To many Does? You make the call!

Phillip Thurmond

Senior Member
I have been reading post where some people are saying we have to many does while others are saying the DNR does not know what there talking about ,we don't have enough! 10 years ago I saw lots more deer, well what is the real answer? I think I know but I want to find out what you think.
To answer this question I have to look back at 30 plus years I have been deer hunting. When I first started hunting I went the first two seasons before I ever saw a deer in the woods. I mean I really did not see one for two years! That was in the 70's. Now the closer we got to the 80's deer were becoming more abundant and I saw lots and lots. Then sometime during the late 80's early 90's our property and other property arround us started going through changes that I think affected our deer population. Our property like most of you was owned by paper companys. They came in and cut the trees. Now at first that was no problem in fact our population increased. However, as time went on and the planted pines grew and shaded out the undergrouth and as the timber company's came over the property and sprayed all the oak trees and killed them the population started to be reduced. I beleive it was not because of hunting pressure but because of lack of food. I think the deer just moved on. Now the reason I believe this is today i'm in a club where it is private owned and we have over 600 acres of food plots. We have all kinds of habitat for the deer and we have more than we could ever shoot. Its nothing to go out and see 25 in one afternoon or morning. The other day I saw 17 in the afternoon and 12 of them were bucks. My thoughts are if you have food then you have lots of deer. If you have pine trees and small food plots that are the norm for timber co land then you might not have all that many deer and think the deer are overhunted.
Well these are my thoughts what are yours? Could it be that deer don't eat pine trees and have gone to other places to find food? Now I know what you are thinking "We plant food plots and we feed the deer in the winter" However, how much does that really help? How much does a deer need to survive? how much food does your little half acre produce and how many deer will it really support? The answer is not very many! I think the problem is not with over shooting the deer I think the answer is we don't have the food anymore to feed the deer. What are your thoughts?
 

SADDADDY

Senior Member
Good points

Mother nature has a way of dealing with animal survival, and will adjust the numbers or herd in accordance with (food, cover etc…) so you may have a die off, or others may simply move away, or the deer will only breed and give birth not so frequent as if they had enough food source to sustain a healthy animal species on any given tract of land.


At least the case on our lease is we are over run with deer especially does, maybe due to we hunt on a farm with plenty of crops, water and cover to handle a good number of animals, and we have a good number of twins being born each year.

I do believe with over development, tree farming etc… the deer, turkey and many small game species are just not (the numbers) what they were 20 years ago, I doubt we as hunters have put to big of a dent into the herd as some may think, I really believe mother nature is playing a large roll in reducing the deer numbers, from many different variables as I mentioned above.

The best solution would be to plant more and more often to keep the herd healthy and keep the numbers up, but if they are getting squeezed out by development they simply can’t survive with out no room to roam.

Ever wonder what happens to the deer in some areas that been built up with apartment complexes, subdivisions, mini-malls? I have seen here in my town, places I use to hunt which had a great number of critters, and slowly you would see less and less until no more? And in this case there was no where else for them to move to, so do they disappear into the air???

::huh:
 

Buford_Dawg

Senior Member
I think loss of habitat is a big reason and also alot more hunters around my territory. All the land around us is leased by clubs and all the land is getting hunting constantly, mostly weekends, but still the deer are pressured and more are killed now than years back. The pressue also keeps them holed up and move more at night.

So, I think loss of habitat, hunting pressure and the desire of the NEW hunters (people who have taken up hunting in the last 5 years) to kill more does (remember back in the 70s and 80s, DNR and most people had the mindset to protect our does) due to the new relaxed regulations on shooting does plus the information in hunting magazines to shot the does and let the small bucks walk. Alot of the older hunters (I'm not old, only 41, but have hunted back when does were protected and were much more numerous) still have the ingrained mindset to let the does walk.
 

WildBuck

Senior Member
Just out of curiosity since i do not have the answer to the question. How would the Red Top Mountain scenario play into the food theory?
 

huntnnut

GONetwork Member
IMO, I think it has more to do with the number of doe's being taken along with the increase in predators that we have today verses the food, although the number of hogs we have today does play a big part in the food supply in some areas.

