A hunter who filled a tag in one wildlife management unit and a friend who hunted across a county are holding two different New York numbers. The 2025 white-tailed deer harvest summary from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation prints both. Unit rows and county rows answer different questions.
DEC's calculated harvest for the 2025 seasons is 227,032 white-tailed deer. That is a 1.7% change from the 2024 calculated take of 223,304. The 2020 to 2024 average on the same row is 226,061. Adult bucks 1.5 years or older were 120,909. Antlerless deer were 106,123. The Southern Zone total was 196,065 and the Northern Zone total was 30,967.
IReporting rate
The unit rows are calculated, not a raw count
The statewide hunter reporting rate on all tags was 62.8% in 2025. The 2024 rate was 53.6%. The 2020 to 2024 average was 48.5%. DEC checked 5.5% of the harvest to estimate reporting by zone and tag type and to record age, sex, and antler characteristics. The statewide harvest estimate carries a 95% confidence interval of ±1.33%. The report states that New York law required successful deer hunters to report within 48 hours.
The 62.8% figure blends different tags. Regular big game tags were reported at 70.6% in the Northern Zone, 64.4% in southeastern regions, and 65.1% in central-western regions. Deer Management Permit reporting was 54.9% in the southeast and 56.3% in the central-west. Bow and muzzleloader tags were at 63.7%. Deer Management Assistance Program tags were at 87.7%. Youth tags were at 75.5%. DEC places the Northern Zone in regions 5 and 6, the southeast in regions 1, 3, and 4, and the central-west in regions 7, 8, and 9. The confidence interval in the trend table is statewide. This summary does not print one beside each unit.
Deer on Deer Damage Permits sit outside the harvest. The report says DDPs authorize deer culling and that this take is not deer hunting. Reported DDP take is excluded from annual deer harvest totals. In 2025 that table shows 6,554 deer on 1,565 permits.
Season columns are another cut of the same calculated harvest. Bow season take was 49,160. Muzzleloader season take was 18,735. Regular season take was 155,005. The youth season was 2,567. The report says those season totals include every tag that was legal in the season and that DMP and DMAP tags could be used in all seasons. Add a season column to a tag column and the same deer get counted twice.
Our rule is to keep the questions split. Use the unit total for where the most deer were calculated as taken. Use deer per square mile for where that harvest was thickest. Keep county totals on the county table. A state density is not a stand forecast and a unit share of the statewide total is not one hunter's odds.
IIRank split
WMU 9H led the count and WMU 8R led the density
WMU 9H has the largest calculated total in the unit table at 8,177 deer. That row is 4,136 adult bucks, 358 male fawns, 3,266 adult females, and 417 female fawns. Density is 4.3 adult bucks per square mile, 4.2 antlerless deer per square mile, and 8.4 deer per square mile.
WMU 8R has the highest density at 17.1 deer per square mile on 4,629 deer. That row is 2,000 adult bucks, 233 male fawns, 2,126 adult females, and 270 female fawns. Adult bucks were 7.4 per square mile and antlerless deer were 9.7 per square mile. The calculated harvest in 8R was heavier per square mile on antlerless deer than on adult bucks. This 2025 summary does not print a population estimate for that unit.
WMU 5F has the lowest density at 0.7 deer per square mile on 972 deer, with 0.6 adult bucks and 0.1 antlerless deer per square mile. WMU 5H has 2,517 deer at 0.8 per square mile. WMU 9Y has 1,628 deer at 13.0 per square mile, with 5.5 adult bucks and 7.5 antlerless deer per square mile. Total deer and deer per square mile put different units first.
On the state row the densities are 2.6 adult bucks per square mile, 2.2 antlerless deer per square mile, and 4.8 deer per square mile. WMU 9H at 8.4 per square mile sits above the state 4.8. WMU 8R at 17.1 sits above both.
After 9H the next calculated totals are 7,080 in WMU 8G, 6,939 in WMU 7M, and 6,909 in WMU 9J. WMU 7M is third by total and its density is 5.6 per square mile. WMU 6G shows the same split on adult bucks. Its total of 5,715 includes 2,737 adult bucks. WMU 8X has 2,524 adult bucks inside 5,696 deer at 14.2 per square mile. More adult bucks were calculated in 6G. The thicker harvest per square mile was in 8X.
Every cell below is copied from the 2025 unit table. The first table follows the Total column. The second follows Total per square mile. The third is the low end of that same density column. No tied value sat on the cut between the last row shown and the next row left off.
