Equality takes a back seat in Arkansas deer hunting. Most outdoors people wish it was otherwise, but the cold, hard facts are that deer are a peaks and valleys subject in the state.
Over the years, at least the last 70 or so, the peaks have out-paced the valleys. Deer have steadily improved since 1939's estimate by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission that there were about 5,000 deer in the state.
Today, AGFC uses the extremely broad estimate of "750,000 to 1 million." The agency has backed off a bit from the late 1990s and early 2000s when the estimate was "about a million."
But these deer, like bananas, tend to be in bunches.
Deer are not evenly distributed across the state and never will be. Varying habitat is the chief reason for this, but the distribution is somewhat better today than 20 or 30 years ago.
Let's take a quick look at some of the ways Arkansas deer have changed over time.
Restoration of deer in the state began in the late 1930s on a limited basis then increased after World War II ended in 1945. But concern over the diminishing deer emerged in the mid-1920s.
Guy Amsler was secretary of Game and Fish, head of the agency, the equivalent of today's director. Amsler wrote and talked of the need to improve and restore deer in the state and even started an agency magazine. He called it The Deer., but this changed to The Conservationist after a couple of issues and was the forerunner of today's Arkansas Wildlife, published six times a year by AGFC.
The earlier deer work involved using deer farms or refuges, fenced and covering sizable amounts of state owned or leased land. Deer that wee produced were trapped, loaded into trucks and taken to various places around Arkansas for release. The whole process was labor-intensive and erratic. Many deer were injured and died. Raising deer in pens and hauling them is considerably different from raising and transporting cattle.
But it worked well enough so some deer were relocated in many parts of Arkansas.
Roughly coincidental was the change in land use in south Arkansas in which small family farms went to timber company ownership. These companies were in the business of growing pine trees, and deer habitat became a fringe benefit or a byproduct. South Arkansas continues to be the area of Arkansas with the most deer.
A strong factor in increasing the number of deer in the state was the limiting of hunting to bucks only. Does, female deer, were the mother element in growing more deer. Eventually, this would become a problem, and here in 2007 a good portion of hunters do not and will not shoot a doe.
A Conway County resident and veteran hunter commented recently, "I know they need to kill some does to keep the deer in balance, but I just won't shoot a doe."
With the lack of uniformity in deer numbers across Arkansas, hunting regulations of the Game and Fish Commission have become increasingly complex in the quest for more balance. The one-time season and bag limit for the entire state evolved into varrying rules for about two dozen different deer zones.
Hunters have to study the AGFC Hunting Regulations guide before going into the field. Word of mouth doesn't do it any more.
Restrictions such as limiting the taking of bucks that have less than three points on one side of antlers have made improvements in deer quality in Arkansas. But the 3-point rule isn't a cure-all, wildlife biologists say, and most hunters agree with them.
The 2007-2008 deer season is still underway n Arkansas and will run through the end of February when bow hunting stops. Compiled results will have to wait for weeks after that, but a rough estimate is that this is a "good" deer season, perhaps even a "very good" deer season.
