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Adam,
I don’t know where you are obtaining your success rates, the latest PGC harvest reports for 2003 show 464,890 deer harvested. Of that number 65,100 were taken with bows, for the entire deer hunting seasons. That is not 27 percent but just over 14 percent. The success rate for flintlocks alone account for 35,000 deer, or roughly 7.5 percent. Add to the mix in-lines in the early season and the percentage for “muzzleloaders” increases dramatically, unfortunately, the PGC doesn’t track this information.
A sad note to hunting is that hunters do wound deer, both archers and rifle hunters. I profess that archers practice their art to a far greater degree than rifle hunters. You can kill at 200 yards with a rifle but not much greater than 40 yards with a bow, most deer are taken at 20 yards or less with a bow, so it takes a lot more practice to be successful. You can pick up a rifle at the local sports shop and be hunting the same day with some degree of confidence, not true with a bow.
True you will find deer in the rifle season with arrows in them, that is unfortunate. However, I have found many deer after the rifle season with extremities missing, in fact we have a deer here locally that feeds in our orchard we call tripod. An arrow didn’t do that.
Like I said in my earlier post, if it was flintlock only or at least traditional only I would be for the early season, either sex deer, but you know that is not going to happen. The in-line crowd is already firmly planted in the early season and they are not going to give that up.
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