Swipe table to see every column
| WMU | Total | Adult male | Adult male per sq mi | Antlerless per sq mi | Total per sq mi |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9H | 8,177 | 4,136 | 4.3 | 4.2 | 8.4 |
| 8G | 7,080 | 3,199 | 4.7 | 5.7 | 10.3 |
| 7M | 6,939 | 3,494 | 2.8 | 2.8 | 5.6 |
| 9J | 6,909 | 3,278 | 4.7 | 5.2 | 10.0 |
| 8F | 5,893 | 2,610 | 3.6 | 4.5 | 8.0 |
| 8H | 5,850 | 2,594 | 4.5 | 5.7 | 10.2 |
| 6G | 5,715 | 2,737 | 2.9 | 3.2 | 6.1 |
| 8X | 5,696 | 2,524 | 6.3 | 7.9 | 14.2 |
| 4F | 5,439 | 3,143 | 2.7 | 2.0 | 4.7 |
| 7J | 5,438 | 2,481 | 3.0 | 3.5 | 6.5 |
Swipe table to see every column
| WMU | Total | Adult male per sq mi | Antlerless per sq mi | Total per sq mi |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8R | 4,629 | 7.4 | 9.7 | 17.1 |
| 8X | 5,696 | 6.3 | 7.9 | 14.2 |
| 8N | 4,121 | 6.2 | 6.9 | 13.1 |
| 9Y | 1,628 | 5.5 | 7.5 | 13.0 |
| 8T | 4,401 | 5.6 | 5.8 | 11.4 |
| 8S | 2,693 | 4.8 | 5.7 | 10.5 |
| 8M | 3,209 | 4.4 | 6.0 | 10.4 |
| 8G | 7,080 | 4.7 | 5.7 | 10.3 |
| 8H | 5,850 | 4.5 | 5.7 | 10.2 |
| 9J | 6,909 | 4.7 | 5.2 | 10.0 |
Swipe table to see every column
| WMU | Total | Adult male per sq mi | Antlerless per sq mi | Total per sq mi |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5F | 972 | 0.6 | 0.1 | 0.7 |
| 5H | 2,517 | 0.7 | 0.1 | 0.8 |
| 6J | 1,390 | 0.7 | 0.1 | 0.9 |
| 6F | 1,171 | 0.9 | 0.1 | 1.0 |
| 5C | 1,252 | 0.9 | 0.2 | 1.1 |
Eight of the ten densest rows start with 8. They are 8R, 8X, 8N, 8T, 8S, 8M, 8G, and 8H. WMUs 9Y and 9J are the other two. That is a sort of one column. DEC does not publish those ten units as their own region total in this summary.
Of the buck take, 72.0% was 2.5 years or older in 2025. The 2024 figure was 66.9% and the five-year figure on that row was 64.4%. DEC ages checked deer by tooth wear and replacement in each unit. The age chart does not print a labeled statewide share for bucks 3.5 years or older.
Deer Management Permit success was 12.4% on 82,905 deer and 666,712 permits issued. That permit rate is statewide. It is a different statistic from the 17.1 deer per square mile in WMU 8R and from the 8.4 in WMU 9H.
IIICounty line
Steuben's 15,913 stays on the county table
Steuben has the largest total on the county table at 15,913 deer, with 5.5 adult bucks per square mile and 5.9 antlerless deer per square mile. Yates has the highest county adult-buck density at 6.3 per square mile and the highest county antlerless density at 7.8 on a total of 4,768 deer. WMU 8R is higher than both of those county densities at 17.1 overall, 7.4 adult bucks, and 9.7 antlerless. WMU 8X matches the Yates adult-buck density at 6.3 and is higher on antlerless deer at 7.9.
DEC notes that the sum of county totals may not exactly match WMU totals due to rounding. Suffolk's sex and age counts and the total of 3,765 match WMU 1C. Westchester's counts and the total of 859 match WMU 3S. The report groups WMUs 1C and 3S as the Suffolk-Westchester aggregate. Matching printed rows are not a reason to add a county total onto a unit total. Steuben's 15,913 does not belong on the unit ranking.
IVField check
Read the total, the density, and the buck split
Pull the row for the unit you hunt. Read the total. Read total deer per square mile. Read adult bucks per square mile next to antlerless deer per square mile. Set the unit's total density beside the statewide 4.8 and the adult-buck density beside the statewide 2.6.
WMU 4F is on the ten-largest total list at 5,439 deer with a density of 4.7 per square mile. Adult bucks there are 2.7 per square mile and antlerless deer are 2.0. In WMU 8R the antlerless figure is the higher density. In WMU 4F the adult-buck figure is the higher density. Both are calculated harvests for 2025. They are not a prediction for the next time you sit and they are not a herd count.
We have no New York unit page beyond this table. The ranks come from the 2025 DEC summary alone.
NOTES AND SOURCES
- Source: New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, 2025 white-tailed deer harvest summary.
Fully Drawn Research is an independent data analysis desk, not affiliated with any state wildlife agency, transportation agency, mapping provider or outfitter. This paper reports official agency harvest records as published when it was written. It does not predict hunting success at any place.
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