I just got off the phone with the MNR, the agent I spoke with put me on hold and spoke with another person for clarification and came back and told me that they only want the number of live deer you saw in person while hunting. She was not interested in listening to what I had to say regarding why I feel this is not an accurate way to take a count, I suspect they work from a script and have no knowledge other than what is on the pages in front of them so I dropped the matter. Anyways, only count the deer you saw in person, camera images don't count.
Mandatory Ontario Hunters Report
- Thread starter Joe549
- Start date
Lol, yup you got me, the MNR are full of geniuses and like most other government bodies, always know what is best. Just like the dept in charge of firearm laws.... smh.
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I give up.
I was watching a hunting show yesterday and saw at least 10 deer so I better add them to my report as well. That is about as logical as comparing the Ontario MNR biologists who have the best interests of our wildlife in mind to the Federal Gov't making political based firearms laws.
But my dad always told me not to argue with people as I just bring myself down to their level. Apparently I'm to much of an idiot to learn that.
I was watching a hunting show yesterday and saw at least 10 deer so I better add them to my report as well. That is about as logical as comparing the Ontario MNR biologists who have the best interests of our wildlife in mind to the Federal Gov't making political based firearms laws.
But my dad always told me not to argue with people as I just bring myself down to their level. Apparently I'm to much of an idiot to learn that.
Did that hunting show take place the day of your hunt on the property that you hunt? If so, then that means those deer are in fact in your WMU.
If anything, those hunters using trail cams would offer a better gauge on the population then those without.
But either way, all they would have to say is "not including trail cameras" if they didnt want more accurate numbers. Because I am sure, like with any government survey that was voluntary, answers were all over the place when they were trying to get a census of the deer population in each area prior to this years mandatory report.
I think the "not including trail cameras" is implied when they ask how many "live" deer you saw. It's likely a statistical thing whereby the new mandatory reporting will be compared to previous data, and having too many other variables thrown in would make any meaningful comparison impossible. I wouldn't just assume that the MNR biologists don't know what they're doing. In the WMU I hunt, the older guys tell me that in the 70's-80's there was zero population management going on, and there were also zero deer. They'd go multiple seasons without seeing a single one. Now the area has a nice stable population that supports a 100% success in antlerless draw year over year.
But could it not also be construed that "live dear" could also mean "not including dead deer carcasses".
Thats nice about your location's deer numbers. But I know in my area the deer success rate has drastically fallen in the last 20 some years. Anecdotal by the local butcher and "hat's for hides" guy as they have seen the numbers getting worse and worse. They spoke of how the ministry (the all knowing) bowed to the insurance companies when they asked to increase the number of deer allowed for each hunter to 6 a while ago. The locals have said that since then all those years ago the numbers have been dropping each year (and the 6 deer limit had long been removed). Almost like the population never recovered since.
But of course they may have just moved on, or the winters have been getting worse.
I couldn't agree more, but clearly some people just love to argue. I get the impression that if I point out that the sky is blue on a clear day Izzy would post how it could be green since I wasn't more specific in the shade of blue. I guess that is why we have warnings on our coffee cups that the "contents may be hot". The common sense thing is just lacking in today's society.
And why are we talking about dead deer carcasess? Unbelievable. But to be clear, they don't count either.
Yup because clearly everyone agrees with you, hence why nobody has ever thought of any other ways of doing things to possibly come up with some more accurate ways of finding our current deer population. The MNR clearly know the best ways to do everything, i mean obviously they knoe best, as do you, since they are a government run entity for crying out loud lol SMH
But i digress, the census will work out perfect and everything will only get better everywhere.
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the part your missing, and I promise this is my last reply, is that if everyone had trail cameras and they asked how many cameras you had, how many days they were out and how many deer you saw, then they could extrapolate that to get reasonable numbers the same way they do asking how many you say and how many days you hunted. The numbers would statistically be the same, just the calculation based on different data would change.
But what you want to do is add artificially high numbers from your cameras into the old math models and again not provide apples to apples numbers and then the calculations are useless and the data is useless.
One way isn't better than the other, its just that you need to pick a way and stick with it. People who are adamant that they know better and provide oranges into the apples calculations mess it up for everyone.
In fact that most accurate method is aerial surveys, which they have done in the past, but they don't have the budget for that all the time. If they count a 1000 deer in an area from aerial surveys, and then the hunter reports tell them that 2000 deer were seen by hunters, they do the math and figure that 50% of the reported "seen" rate is the current population. Simple. But when everyone reports how many they saw on their cameras and they get 6000 seen, then their calculations show 3000 as the current population.
I hope I made that clear enough to realize that I'm not arguing that one way is better than the other, and they may change the method someday, but for now the method is the method, so just answer the question they asked.
If you want to suggest to them another method go for it, but until they change the question and thus the calculations, just answer the question. Your way overthinking it.
But what you want to do is add artificially high numbers from your cameras into the old math models and again not provide apples to apples numbers and then the calculations are useless and the data is useless.
One way isn't better than the other, its just that you need to pick a way and stick with it. People who are adamant that they know better and provide oranges into the apples calculations mess it up for everyone.
