I liked Skip’s group examples.
Group 1 & 2. Access will continue to decline going forward and there is nothing you, me or anyone else can do to stop it. Even going to a walk in program may provide some opportunity for those without access but that will ultimately decrease the areas top end potential just like having public land bordering your farm. Nobody can manage for top end bucks or a balanced age structure on public or walk in areas. So that will ultimately increase high grading and promote population decline in those areas. Ultimately, that will not help the permission hunter, lease hunter or any other parcel owner by those properties trying to manage for top end bucks.
Group 3 will not get sympathy from Group 1 & 2 and never will because guys in Group 3 have what everyone in the Group 1 & 2 would love to have. A place to control access, plant food plots, put a box blind and sit by their buddy heater. Doesn’t matter if it’s 10 acres or 2000 acres. Guys in Group 1 & 2 would take it.
The one commonality between all three groups is that increasing the population will help all three groups. Regardless if you have access to a few acres, a lot of acres, hunt public, or own a piece. Having more deer is the only thing that will help everyone. It means more deer on average parcels, good parcels, and public parcels for those in Group 1 & 2 and even your own parcel if you’re in Group 3.
Skip asked the question…”Do guys who manage for a balanced, quality deer herd get a voice at the table?”
Guys in group 3 don’t need a voice or a seat at the table because they own the table. They control what happens on their property. If you own and manage your own property you have the biggest voice out there. If you don’t want any does shot on your property then don’t shoot any. If you don’t want young 10 points shot …don’t shoot any. If you want cull bucks shot…shoot them. You can really only control what happens on your property. Try to get neighbors to work with you. If they won’t then “you do you”. Make your property as attractive for deer as you can and try to get them to stay on your property as much as possible. Remember back in the day asking a farmer for permission to hunt deer and their response was “sure…shoot every one you see”, or they would say “we don’t allow hunting because the wife likes to watch the deer”. Perfect example of two group 3 guys who were polar opposites. If you’re in group 3 where do you fall??? Are you a guy that puts in a food plot and then shoots the highest scoring buck you can regardless of age? Or are you actually managing the deer herd by culling bucks and letting better genetic bucks reach 4,5,6? One thing is certain. Guys in group 3 have the biggest voice because ultimately they own the table.
My thoughts on some of these other ideas or suggestions that keep getting brought up.
Number of buck tags. Guy’s if you are worrying about the third buck tag. Let me relieve your stress, because worrying about it is a total waste of your time if your goal is increasing the number of top end bucks. Remember the guy getting the third tag is in Group 3 and is hopefully managing cull bucks on their own property, which you don’t have access to and more than likely never will. Guys in group 3 culling bucks helps guys in all three groups. Guys in group 3 are or at least have the opportunity to let top end genetics bucks live longer and breed more while culling lower potential bucks. That helps everyone. Not just themselves as Skip pointed out when talking about Group 3 guys. Plus, wasting time to rewrite the regulations and fighting FB just expends political capital. For what? To save 200 bucks Statewide. Iowa has 99 counties. So you’re basically saving two bucks per county.
Let’s break this idea down. Each county is made up of townships, a township typically has 36 sections (square miles). There are 1,598 townships in Iowa. So on average 16.1 townships per county. So you’re saving 2 bucks per 579 square miles (in the average county). Do you really think that will help produce more top end bucks? Absolutely a complete and total waste of time. It will not help top end potential or balance the age structure of Iowa’s deer herd. It just won’t.
Going to a one buck State only adds another 35 bucks back per county to those same 579 square miles. Anyone pushing this agenda does not understand our problem.
Try and look at it this way. If you add 37 does back to a county’s deer population you just added back the exact same number of bucks every single year to the herd that are taken as a second and third buck. That is basically one doe per section of land in just ONE township of the 16 townships in the average county.
What would be possible if we could add three does to each section of land in all 16 townships??? That would add 1,737 does to the county. (There are still counties in Iowa that have extra doe quotas much higher than that number.) If you added three does to each square mile in all 99 counties. (I personally don’t know of one area in Iowa right now that couldn’t handle or support an additional three more does per square mile with our current population levels). That equates to roughly 172,000 does Statewide. That adds an additional 86,000 bucks back to the landscape every year. That equates to adding 1.5 bucks per square mile to what we already have currently. That equates to 868 bucks added back per county. The 37 second and third bucks are not why the number of top end bucks has decreased. That potential is lost when you take the 868 bucks off the table to start with in every single county in Iowa. That is exactly what WE did by over harvesting our doe population. We actually took way more than 172,000 does off the landscape from our peak population to our current population.
When I hear or read guys posting that they think we need to take this or that away it makes me realize how many really don’t understand our problem or what it will take to fix it. While some are starting to figure out that increasing the population is the only way out. Others keep grasping for things to take away that they hope will help them see a few more top end bucks. Those people pushing for some of these changes remind me of the saying “Can’t see the forest for the trees.”
Some may think…death by a thousand cuts, sounds logical…but in reality those perceived cuts don’t make a difference at all. Especially, when you’ve had both lower extremities severed at the hips. You better address that hemorrhaging first and foremost and not waste time on a few perceived cuts. Because without stopping the hemorrhaging the end is inevitable and will come fast. That hemorrhaging is the killing of our doe population.
