UPDATED: Ohio's gun deer season figures way down; Lake County's numbers fall off Earth

Oops, Ohio continues to see a deficit in the number of deer its hunters manage to kill.

The just completed seven-day firearms deer-hunting season ultimately resulted in a 13.29 percent decline from the 2012 firearms deer-hunting season. Which itself was a fall-off from the 2011 season.

The reported kill for the entire state during the just-concluded seven-day firearms deer-hunting season is 75,408 animals compared to the 86,963 deer shot during the 2012 gun season.

Originally the Ohio Divisions of Wildlife estimated that gun hunters would kill between 80,000 and 90,000 during this years firearms deer-hunting season.

Only eight of Ohio's 88 counties posted gains, too. And most of these counties always had low-ball kill numbers to begin with as well.

An exception was Ashtabula County. Here, hunters killed 2,334 deer, a 13.74 percent increase from its 2012 gun season harvest of 2,052 white-tails.

Other traditionally top deer harvest counties saw significant drops, however.

Among them was Coshocton County which reported a kill of 2,658 deer for the 2013 gun season. That figure represents a decline of 14.78 percent from the county's 2012 gun season harvest of 3,119 deer.

Also seeing a sharp decline was Guernsey County where hunters reported a total kill this gun season of 2,401 deer. This figure is an 8.36 percent decline from the county's reported 2012 gun season kill of 2,620 animals.

And in Muskingum County an 11.04 percent drop was noted. The just-concluded gun season harvest was 2,604 animals compared to the 2,927 deer harvested during the 2012 firearms deer-hunting season.

Up here in Northeast Ohio Ashtabula County was not the only bright spot. Trumbull County deer hunters reported killing 1,298 deer, a 4.93 percent increase from its 2012 gun season kill of 1,237 deer.

Not so good, though, were the deer harvests in Lake and Gauga County.

In Lake County a noteworthy drop of 39.13 percent was seen. Only Darke County and Hancock County recorded greater percentage drops than did Lake County.

Actual numbers of deer killed during this year's firearms deer-hunting season in Lake County were 126 animals compared to the 207 deer killed during the 2012 gun season.

For Geauga County the percentage of drop was not nearly so bad but was still bad enough.

Geauga County's drop was 14.88 percent, a figure revealed in the 509 deer killed during this year's gun season compared to the 598 deer killed during the 2012 gun season.

Thus the 2013 firearms deer-hunting season decline reflects similar drops in the recently conducted youth-only firearms deer-hunting season as well as the 2013 to-date harvest figures when stacked up against the respective to-date 2012 kill figures which is off by 5 percent.

Here are the reported kills for both the 2013 and the 2012 firearms deer-hunting seasons:

This story will be updated as further information becomes available.

Adams 1,343 1,554 -13.58%

Allen 380 393 -3.31%

Ashland 1,162 1,240 -6.29%

Ashtabula 2,334 2,052 13.74%

Athens 1,745 1,983 -12.00%

Auglaize 299 362 -17.40%

Belmont 1,851 2,127 -12.98%

Brown 932 1,094 -14.81%

Butler 312 350 -10.86%

Carroll 2,019 2,062 -2.09%

Champaign 414 487 -14.99%

Clark 198 226 -12.39%

Clermont 667 835 -20.12%

Clinton 250 348 -28.16%

Columbiana 1,726 1,686 2.37%

Coshocton 2,658 3,119 -14.78%

Crawford 528 543 -2.76%

Cuyahoga 31 30 3.33%

Darke 170 312 -45.51%

Defiance 744 882 -15.65%

Delaware 393 620 -36.61%

Erie 176 171 2.92%

Fairfield 827 1,040 -20.48%

Fayette 103 111 -7.21%

Franklin 113 176 -35.80%

Fulton 341 413 -17.43%

Gallia 1,420 1,747 -18.72%

Geauga 509 598 -14.88%

Greene 224 318 -29.56%

Guernsey 2,401 2,620 -8.36%

Hamilton 202 244 -17.21%

Hancock 338 558 -39.43%

Hardin 544 512 6.25%

Harrison 2,133 2,370 -10.00%

Henry 326 346 -5.78%

Highland 1,041 1,347 -22.72%

Hocking 1,456 1,966 -25.94%

Holmes 1,494 1,837 -18.67%

Huron 1,029 1,006 2.29%

Jackson 1,156 1,439 -19.67%

Jefferson 1,494 1,830 -18.36%

Knox 1,966 2,159 -8.94%

Lake 126 207 -39.13%

Lawrence 1,002 1,286 -22.08%

County YR 2013 YR 2012 % Change

Licking 1,887 2,271 -16.91%

Logan 653 755 -13.51%

Lorain 678 764 -11.26%

Lucas 131 158 -17.09%

Madison 127 141 -9.93%

Mahoning 750 664 12.95%

Marion 348 410 -15.12%

Medina 555 596 -6.88%

Meigs 1,482 1,764 -15.99%

Mercer 219 318 -31.13%

Miami 211 241 -12.45%

Monroe 1,337 1,695 -21.12%

Montgomery 109 162 -32.72%

Morgan 1,445 1,712 -15.60%

Morrow 640 844 -24.17%

Muskingum 2,604 2,927 -11.04%

Noble 1,454 1,647 -11.72%

Ottawa 88 86 2.33%

Paulding 499 551 -9.44%

Perry 1,362 1,726 -21.09%

Pickaway 343 500 -31.40%

Pike 818 973 -15.93%

Portage 568 608 -6.58%

Preble 274 323 -15.17%

Putnam 255 327 -22.02%

Richland 1,182 1,418 -16.64%

Ross 1,167 1,512 -22.82%

Sandusky 208 224 -7.14%

Scioto 1,099 1,138 -3.43%

Seneca 747 803 -6.97%

Shelby 371 456 -18.64%

Stark 883 833 6.00%

Summit 140 163 -14.11%

Trumbull 1,298 1,237 4.93%

Tuscarawas 2,604 2,860 -8.95%

Union 301 352 -14.49%

Van Wert 214 290 -26.21%

Vinton 1,424 1,583 -10.04%

Warren 285 406 -29.80%

Washington 1,606 2,163 -25.75%

Wayne 724 784 -7.65%

Williams 838 906 -7.51%

Wood 213 254 -16.14%

Wyandot 690 812 -15.02%

Statewide Totals

YR 2013 YR 2012 % Change

75,408 86,963 -13.29%

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net