How many inches can a man add

[SRShunter]

I hunt in sc and we have 130class bucks. With the right management letting them grow, foodplots, supplemental feed etc. Can we grow a booner???? I know we have way to many does and need to thin them back too. Just wondering how many inches yall think we could add to a 130" deer

 

[NCMTNHunter]

How old are those 130” deer? If they are 2.5 you can add a lot. If they are 7.5 that is about as good as you are going to do.

 

[SRShunter]

I'm not great at the whole aging thing, but doubt they are close to 7.5 years old. I'm gonna say 3.5. Best buck i ever shot there was 148" 10pt and he weighed 215lbs guts and all

 

[DAVE]

Look at the record books for your area.

 

[SRShunter]

Look at the record books for your area.

I have but I want to know yalls opinions about proper management and how much it really helps.

 

[SRShunter]

Our neighbor who has the biggest tract of land next to us doesn't believe in shooting does. He is old school and said the does make deer and we shouldn't shoot them.....the place is overrun with does

 

[brownhounds]

Pm Jim Boyd. He seems to be real passionate about this topic

 

[spencer12]

If he is 3.5 and 130" possibly a lot, if he's older than 6 probably not much.

 

[SRShunter]

Pm Jim Boyd. He seems to be real passionate about this topic

Yeah he isn't far from me, JB has it going on great guy and love reading his posts

 

[across the river]

I have but I want to know yalls opinions about proper management and how much it really helps.

Look at the Boone and Crockett map for SC. In the history of the State, I don't think they have a single county that has more than a couple or three B&C entries at most. You don't have a good chance at all of growing a Booner, regardless of what you do. Statistically, you chance of growing a Booner is very close to zero percent.

 

[SRShunter]

Look at the Boone and Crockett map for SC. In the history of the State, I don't think they have a single county that has more than a couple or three B&C entries at most. You don't have a good chance at all of growing a Booner, regardless of what you do. Statistically, you chance of growing a Booner is very close to zero percent.

That's promising I love honest people, really love proving people wrong too? thanks for a honest answer though

 

[kmckinnie]

How many acres y’all got.

 

[buckpasser]

Ingredients to producing a buck over 130:

1 genetically capabale buck
1 environment with enough feed/nutrition
*key ingredient, time

I’d bet you have several genetically capable bucks available. I’d also bet you can provide the environment. If your spot is like mine, time is not often granted them.

 

[SRShunter]

Property butts up to Savannah river site so 100s of thousands if you wanna view it that way. We have another tract down the road which isn't that big at all, but the neighbors have a 1000 acre tract and a 1500acre tract on both sides of us which still isn't that much

 

[buckpasser]

I will add this as well; some of my neighbors and some big money folks around here (not clubs, very few guns per acre type places) have added quite a bit of mass and inches with protein gravity feeders. It’s impossible to say per buck what exactly it adds, but it seems to turn 135 inch every year places to 145-150 inch every year places after about four years of doing it. I guess thats the time it takes a 1.5 to move onto your place, take a liking to the feeders, finish his skeletal system, then peg out. With much hunting pressure this tactic would likely be useless except for possibly killing heavier 2.5 bucks.

 

[SRShunter]

I will add this as well; some of my neighbors and some big money folks around here (not clubs, very few guns per acre type places) have added quite a bit of mass and inches with protein gravity feeders. It’s impossible to say per buck what exactly it adds, but it seems to turn 135 inch every year places to 145-150 inch every year places after about four years of doing it. I guess thats the time it takes a 1.5 to move onto your place, take a liking to the feeders, finish his skeletal system, then peg out. With much hunting pressure this tactic would likely be useless except for possibly killing heavier 2.5 bucks.

Thank you?

 

[tbrown913]

The better the environment during the stress times of the year, the time after the rut until spring green, the better the bucks will be. When you start trying, dont judge what your 130 turns into next year. Judge what you small rack bucks turn into after a year. If you give a deer a lifetime of not being stressed nutritionally they will bloom into big big bucks. The ones that have lived half their life with nutritional deficiencies are not going to bloom as big.

As the guys from Tecomate say: Nothing trumps food when it comes to growing big deer.

 

[across the river]

That's promising I love honest people, really love proving people wrong too? thanks for a honest answer though

I'm not saying a B&C deer can't come from SC. There have obviously been a few come from the state over the years. I'm just saying your chances aren't very good at all, regardless of what you personally do on your place. You aren't going to take a deer with 130" genetics to 170". There is a reason that deer farmers, race horse stables, and cow farmers pay tens of thousands of dollars or more for a little tube of genetics from a specimen with the desired characteristics rather than just trying to "feed them up" into what they want them to be. There is also a reason certain areas of the countries and even within individual states produce more Boone and Crockett deer than others. There are plenty of counties in agricultural states and areas that have very few or no Boone and Crockett deer, while others not that far away have a bunch. It isn't as easy as just letting them get old and pouring the supplements to them. I wish you well, and I hope you can actually do it. I just think your chances of doing it are slim to none.

 

[Jim Boyd]

SRS,

The SRS is a vast reservoir of buck talent and they have some absolute giants in there.

I don’t think you can push a 130” deer to 170” but I do think - under perfect circumstances - you can probably add 15-20” to an existing buck.

That said, the perfect circumstances are very hard to come by.

Now, the possibility exists of a Booner being taken without doing anything. If u look at the SC record books, I think there are a few typicals and several non typicals in the record book that are 170”+.

The books are full of 150”+ and that is a beast of a buck.

In the end, I think that QDM management will help you but the probability of “growing” a Booner (and also killing him) is statistically very low.

I think your biggest plus would be having land adjacent to the SRS.

If you can get some good food plots growing and manage the other variables (mainly pressure) there is no telling what could show up in late October.

Good luck!

 

[SRShunter]

Yall pretty much make me wanna shoot every buck I see, sell my land and buy something smack in the middle Georgia so maybe I can have a booner???lol I'm kidding but thanks for the comments gon?