They don't have a clue what % it really was. I have a feeling it may have been greater than 35% but who knows and that is the problem. Most people I have talked to have reported lower sightings but thats a small sample. If they're going to continue to use the old #s to figure the percentage of reporting success what was the need for something new? At what point do you stop using the old #s to get an assumed deer harvest and start using the new game check numbers? Or will they just use their number assumptions that they want to use and continue to tell us what the percentage of people that are using game check? At what point do you start looking at these numbers as data that can be trusted, when it lines up with the #s you've been putting out? If not when do you change your numbers to match a guessed % from game check?

I have not seen anyone say that they did not use it. And, I do not know anybody that did not use it.
I do know a lot of guys that hunted this year and did not kill anything.

I'm betting 35% is a bit inflated.

I entered the buck I killed in game check in Alabama and registered the one I killed in Illinois using their system. Alabama's was actually easier to use.

How can you estimate the amount of deer not reported. I don't see how that is possible at all. It could be 10% or 90%; how could you know. So I assume they are using the guess they had last year and dividing what was reported this yr by that number and getting 35%?

How can you estimate the amount of deer not reported. I don't see how that is possible at all. It could be 10% or 90%; how could you know. So I assume they are using the guess they had last year and dividing what was reported this yr by that number and getting 35%?

How many game warden interactions would there be? That sample size seems like it would still be small and how could it give you the total number of deer killed in the state?

How can you estimate the amount of deer not reported. I don't see how that is possible at all.

For decades they estimated an annual "harvest" based on the statistically valid post-season survey -- deemed last year as worthless info by the director -- and whatever other method they used for the estimate.

So estimating the amount of deer killed based on a little-used check system should be easy. Just come up with a percentage, multiply it by whatever factor and then say "Hey, success!"

I'd be embarrassed and madder than 10 wet hens if after 2-3 years of a voluntary system, the amount of meetings and such they had last year, the discussion based on this site and elsewhere, and repeated stories about it being mandated, and 70% or so of the people ignored it.

As Skinny said, in the private world some heads would roll at such a failure.

All those seminars/meetings didn't cost the state a single red cent correct?