The reason I say this is because back in the 70's and early 80's I never heard of a coyote being seen and I never saw a bobcat back then.

Now we have packs of coyotes, wild dogs along with more bears and it appears that we have many more bobcats roaming the State than before and I believe their having a larger impact on the deer population than a lot of folks realize.

I see very few fawns roaming our woods these days and I believe it is because of the predators more than anything.

With the food plot craze that has been going on over the last several years, I would think the deer have more to eat now than they ever had, at least on a state wide basis.

I may be wrong, though these are my thoughts FWIW.... :D

BTW, I haven't killed a doe in at least 5 or more years.
 
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Larry Rooks

Senior Member
Phillip
I am one that believes we do not have too many deer, Does or Bucks and the 12 deer limit needs to be decreased. In 35 years of hunting , I have seen a lot of changes, but the herd growing to enormouse proportions is not one of them. The thing that has grown the most over the last years is the legal limit, from 2 to 12, and there is a push to go to a deer a day :( Just my opinion
 

dixie

Senior Member
There's no

such thing as too many does, that just means you don't have enough bucks!
 

Cranium

Senior Member
Just curious as to why people are seeing VERY late fawn births this year (evidenced by the reports of even spotted fawns a few weeks ago) & yet we don't have too many does? We either have to few breeder bucks or way too many does..since the unbred does will keep coming into estrous every 28 days until bred...which means some of these does were bred in April??
 

huntnnut

GONetwork Member
Jeff, IMO some areas do have to many doe's and that's the reason the DNR has increased the number of doe's that can be legally taken, though on the other hand there are more areas now I believe that don't have enough doe's and the entire population is way down at least from what it use to be just a few years back.

Just because we're allowed up to 12 deer a year doesn't mean we have to take 12 of them and please don't get me wrong I'm not saying you do this, I'm just pointing out the facts.

I believe each club/lease has to manage their property/herd accordingly. Of course that doesn't help the WMA's or other Public hunting lands.
 

Cranium

Senior Member
huntnut,

my post was just meant to reply to all the naysayers that say that the entire state population is down & that the regs should be changed...I can't say that I have even been around anyone that harvested more than 6 deer/yr...but we have always managed our properties & adjusted the harvests accordingly. Not accusing anyone..but who knows..the way leases change hands nowadays maybe some of the "barren" leases have been maxed out in previous years & not managed properly....doesn't make it a statewide problem or issue...makes it a localized problem/issue..that may be painful for a few years to correct with individual clubs' responsibilities & harvest restrictions...but I would rather have the choice & responsibility to correct it ourselves instead of saying the government has to step in & dictate.
 

CAL

Senior Member
North of my house there is a club made up of Florida and Ga.hunters.These hunters are very responsible people who hunt food plots and woods.They do not bait or feed the deer.This is their rule!They have somewhere between 1000acres and 1500 acres.This week it has been 8 hunters there all week hunting the rut.They hunt morning and evening each day.To date they have killed one small doe and have seen one small buck and two does.

To their north is 1000 acres not being hunted and to their south is 650 acres not being hunted.Both places are privately owned property.

I see a lots of sign at crossings on the public road,mostly does and little ones.They are not seeing deer nor are they killing deer.They are like me and don't think the deer are in our area!We both agree the deer have been killed down too low! What would you folks think?
 

JBowers

Senior Member
Mother nature has a way of dealing with animal survival, and will adjust the numbers or herd in accordance with (food, cover etc…) so you may have a die off, ...
Die-off? Interesting. When was the last die-off from starvation of deer in the Southeast?

The Red Top herd had well exceeded the capacity of the land for over a decade. They didn't die-off. I would just be extremely cautious of tossing that out there as justification in the SE.
 

Son

Gone But Not Forgotten
too many, not too many?

