(WWJ) While the number of deer hunters in Michigan has declined quite a bit over the last two decades, there were still a few hundred thousand deer harvested in the state this season.
That's according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, which is out with its annual 2022 deer hunting season recap.
Hunters reported total of 303,087 deer harvested in Michigan this season, which kicked off with the Liberty Hunt Sept. 9, and ended with the urban deer hunt in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties in January.
For the 2022 season — the first year of mandatory online harvest reporting — 586,595 hunters purchased a deer license, which is about 1% less than in 2021.
According to the DNR, Sanilac County led the state with a reported 8,150 deer harvested, followed by Montcalm with 8,103, Newaygo with 7,422, Jackson with 7,141, and Lapeer County with 6,976.
There were 182,586 deer reported harvested in the southern Lower Peninsula, 97,714 reported from the northern Lower Peninsula and 22,787 reported from the Upper Peninsula.
Unsurprisingly, the DNR said, the most harvest reports came during the firearm season, with 154,598 deer reported taken Nov. 15-30. Interestingly, 45,834 deer were reported taken on opening day of firearm season, translating to nearly 30% of the firearm season harvest and over 15% of the overall deer season harvest.
The total reported for archery season was 95,125 deer. The combined total of harvest reports in firearm and archery seasons, 250,083 deer, made up 82.5% of the total harvest.
A majority, 56.76%, of the harvest reports that came through were for antlered deer, the DNR reported, with 172,044 legal bucks and 131,043 antlerless deer reported, with about 15% of those antlerless deer reported as fawns.
here were 23,123 hunters who reported harvesting more than one buck.
So, how did hunters handle the new online reporting?
The DNR says nearly 83% of hunters reporting a deer harvest this year were able to complete their report in under five minutes. The DNR website proved to be the most common way for reports to be submitted, with over 86% of reports received through the website, while the app accounted for 13% of reports. In total, 208,408 individual hunters submitted a harvest report.
Want to see more stats? Check out the full harvest report summary dashboard HERE.
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