The DNR published the new bonus county map with, surprisingly, reductions in 30 counties. My county was cut from 8 to 4.

Yeah got the email yesterday. Was shocked to see Fulton county down to a three.

Here's last year's map for comparison.



Looks like 9 counties were removed from the Special Late Antlerless Hunt for 2017-18:

Allen
Dekalb
Dubois
Fulton
Madison
Morgan
Noble
Spencer
Warren

And one was added, Greene County

Reduced quotas wont affect numbers much since they were already set way to high. How many hunters killed 8 in an 8 county...not many?.....basically this reduction wont change a thing because very few killed their county quota to begin with unless it was an A, 1 or 2 and they are only 12 counties with those quotas. Until the DNR dumps the bundle tag and you see a map with 1's and 2's, not much will change h.h.

hornharvester I just can't see that happening. It's a money maker for the IDNR and it's proven to be quite popular with hunters.

still to many 4 and 8 counties, need to drop more down to 2 or less and stop the Dec. kill all the does gun season ..

Yep reduce the numbers I am in, no one needs that many deer killed

I didn't deer hunt last year and I'm kinda over arguing about stuff.
But I can't for the life of me figure out what our deer managers are thinking? 8? Seriously? 8 in one county? That means one hunter COULD put the smack down on a particular 300 acre parcel and do nothing to help the county. And exactly what data suggests they lower it from 8 to 6 or 7?
"We think we're getting the herd under control so we will now make it 7 in six pack county."

I realize very few hunters take more than a couple...So if that's true, how silly is a quota of 8? It sounds like we have a couple people who majored in social work and minored in basket weaving managing our deer herd.

to answer your question...very silly!

I suspect that the particular county bonus quota, whether it is 1 or 3 or 8 probably has little effect on the overall deer kill in that county. The number of people who shoot a truckload and of does is small. The exception might be in the Amish-heavy counties. More significant elsewhere, may be whether or not the county participates in the late antlerless season. That could be even more significant now that unlimited centerfires are in play for that season, as more guys may take a notion to go out and drop a few now that those toys are legal.

I went and looked back @ the harvest data for the late antlerless season since 2012. In that first year there were 10,000 antlerless deer killed. Since then, the average has been 4,978 per year killed in the roughly 60 eligible counties. That equates to about 83 deer per eligible county on average per year.

Will that number go up this year? Based on the averages, I don't expect it to. I also expect the overall late antlerless harvest total to drop this year as there are 51 counties eligible for the late antlerless season this year as compared to the average of about 60 over the last few years.