A liberal doe limit is a useful tool for places that need numbers reduced. I say leave the limit where it is or even a deer a day. Eventually hunters will realize they need to manage their leased or private property for better future hunting. There will always be the greedy, but I believe the majority of hunters are smart enough to know when deer numbers are down on their property and will limit themselves accordingly. Depredation, reduction of deciduous trees, clear cutting and overharvesting has caused a severe reduction in deer numbers in parts of SW Ga. Can't speak for the rest of the state or for well managed plantations. I've managed for deer, turkey and other wildlife for over 30 years and can give one good example for thought. Scenerio, I managed 850 acres for 13 years, planted enough food spring, summer and fall to overpower the feeding habits of a tremendous deer herd, turkeys and small game. 13 years of planting sunflowers, ironclay peas, oats and wheat provided great deer and turkey harvest of trophy grade deer and gobblers. year 14, new management took over, they planted a mixed seed blend intended for everything. They first fertilized and limed, waited two months before planting. Sick looking food plots with birdseed varieties shaded out limited deer food varieties. Result, poor food plots, lots of birdseed and the deer have moved to adjoining properties. An aggressive planting of oats with bad seed required them to replant and the season is almost half over. Deer sign's almost nonexistant. So it looks like food is the # 1 answer to having deer numbers, Managed harvest is # 2. This particular property was mislead into believing they had too many does, so they have been overshooting does. Second mistake, they were taking too many 1 1/2 and 2 1/2 year old bucks. Now with a blank look they come and ask, "Where are the deer, what happened to them"? When a young buck is killed it's common to hear some say, "Good to get him out of the herd cause he's probably an older deer that didn't make good antlers, bad genetics etc... (feel good excuses)
Evidently they didn't learn from watching 13 years of what worked. The original program was cost effective and productive. :type:
 

Son

Gone But Not Forgotten
too many etc.

And the so called self proclaimed experts don't want anyone to split the jowls to show a bucks baby teeth after they've claimed it to be an older buck. Easy to do, check the first three premolars, if the third one has three cusp, it's 18 months or younger. You ask, and there's my thoughts. :fine:
 

Throwback

Chief Big Taw
I hear a lot of people complaining they don't see deer all over the place like they used to. If you are seeing them all over the road and all over the place, most likely the area is overpopulated. The population is supposed to be what is best for the deer, not maintained artificially high for hunters. That means you won't see them EVERYWHERE.


T
 

TJay

Senior Member
I wonder how much the weather plays a part in the perception of the low deer population. It seems to me that in the past 8 or 9 years the "cooler weather" arrives later and later, this year being a prime example. A deer casts it's summer coat and starts growing a winter coat and it is still 80 degrees. Maybe the deer are still there, but nocturnal. Deer management plays a big part to be sure, but maybe the climate changes are a contributing factor too. Just a thought.
 

JBowers

Senior Member
Exactly what is "too many does"? How is best measured? Does it or can it apply equally to all?
 

Larry Rooks

Senior Member
I don't think it can apply to all. I think it depends on the area. An example, last year on the same property I am hunting now, Crawford County, I let 14 Bucks walk during bow season, and killed the 15th one I saw, 8 point, scoring 130. During that time, I had seen one (1) Doe. The total $ of Does seen was seven (7) ALL year. This year, ONE Buck has been seen in the same area
and no Does until yesterday and four were seen. A big deer kill here is just what we don't need.

I think it would be foolish to raise the limit to a deer a day too. Good hunters
would never shoot that many deer but there are those that would, kill just for the sake of killing. I think that 12 is too many too. I would like to see it at least go back top five, no more than 2 Bucks with some restrictions or they could all five be Does, just not more than two Bucks :clap:
 

Phillip Thurmond

Senior Member
The problem as I see it is that we as hunters are mostly uneducated. We don't see the big picture. Ok here is what I'm talking about. We have 640 acres. One square mile. How many deer do we think are on that 640 acres? at best 30? 40? Ok so we are in a club and there are 10 members. Each one wants to shoot 2 bucks and a few does. Ok if each member shoots 2 bucks then thats half or more than half the herd already. Now if you shoot a few does then thats all of your heard. now I know that we are not going to shoot all of them but now lets say your 640 acres is all planted pines with very little other food soursce. Now instead of 30 to 40 you mabe have 10-15 and you complain about not seeing any deer. In the club I'm in now we have 600 acres of food plots. All of our neighbors complain about not having any deer. Well there all over at our place. All of our neighbors have planted pines. I think habitat playes the major roll in what we see and what we shoot.
 
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