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The "Right" Number of Does

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Primetime01

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Was looking for other landowners experiences with shooting does. My issue I seem to be having is keeping bucks "home" during November. All spring and summer I had 5 bucks that were 4.5 or older on my place and had set my target on one of them, with hopes a couple others with alot of potential would make it one more year. All October I got regular trail cam pics of these bucks but after about November 6th it feels like a ghost town of my older deer. I feel I have the best cover in the neighborhood, 120 acres of timber that I never step foot in, consisting of mostly cedars, locust, and thick brush. My food plots seem to be holding every doe in town, but it seems odd that I will have a field with 15 does in it and not one of these deer show up, either while hunting or on trailcam. In October I would guess my 200 acres was holding 60 does and roughly 25 bucks of various ages. Now it feels like I have more does moving in everyday and fewer buck sightings. So what do you think? Hammer hard on these does? I dont know if my bucks hit all these does the first week of November and are moving on or whats going on. Alot of people preach about shooting the does, but I enjoy seeing 15-20 deer when I go out and it just seems counter intuitive to keeping bucks home. I also have a deer or two that are 5.5 that never seem to go anywhere but their racks suck, short tined eights mostly. I am wondering if these deer are the real issue, not the high doe numbers. I recognize bucks are going to roam but its very discouraging to have these deer vanish during the best times. Its even more frustrating waiting to see what comes home to winter, just hoping they come back before the slugs start flying. This isnt a real QDM friendly area. :D
 
I think you've hit on something with your two mature deer. Welcome to the rut! I can only suggest that you bow or early muzzy when the deer are there. Myself, I would make sure my friends and myself removed those older guys asap and possibly let something nicer come back to stay. If you're happy with the does, I say leave all you want. I'm a firm believer that when you see a large herd of does with no buck, that there is prob a giant lurking nearby..............ck
 
Get rid of those crap old bucks asap!!! Old bucks sometimes relocate during rut BUT often they have very small core areas. What old bucks also have is knowledge of what/when/which does r in heat and imo- they r often with a hot doe from early nov and just go right to the next til late nov. So u can kill before or after that if u can get right place daytime movement or get really lucky in rut when going from 1 doe to next. We got some great late season hunting coming up!!!
 
Yup those bucks should be back about now. The buck I was after showed back up last night in a bachelor group and stepped out at 10 yards. Lucky for him he had gotten all busted up on his vacation. He actually looked right at me as to say maybe next year and proceded to munch on my radishes for 20 minutes. lol.
 
To me does mean buck bait. I'd like to see that many deer around my land anytime. don't agree with you guys calling mature deer crap,,with small antlers. Any buck that has made it thru the multitude of hunters I have around my land to be 5 or 6 yrs old are trophies,,regardless of antler size.. Just me though I guess..
 
Sounds like you have yourself some "bully" bucks.. those older deer will bully off the younger and even genetically superior deer.. I agree with everyone that you need to harvest those two mature bucks to make room for others
 
Your buck to doe ratio is not bad at all (2-1) roughly. so IMO I would concentrate on removing some of the older bucks. It may mean a year or 2 of putting your tag on something that may not meet your standards, but it will be well worth it.

A great example of this was last year on Bill Winkes farm. If you follow Midwest Whitetail you probably saw this. He had a couple of "bully bucks" on his farm that he was able to kill last year. This year his hitlist bucks were all over the farm and visible and he was able to find and kill them.

Not saying that is going to happen to everyone, but it is sure a great place to start. Killing 2 deer could make all the difference. :way:
 
dedgeez said:
Your buck to doe ratio is not bad at all (2-1) roughly. so IMO I would concentrate on removing some of the older bucks. It may mean a year or 2 of putting your tag on something that may not meet your standards, but it will be well worth it.

A great example of this was last year on Bill Winkes farm. If you follow Midwest Whitetail you probably saw this. He had a couple of "bully bucks" on his farm that he was able to kill last year. This year his hitlist bucks were all over the farm and visible and he was able to find and kill them.

Not saying that is going to happen to everyone, but it is sure a great place to start. Killing 2 deer could make all the difference. :way:
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You beat me to it, I saw the episode on bully bucks and it is so true. I shot a 125 inch 8 "bully" that was pushing everything off my 45 acre parcel a few years ago. As soon as he was gone I had some nicer bucks move in. Unfortunately in MN---one tag and it ended up on the "bully" but thats OK!
 
loneranger said:
To me does mean buck bait. I'd like to see that many deer around my land anytime. don't agree with you guys calling mature deer crap,,with small antlers. Any buck that has made it thru the multitude of hunters I have around my land to be 5 or 6 yrs old are trophies,,regardless of antler size.. Just me though I guess..
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Crap genetics may have been a better description. And those sure do exist- I'm happy to shoot them too.
 
loneranger said:
To me does mean buck bait. I'd like to see that many deer around my land anytime. don't agree with you guys calling mature deer crap,,with small antlers. Any buck that has made it thru the multitude of hunters I have around my land to be 5 or 6 yrs old are trophies,,regardless of antler size.. Just me though I guess..
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Loneranger: I see your point, a mature buck with an average rack is still a trophy I agree.