In Iowa, our top end potential has not been decreased by cell cams, the length of our season, the weapons currently used and for sure not the number of buck tags. Those are just the boogeymen that some want to blame.
Our top end potential has been decreased by decimating our doe population by over harvest. Add to that EHD taking out additional does and a large percentage of bucks in certain areas in various years. Then high grade the best bucks that are left in those areas over the last 10-15 years and you are left with what everyone is experiencing. That is the gradual decline in quality bucks and their quantity.
Honestly, IMO the rest is just nonsense and a waste of time and energy. The rest of these ideas while well intentioned won’t change a thing and will not move the needle at all with regards to increasing the number of top end bucks.
Actually, I could make very compelling arguments that taking away most of them will actually hurt top end potential long term. That includes taking away cell cams, straight walls, shortening seasons, and decreasing buck tags.
Ever heard the saying “pissing on a brush fire“. That is essentially what going after cell cams, season lengths and buck tags is doing. Because none of those are affecting the number of top end bucks in any measurable way.
Frankly, I think that claiming that they do or that it is the combination of them is misguided. I think to understand our problem you need to take a step back and look at Iowa’s deer population when our hunting was the best. Look at how our large scale herd management was changed (increased doe harvest). Then look at your personal hunting area with regard to EHD outbreaks, buck displacement, high grading, and habitat changes because no two areas are exactly the same. One thing that I am confident about is that cell cams, straight wall rifles and number of buck tags didn’t cause our problems.
All I have to say to those that actually believe they are is…show me one shred of evidence from Iowa to convince me.
Regarding cell cameras, I agree that monitoring a bait pile with a cell cam could produce a technique with repeatability but that is over bait. Guess what Dorothy, we’re not in Kansas, we’re in Iowa. We’re not hunting over corn piles like Kansas, Ohio or other States that allow baiting. Anywhere with any significant hunting pressure, mature bucks are not that easily patterned during shooting hours unless on a bait pile. In Iowa, just because a buck walked by your cell cam at 8 AM and you drop everything to be in the stand by 1 PM doesn’t mean that same buck is coming by you that afternoon. What could help increase your odds of harvesting that same buck is the fact you’re hunting and not at work. Regardless, a cell cam isn’t gonna increase your success rate anymore than the guy hunting on the adjoining property that had the same buck on his regular trail camera from the previous week and decided to hunt that same day. Both guys would have an equal opportunity to harvest that same buck that afternoon. It just comes down to where that buck decides to go that afternoon, that is if he is on his feet at all before end of shooting time. Do you really think there were more top end bucks killed in the last 5-10 ten years when cell cams took off or prior to 10 years ago when almost nobody had a cell cam? If cell cams made big bucks easy to kill then our buck harvest rates should be higher over the last 5-10 years. Are they??? No they are not. They have been basically stable with approximately 50% being 1 1/2 year olds since they started checking the beam lengths.
As far as more effective weapons, not based on any of Iowa’s harvest statistics. If they were that much more efficient and longer range then there should be increased buck harvest success rates and harvest numbers to match. Neither of which is the case.
Season length…that is also a non factor for increasing the number of top end bucks. There is no evidence that shortening the season 10 days does anything to improve the number of top end bucks. Zero.
Our population will rebound some regardless, because deer will repopulate the areas hit hard by EHD. Fortunately, the DNR is working to reduce doe tags in the affected areas. Even without doing anything, our hunting will improve when the population recovers. But it will never be like it was before because of high grading, UNLESS we significantly increase our doe population and get people to cull inferior bucks.
I believe that guys will not burn their only buck tag to cull inferior bucks if we go to a one buck State. That will ultimately just lead to intensifying the high grading just like it did in the Amana Colonies when they went to a one buck limit. That will result in a continued decline in top end quality and quantity.
So we can all argue and try to take something away from each other that won’t change a thing or we can all work together and do our part to increase the number of does in the section that you hunt by three or more if able. The final number of does you decide to pass in order to increase the population falls on you. Hopefully you can pass all the does you see for a couple years. Only the guys that hunt in a given area have the ability to positively affect the population. They also know better than anyone what the population was like when their hunting was the best. So first and foremost do what you can. Secondly, talk to your neighbors and fellow hunters and work to get your area’s population up by not shooting any does for at least a couple years.
We (you, me, IBA and ISC) need to work with the DNR to get doe tag quotas significantly reduced in all county’s that still have them. That along with preventing crossbows from creeping into the regular archery season and limiting NR tags should be taking up 100% of everyone’s legislative time and energy if your goal is top end bucks. Then work on getting the message out to fellow hunters to stop shooting does with their anysex tags and shoot cull bucks instead of does. Because increasing the doe population significantly is the only thing that will right this ship when it comes to increasing the number bucks on the landscape and ultimately the number of top end bucks.
There is no quick fix to our problem. We didn’t get here overnight. We have spent years shooting down our doe population while high grading the herd at the same time. Then we got hit with widespread EHD. It will take at least three years to bounce the doe population up significantly IF guys lay off them. Then it will take a couple more years after that before we see the number of top end bucks rebound. Decreasing buck tags will not get us there faster and neither will taking away cell cams or different weapons. Increasing the doe population is the only way out of this situation.
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