Well Dave, I haven’t seen a SINGLE deer since the opening day of gun season. My normal practice is to stay out in gun season, and give our place up as sanctuary for the deer until I see one I want to go after. In recent years there are always 15-20 deer that yard up on our place from the pressure. (That number was once 50-60) Nothing has changed, and actually we have made it better for the deer. It has always been that way. But, I don’t have to hunt to know what’s there. Where I’m at, I can see deer whether I’m in one of my stands or not. And I’m not talking just on our farm. I’m talking the two square mile block that I have access to, and I’m on or around every single day working on the farm! In setting coyote snares, and glassing almost every evening, I have seen exactly ZERO! Its just not me, it the neighbors, friends, and my trail cameras that back up what I’m not seeing. You know its bad when several local farmers ask….”Where’s the deer”! It’s not about the weapons, can’t do anything about that anyway. But I KNOW for a fact there were several people hunting and killed deer with HPR’s in the neighborhood, and just as many hunt with crossbows as do compounds now. Want me to take a picture next time a buggy goes down the road with a couple of crossbows strapped to the top?? After having a lengthy conversation with the local biologist, I initially disagreed with him. I was saying get rid of the one bonus permit we have in the county. He said it wouldn’t do any good. When you have more people hunting for deer, than there are deer, it just doesn’t matter. After thinking about that all night, he is right. We can already kill more does than what’s needed without the bonus permit. As you always say, “a dead deer is dead no matter what weapon killed it”. Well, that’s true, but with all that now, what it has done is greatly sped up the process eliminating most of them! So, before you, or anybody else for that matter, snidely spouts off about the “sky is not falling” crap, what you need to do look outside your 20 acre deer paradise or whatever it is, and see what’s going on elsewhere. Because here, the sky isn’t falling, it’s SLAMMED to the ground!!!! State wide, I’m sure we’re good, I have no worries about the deer population. However, I’ve been hunting this area for 30+ years. I know what the hunting used to be like, and what its capable of being. Not any more…………..