Scientists at the University of Wyoming say the size of antlers on trophy game has been decreasing over the past century.
Kevin Monteith, the lead author on the report, says they tracked a range of animals, including deer, elk, moose, and antelope. For the majority of animals, antler and horn size decreased slightly.
Monteith says that’s likely because hunters are harvesting more game, which means the animals don’t get very old before they’re killed.
“If we have fewer old males, what that’s going to inevitably lead to is a slight reduction in antler size, because males don’t grow their larges set of antlers when they’re very young,” Monteith said.
He says there’s no cause for alarm, though, because size decrease was minimal. He also says it would be easy to reverse the trend by allowing more hunting of female game, and less hunting of males.