Upstate Obsession
- Thread starter Elkaddict
- Start date
Chainsaw
Well-Known Member
Thanks Tom. Yes group tours will be a lot of fun as well as a great way for all of us to continue to learn from each other. It will also be a motivator for some of us (definitely for me) to get moving on some of the planned projects that are yet undone. Will tell Dennis on the Triticale;He will be planting grains again soon. Fields have been combined and were sprayed for weeds last week so they are ready to be planted to grains again.
On that spectacular trunk spouting growth happening in your maple, oak and poplar trees, I would like to add that it is not only the great root systems they have but definitely the lack of invasive plants as well as a deer herd that is way below 50% the saturation level for the property. If you had just timber as we discussed, the regrowth might have been seriously curtailed by deer browsing but those great food plots providing year round food was a big factor in the unusual regrowth rate for our area.
The age of the deer you show in your last post is Shooter.
Elkaddict
Well-Known Member
Certainly a shooter with the bow.... I think he is 1 of 4 4 year olds (older bucks didn’t survive the hunting/winter.
I’m interested in your 50% saturation comment. We’ve taken 2-3 does a year to date. You feel like the property could sustain 1/3 more deer with the present natural browse and current plot acreage? With the tough winters we get, I’ve worried about letting the population get too big and having a crash in the numbers.
I’m interested in your 50% saturation comment. We’ve taken 2-3 does a year to date. You feel like the property could sustain 1/3 more deer with the present natural browse and current plot acreage? With the tough winters we get, I’ve worried about letting the population get too big and having a crash in the numbers.
Chainsaw
Well-Known Member
Even though I only have experience with a couple of die offs over the years on this property, I will comment on your question but keep in mind that you are most intimate with your property so your instincts should guide you. So yes I feel that you could easily add another ten deer to the winter property population with little to no effect on winter die offs. With that said if your property experiences a severe winter many deer will die because they simply can't move well to stay safe, warm and fed. Winter die offs will happen whether you are at 25% of capacity or 75% when the weather is beyond what they can handle.
When we had the large die off of young deer (38 dead deer were found on me and my neighbor combined, 700 acres total), I called our deer biologist who has been at this a long time and is definitely extremely knowledgeable about deer in New York. I asked him if I had taken another ten deer out of the population, would more of the remaining deer have survived that winter. He thought definitely not as we were not over populated in this area at the time and had plenty of browse there; The browse (deer food) was simply buried in over five feet of snow and the above snow tier was completely unreachable for smaller deer.
As you we now have regrowth that contains usable browse from the ground up to 10 feet or more so no matter what the snow depth if they can walk on top many deer can still be fed; conversely if they sink in the snow they won't reach the food. Note; your property has much better browse than this property due to the general absence of invasives on yours which are taking up space here and providing only cover but little to no food in the spaces they occupy.
Further if one did the math of lbs. of winter deer food available in your food plots alone compared to the lbs eaten per deer per day times the number of days the deer rely on those food plots you likely have an amount of food maybe double or more of what is required to feed the current population thru most winters. And that is not counting the all important high level of high quality browse you have available.
And of course we must always keep in mind to not have too high of a population that deer die off due to too many deer for the property; All indications by experts point that if there is 50% or more of available browse left in the spring then the population is not over reached assuming all food was not buried in five feet of frozen snow. A second population indicator is the extreme lack of invasives on your property (there might have been one MFR plant, we weren't sure). When there are too many deer, the invasives flourish for sure. Note on the MFR--took some pics of MFR and blackberry and will post on my next update to my property tour. We got the invasives here mostly due to too many deer moving onto this property for fall and winter as well as a huge general over population for this area which resulted in really bad habitat on most area properties. As much invasives as I have it is obvious even from the road that most other properties in this area are much more severely over run with invasives than here.
Having been through all this I would on your property opt to take younger deer when I wanted to take a deer for eating while waiting for three or four year old bucks; the younger deer take the heaviest hits from the winter with our current age dynamics. At least for here some bucks are making it to three years old and once in a while some make it to four but older than that is almost a miracle at this time.
farmhunter
Well-Known Member
Nice post chainsaw. Good points and I agree on all accounts.
Elk for us - three year olds are the best we can really hope for a realistic harvest and occasionally 4 years tease is. Our rule is 2.5 years old min and most of us don’t take a buck most years. They are harder to hunt - and we have a lot of pressure that doesn’t help.
We don’t get quite the snow you do - but we get die offs once or twice every 10years. The one chainsaw said - was a real bad one - it only took two years for our numbers to bounce back
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Elk for us - three year olds are the best we can really hope for a realistic harvest and occasionally 4 years tease is. Our rule is 2.5 years old min and most of us don’t take a buck most years. They are harder to hunt - and we have a lot of pressure that doesn’t help.
We don’t get quite the snow you do - but we get die offs once or twice every 10years. The one chainsaw said - was a real bad one - it only took two years for our numbers to bounce back
Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum
Elkaddict
Well-Known Member
Thanks guys. I’ve got to get a better handle on the population after last winter’s die off. I’ve got 1/2 the fawns of the last 4 years and hence smaller doe groups. The number of doe groups seems down as well. May not have a real good sense until some snow sets in. If bowseason sightings suggests ample does, we’ll take a few....
Chainsaw
Well-Known Member
Thanks Farmhunter, The same happened here as with your property; there was a very quick population bounce back on this property and a couple of others that I know of that still have good habitat compared to the general area after the severe winter year that wiped out so many young deer. One more note Elk on the old does, the ones that walk ahead of the group alone into the danger areas before somehow signaling to the others that it is safe, those get a free pass here always now regardless of the population.
Elkaddict
Well-Known Member
Bears are bulldozing the corn. Sat in a blind last night to watch deer and had a 200lb+ boar walk out at 60yds. We had a stare down for a minute or so and he walked off. Sadly, I didn’t have a camera. A month from now, arrows will fly..... I expect more will move in as the berries are popping.
Elkaddict
Well-Known Member
I'm convinced you were actually a farmer in a former life and brought those skills into this one..
Anything but....
. I just am passionate about it and have worn out the ears of a retired farmer.
Elkaddict
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the kind words gents. It’s been a lot of work but very satisfying. I got the last of our planting done for the year (a couple 1/2 acre plots got rye and clover). I’m trying Alice for the first time. Anxious to see how it compares with jumbo ladino we usually plant.
farmhunter
Well-Known Member
Yes all looks great - super impressed with that Winfred/rutabaga crop - kind of looks like collards even -
