Terry Lee Grams]

I do not mind at all. I stuck with the number of hunters and did not include the number of tags because I thought it might be confusing to a reader. But I was wrong to do that just because I thought it might be confusing. I should have published everything.

[Freedom Seeker]

How funny--deer smarter than kids! Yes they are! I have observed deer not only wisely looking both ways before crossing a road, but also doing the "left, right and then left" before crossing AND even waiting when they see my car when travelling 25 m.p.h. or less. It must be at speeds of 55 m.p.h. that they forget the rule or get spooked. People should plant more hostas and deer-friendly plants at the road edge to distract them from crossing into traffic.

As far as shooting with high powered riffles in human populations, no thanks. Why not quit shooting, relocate or provide deer sanctuaries and quit using up their spaces?