In fact that most accurate method is aerial surveys, which they have done in the past, but they don't have the budget for that all the time. If they count a 1000 deer in an area from aerial surveys, and then the hunter reports tell them that 2000 deer were seen by hunters, they do the math and figure that 50% of the reported "seen" rate is the current population. Simple. But when everyone reports how many they saw on their cameras and they get 6000 seen, then their calculations show 3000 as the current population.
I hope I made that clear enough to realize that I'm not arguing that one way is better than the other, and they may change the method someday, but for now the method is the method, so just answer the question they asked.
If you want to suggest to them another method go for it, but until they change the question and thus the calculations, just answer the question. Your way overthinking it.
I suppose you're right - it could mean that, so I'm glad we got clarification.
That's certainly a bad decision regarding your WMU, and sucks that everyone is paying a price for it years later. Full disclosure, my BIL is a CO, and I know they do the best they can with their limited budgets. There certainly won't be any increases under the Ford government that would allow for larger population studies. This mandatory reporting will have to do for now.
I understand, and yes you are explaining it based on the old math if that old math was in fact correct, which it no doubt was not. (Yes i understand that what they had to go on back then was not a great system that relied on visual confirmation that you saw a deer walking infront of you, considering you could be out all week and see tracks up and down gods green acres but to report that the hunter saw 0 does not help with a population census, plus the fact so many were not even reporting at all).
But with this new era of hunting and cheap cameras and much better ways of keeping a closer idea of how many deer are in the area, i would think they can now add to their counting questions and figure out a new formula.
I know they have a very small budget to work on, but if their system is so out dated with their census and they rely so much on their aerial counts (even tho many deer hide in the woods and cant be seen, but like you and i both agree that there is no perfect way to count every single deer), then i would think that doing a round of new counts, and using the new info that can be provided by hunters who can identify specific individual deer (yes mostly bucks since does are harder to identify) then wouldnt it help them do their job better? Which is to maintain a healthy deer population?
Im sorry if i came across as simply wanting to argue for the sake of arguing, i am genuinely trying to convey that with the massive influx of cheap trail cams now compared to 30 years ago, us hunters can provide a much better census for the government if they could do some work on their part to add things to the census like "how many different deer can you confirm seeing during your time hunting, be it camera shots on those days or in person on those days you hunted" (obviously in a click type census format not the way i wrote it) even if it means adding a few more questions. Hell, the census is mandatory now so you HAVE to sit through the questions. I know when it was voluntary, they probably kept it super short in the hopes that people would see it didnt take time and they would actually fill one out. Well again, now it is mandatory they can get slightly more in depth with their study.
If oranges being thrown in with the apples is to be avoided then they should be crystal clear before requiring thousands of new numbers to be added to their census since this year's will be the biggest influx of data yet. So it stands to reason that there will be many many more people than just joe and i who might see things differently (overthinking) in what the mnr would be asking of us with help about how many deer are around our areas when we are hunting.
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Based on the current wording and questions available then yes that is what they are looking for.
Not like they could ask "did you hunt with anyone else? How many others? Did they see any of the same deer as you? How many of those deer were seen by the others? "
Im sure there is a way to include some better questions for more accurate tally (mine not being the greatest obviously, since i guess you would have to input the license numbers of the ones that hunted with you and saw the deer together to confirm with their reports) but the current system needs an upgrade if they are going to be getting so many reports from now on.
You raise an excellent point - it would be very cheap, but informative to ask a few additional questions pertaining to trail cams - do you use them, how many?, how many deer did you see over how many days? I may very well send an E-mail to the ministry of swamps and bushes suggesting it. If a bunch of us do, they may pay attention.
New Camper
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Lurking in the woods near SFRC.
It'd be interesting to test the theory fully: Response to the question "How many live deer did you see?", "They were all alive."
You saw 2. Your answer is 2
Don’t over think the issue.
They are not trying to get an accurate count. If they were there are easier ways.
As has been stated by others, Xhunters could all see the same Yanimals.
So is the total number of animals in that area XY or Y or some other number Z?
If someone shot 2 of those seen early in the week the # could be XY-2
And how would you know your number is correct?
Don’t make it more difficult than it is.
Don’t over think the issue.
They are not trying to get an accurate count. If they were there are easier ways.
As has been stated by others, Xhunters could all see the same Yanimals.
So is the total number of animals in that area XY or Y or some other number Z?
If someone shot 2 of those seen early in the week the # could be XY-2
And how would you know your number is correct?
Don’t make it more difficult than it is.
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I have worked with the biologists that use this data. Surveys with numbers too far out of the norm for the WMU get tossed out of the dataset anyway, so don't waste your time coming up with trying to game the system unless you convince most of the other hunters in the WMU to do the same.
I seen 21, not a fake number. Haven't seen that many in a deer season since I was a kid. 15 in one little backwoods meadow at once, that was quite the couple hours. No head gear on any of em. But it was quite the sight, herded up for the winter already possibly?
257Roberts
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Peterborough ON
Still have Dec. 8th for Black Powder and Dec. 31st for bow, before we have to fill out the info.
Correct me if I am wrong.
David
Correct me if I am wrong.
David
You are correct
There is no need to fill it out yet unless you are done hunting and just want to get the chore done
