PA Hunters Thin Deer Numbers: See Game Commission 2024-25 Stats

PENNSYLVANIA — Hunters reduced the number of deer across the state by harvesting about 11 percent more of them in the 2024-25 hunting season than they did the year before, according to Pennsylvania Game Commission estimates released Friday.

The statewide 2024-25 harvest is estimated at 476,880 deer, 175,280 of them antlered deer and 301,600 antlerless. The statewide 2023-24 harvest was estimated at 430,010 deer.

Game Commission officials attributed most of the increase to the antlerless deer harvest. The 2024-25 buck take was up 2 percent over the year before, and 9 percent over the most recent three-year average. The 2024-25 antlerless harvest increased 17 percent over the prior year before and 21 percent over the three-year average.

Game Commission Deer and Elk Section Supervisor David Stainbrook said the agency's objective was to reduce deer numbers in state wildlife management units impacted by chronic wasting disease, where deer impacts on forest health are occurring and where populations are increasing.

Stainbrook said that many variables can impact harvest totals from one year to the next.

“Harvest estimates can fluctuate from year to year from a number of factors, so we caution reading too much into annual variation in harvest,” he said in a release. “The trends in data are what give a truer picture of what’s going on. We manage deer over longer periods of time, for example looking at six-year population trends.”

The Game Commission’s harvest estimates are calculated using antlered and antlerless harvest reports submitted by hunters in combination with data from deer checked by crews at processors across the state.