I think bowhuntia has a good point. A one buck limit forces a choice. If you had a one buck limit in Iowa, there would be more bucks and larger bucks (simple math). The guy that shoots that 140 inch buck with his bow on November 5th is then done hunting and cannot take another buck.
Another scenario would be that same hunter passing the 140 inch buck because he only has one tag, and then two years later that buck is 185".
Now keep in mind that I am not critical of Iowa on management, but that is the one area where my home state (Minnesota) has it right...one buck limit.
But then you throw party hunting into the mix, and all of sudden it is not a "true" one buck limit.
Long term I believe Iowa will have to address this, it certainly wouldn't hurt mature buck numbers by reducing the limit!
Hardwood11- I don't think bowhuntia was making the same point you are. Resident landowners can get 3 buck tags per year,
all resident hunters can get 2 buck tags. (BTW, I am not even considering the "loophole" where both resident and non-resident hunters can shoot multiple bucks per year while party hunting during the shotgun seasons. We'll save that topic for another thread. :grin
Virtually every landowner I know is more likely to shoot 0 or 1 buck per year than 3. (150Class' post is
exactly the same thing as what I have seen from almost all landowners that I know. Speaking just for me, I too could have shot 30 bucks over the past 10 years as a landowner, but I have shot 5 or 6 total and never more than 1 in a year. In my experience, this is pretty typical for land owners that I know. If we changed the annual limit from 3 to 2 for resident landowners then between 150 Class and myself, there would be NO impact on buck numbers.)
All I am saying is the eliminating the 3rd anysex tag for resident landowners will essentially have NO impact on buck numbers and/or sizes in Iowa. There just aren't enough of "3rd bucks" being taken to make a dent in the population one way or the other.
Now then...what you propose, a 1 buck limit per year, I believe
would have the potential to impact age structure because I too think it would influence a good number of hunters to pass say a 130" class buck in hopes of a bigger one later, etc. Reducing from the standard 2 bucks per year to just 1 would force many more decisions in the timber.
Bowhuntia - I am not arguing that regulation changes cannot or should not be made, only that the 3rd buck factor is essentially a non-factor in how many 180"+ deer there are roaming our state. If we are considering changes though then let's identify some that truly impact the problem. IMO, the 3rd buck deal just doesn't.
