Its impacted my area and all the counties around me on a very large scale. Support it 100%

I'm not complaining about AR....I can see how they would keep Bubba from shooting anyting that moves, which would be a good thing. The part I can't understand is why allow people to shoot spikes? If the idea is to let animals mature, why shoot yearlings? Why not just have the 13-inch limit?

I also don't get why they just don't have a minimum number of points, instead of having us guess at a spread. I can count points easier than asking the deer to hold still while I get my tape measure. The only thing I have to go by is that if the rack is not clearly beyond the ears, don't shoot.

Me too dang it. I hate AR's

I live and hunt in one of the first experimental counties where we had a 1 buck bag limit and when a buck was taken, it didn't matter of what size it was as long as it had antlers.

Now, with the AR's, our deer population especially bucks (must have MLD permits for antlerless during the Youth, General and Muzzleloader seasons) have really escalated in numbers seen, body and antler size since a hunter must check close on the bucks if they are taking one with a branched antler to be 13" or greater. The biggest draw back and I admit, is the bucks who are mature, but will never have an inside spread of 13" or better, that's the shame and I was one who brought that up when they added a buck to the limit but only one with an unbranched antler. It would be great if they would allow an age to be used, but like so many have said, the majority of hunters are unable to accurately judge age on bucks.

The only way the spike tag makes any kind of sense in a program geared to increase buck numbers and that group's age is to allow a spike, thought to be antlerless, to be tagged as a whoops deer. But, if you expect people to visualize 13" at whatever distance, I've always thought seeing horns of any kind should be a requirement with no whoops tag to fall back on.

I understand E Tex and shooting young bucks. But that is NOT the whole state. Where I am at I have 4 bucks that are straight up 6 pointers, have watched them for 3 years, most are at least 3.5 to 4.5, and they breed, have seen them in the pasture. Now I cant take them, they will never, ever make AR.BUT I aint in E Texas, or where they have harvested young bucks, so no I am not at all with AR's!! Count me in with Curly and all.

THEY WORK, at least in the four counties I hunt...
Unspoken compromise to appease the meat hunters.

The AR has its place but I think TPWD needs to cycle the restrictions in each county every 3-4 years so the hunters can take out the cull bucks that will never be over 13". We have always tried to manage the deer on our lease,and now we have our hands tied because we can't cull out the inferior bucks.

Go MLD

I read somewhere (escaping my memory where) that spikes were a sign of bad antler genetics,and that a yearling deer should just as easy make a branched antler its first year. I think this might be a way that TPWD is trying to avoid those mature deer with a spread less than 13" in the long run, by allowing hunters to cull bad antler genetics before they start breeding...whether this is a proven fact or not, I can't say.

Not my ranch,and the owner doesn't want the paperwork/expense.

I Deer hunted East TX from 1980 to 1995 on my wife's families 150 acre farm. My father in law and I took a lot of great bucks during that time. My son has been hunting from 1995 to the present time and from what I have seen, the number of mature bucks is much greater now than when I was hunting. I wish AR's had been in place back then. It forces law abiding hunters to let smaller immature bucks walk. Over time it improves the number and size of older age class bucks. With the average size of land holdings decreasing and the number of hunters increasing over time I think the AR's are a good thing and are working pretty well.

In my county AR appears to be working. I do wish they would relax the AR restrictions on youth season and maybe even archery and muzzleloader season as I would like to get some inferior bucks that don't meet restrictions out of the gene pool.

I love ARs like I love my dear children.

They are like a brother to us all.

Don't get me wrong I like the antler restrictions but I wish they didn't apply so much for little kids.

I gotta say I wasn't to happy when they came my way.I had a lease up in Red River County for 11 years. As much As I dis-like the AR for the sole reason of the hard to "cull" older buck which is still a very nice deer for many.Antlers are fun but who eats them.I have to admit that there have been some nice nice deer taken off the place the last 2 years I was their and the 4 years since(friend still hunts their).Course the lease prices quadrupled too!

PS: Im pro youth season in part but I'm sorry I don't favor special rules for children either. But then that's another whole topic then!

I would have to disagree just based on the pics of bucks I've seen on this forum from East Texas over the last two seasons. That evidence tells me they are working.

I would like to see some additional management practices done by TPW. With technology today, I think they could implement a program where you could send TC pics of obviously mature bucks that will have a narrow spread their whole life to your local game warden and have them issue a permit exception you receive from them and tag with the deer. They could submit the pic to the county wildlife biologist/manager to confirm full maturity and send you the permit. I don't understand why this would be difficult to do.

That's an anecdote, not evidence. No one posts pics of mediocre deer. Of course the pics look good. But in the low density areas, the increase from one to four deer is devastating.

Im not sold on ARs but not opposed to it either. If they would increase our doe season more than the Thanksgiving weekend it would be much easier to take!