Doe harvest/ ratio question

[Kwood]

In 5 years of owning this we had the fewest summer pics of 3+ year old bucks we’ve ever had. We had the most we’ve ever had on camera for about a 2 week stretch in late October and first week of November. Then they mostly disappeared.

We killed one and shot and didn’t recover another. Had an encounter with one more that was missed and we believe survived.

Not sure what the beat scenario. Just going to file it away and make record of it and keep seeing what things look like year over year.

So many variables change from year to year it’s hard to know what is correlation and what is coincidence. I guess that’s what makes this fun.

For those of us that don’t have massive properties or high fences all we can do is try the small things that make the property better.


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[Mennoniteman]

I agree that too many does or too many deer ruin a habitat and twenty does is way more than is needed on 135 acres. However too many does pushing out the bucks during the rut; I'm not on board with that. Are there any scientific studies that substantiate such?

As an aside I can remember when a local bar had free drinks for women on a Wednesday night; there were more guys there on Wednesday night than the whole rest of the week combined.

It's a much debated point amongst hunters, and with so many other variables like habitat on your land vs habitat on the adjoining land, hunting pressure on your land vs hunting pressure on the adjoining land and deer numbers & ratios on your land vs ratios on neighbors etc. that it can be difficult to sort it all out. But as to your observation about guys in the bar, most of my land manager friends agree that bucks will be exactly where the does are during the rut, but will keep their distance at all other times. My observation and the greater consensus is that older does won't tolerate bucks and will chase them away. If the away place is on your neighbor's land sometime in October your biggest bucks could be dead by another hunters arrow before the rut ever happens. This is my reasoning behind the principle of not feeding more does than you need to keep around for "bucks killed" replacement purposes. A big outfitter from SC was asked the question; what to do if you own a lot of land and your biggest bucks on camera are being shot by your neighbors? His answer was, you've got to shoot the longnoses, meaning older does.

 

[Sampson]

I have a similar situation with one of my farms Oklahoma. On my 120 acres, it’s nothing to see 20 or more deer in a morning/evening hunt. Most of them are either bedding on or moving through my farm to the wheat fields close by.

I have owned my farm for 11 years now and I do not plant food plots currently but have in the past. No plots at this time as most of the good soil is in CRP. Plots can be done in CRP program but if I plant 10 acres in plots then I have to do the plots for the life of the contract, most are 10 yrs long. Not a big deal, but I had to pay someone to put them in as I didn’t have the means to transport my equipment 2 1/2 hours south of my home. Paying a local is great but if he can’t get to it that year then no food plots. So, I decided to skip the plots while enrolled in CRP to make sure I didn’t violate anything in the contract.

First year I owned it, I set aside 8-10 acres of woods as a sanctuary as the surrounding farms are all hunted. At the end of our rifle season, I counted 25 plus deer going into the sanctuary.
Every year since then it’s been pretty much the same MO for the deer. However one thing I did was start a hunting/harvest journal for my place, which includes dates, times, stands, weapon used and who killed what. This includes Turkey, hogs and deer info. Btw, kids love getting to put their name in the journal with the info on their hunt. It’s a big deal!

For the last three years, I have tried to better balance the herd as it was nothing to see ten does for every buck. For the past couple of years I requested family and friends to harvest some does and I wanted more does then bucks killed each year. In 2016 we killed 5 does and 2 bucks, 2017 we killed 5 does and 3 bucks and so far for 2018, we have killed 4 does and 3 bucks. I can honestly say we have more bucks on camera the last two years and the rut has been great with a couple of mature deer being killed by my kids. To date we have killed 41 deer off that farm in 11 years, we are mostly meat hunters but we love hunting mature bucks as much as anyone else. I manage the game but it’s is not specifically geared toward trophy deer as my kids are young and only really started hunting 5 years ago. But who knows that may change as they grow as hunters and we can always make adjustments to the game plan.

I recommend keeping a journal and if you make adjustments log the data and see what the results are. It’s nice to look back over the years and see what changes have been made. It’s also easier to see which ones have made an impact on our herd and improved our hunting. The older I get the harder it is for me to remember what I did and when, but with the journal I can look back to see.

Even if you don’t change a thing, I would recommend the journal.


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