HARRISBURG - Pennsylvania's state-owned forests have received a seal of approval for the past 13 years for the way they are managed, but there is continuing debate over the declining size of the deer herd.
The Legislative Budget and Finance Committee has just done a cost-benefit study of whether the forests' certification as being sustainable from an environmental, economic and public-use standpoint by the Forest Stewardship Council has an impact on deer hunting. The council is made up of foresters, environmentalists and others and logging businesses.
Maintaining certification of the state forests, which involves annual reviews and periodic audits, has surfaced as an issue in the debate over leasing tracts of land for natural gas drilling, but that isn't examined in this report, said committee director Philip Durgin. The lawmakers requesting the report wanted to put the focus on the hunting issue, he said.
The issue has surfaced because one of the conditions to obtaining certification from the council is improving the biodiversity of the forests. Overbrowsing of brush by a large deer herd is viewed in this context as harming biodiversity.
To that end, the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and the Pennsylvania Game Commission have run a deer management program since 2003 to reduce the impact of browsing on state forest land. The program provides for issuing hunting permits for use in specially designated areas.
Meanwhile, the size of the deer herd statewide has declined from 1.5 million in 2000 to 1.2 million in 2010 and the sale of hunting licenses is down over the same period, according to the game commission. Participation in the certification program increases public confidence that the forests are being managed properly, said DCNR officials.
"To speculate that FSC Certification has resulted in decreased hunting opportunities or losses in economic activity is unfounded," said DCNR Secretary Richard Allan. "Rather, DCNR would argue that hunting opportunities on State Forest lands have increased."
The finance committee study concludes that many factors are involved in the decline of the deer herd and it's overly simplistic to link that to the forest deer management program.
Contact the writer: rswift@timesshamrock.com