Deer hunters in Pennsylvania killed an estimated 315,813 deer in the 2015-2016 seasons, representing an increase in total kills of about 4 percent. Of those deer killed, 137,580 were bucks and the remaining 178,233 deer killed were antlerless deer.
Harvest estimates are based on the more than 24,000 deer checks by state officials combined with over 100,000 harvest reports submitted by successful hunters.
The number of bucks killed in the latest season represents an increase of about 15 percent as compared to previous seasons, while antlerless kills decreased by roughly 6500 deer.
Game Commission Agency Executive Director, R. Matthew Hough has stated that recent deer seasons in the state of Pennsylvania have been nothing but ‘outstanding’.
Roughly 60 percent of the whitetail bucks taken by hunters in the state were 2.5 years or older, a promising trend for the health of the overall population of deer in Pennsylvania.
“To see that number now at nearly 60 percent is remarkable,” Wayne Laroche, the Game Commission’s wildlife management director told Lancaster Online. “It goes to show what antler restrictions have accomplished — they’ve created a Pennsylvania where every deer hunter in the woods has a real chance of taking the buck of a lifetime.”