The important thing to consider is that at some point they "bully bucks" are and will keep other bucks off your property and management means addition by subtraction:drink2:
 
I'd focus on those older deer that are "ripe" so to speak for harvest. They push off younger deer (which may have better genetics). Also, bucks core ranges shrink in general as they age and they learn to be more "efficient" breeders. They will not waste time/effort when does are not in, they know where the does will be and know how to evade us.

Also, if you have too many does, the mature bucks will not move as much because they don't have to. As skip said, they will be on lockdown with a doe from early November till late November. You balance the doe numbers and the mature bucks have to move more to find the next one. This will not push them off their core areas having fewer does. They just move more in their home range.

Grant Woods talked about having few does/mature buck movements a few episodes back on his show....www.growingdeer.tv
 
loneranger said:
To me does mean buck bait. I'd like to see that many deer around my land anytime. don't agree with you guys calling mature deer crap,,with small antlers. Any buck that has made it thru the multitude of hunters I have around my land to be 5 or 6 yrs old are trophies,,regardless of antler size.. Just me though I guess..
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I agree they are a trophy, but to a trophy hunter, a 130-140 class mature buck is one to "pass". They don't realize they are hurting their chances more of seeing/killing good genetic deer by leaving a buck like that on smaller acerages.
 
That is a tough situation to figure out. Probably impossible. In my opinion, unless you have eyes on all your bucks nearly 24/7, accurately identifying any potential bucks as "bully's" is just a wild guess that may be based off just a few random observations (very small sample size). In addition, I don't believe that any one "bully" buck is going to effectively keep all desired bucks out of a 200 acre size farm. You could shoot one but why if it's not the buck you want? Then you know for certain you won't get the buck you want. A bully buck this year may not be a bully buck next year and/or may be shot by an adjacent landowner. Why fill your tag with a buck you don't want? In my experience, most bully bucks are 3.5 -5.5 year old deer. Older bucks are rarely bullies, from what I have seen.

In my experience, some bucks like to roam more than others, while some are "homebodies". Also, some farms seem more attractive to bucks during the summer through early fall season -- farms that tend to have more open areas -- while other farms attract them more during fall and winter (thicker habitats with more food and more does). I have seen farms house big bucks during the summer period and then about mid-October they vacate for other premises. Most bucks will roam at least 600 or 700 hundred acres -- in my experience -- during fall, no matter how good your habitat is. And more often, many more acres than that! I frequently get trail camera pictures of the same bucks on different cameras located 1 or 2 miles apart. Bucks are programmed to roam and roam they do -- and there is no holding some of them back.

On another note, trying to control genetics by shooting one or two deer on a couple of hundred acres is like swatting an annoying fly at a picnic table. You can do it but expecting things to change much afterwords probably isn't going to happen. When a "good genetic buck" is off breeding a doe somewhere, there could easily be dozens of other bucks with other does in the same general region. A lot of does come into heat about the same time in mid November and a buck will stay with a doe for a couple of days. During that time, all the other does, in heat, in the region are hounded by other bucks-- many of these bucks may be just 2.5 year olds. Who knows what kind of genes all these other bucks are dispersing into the herd? And who knows the genetic "quality" of each doe being bred? Remember, too, that most of the button bucks that are born on your farm will likely disperse miles away-- so the genetics of the bucks doing the breeding on your farm you may not ever really see with your resident bucks.

I would say shoot some more does. This will open the door with more space on your farm for bucks to move into during spring dispersal. Also, I would bet that at least a handful of the bucks you mentioned are there and are just not being seen during the rut. They are probably spending most of there time lying low with the resident does and not moving much. If you have much thick cover, these bucks can be very tough to see in person or on camera, under those conditions, in my opinion.

Bottom line, my suggestion then is to shoot more does and to simply wait for and shoot the buck you want. It simply never made sense to me to put a tag on a buck I didn't really want to shoot. It's your hunt and you should shoot the buck you want.

Good luck and have fun!

Rich W.
 
I shot a bully buck last week that was broken up from fighting, came in almost any time I rattled in that area. He wanted a fight any time he could and I've seen him run bucks off. There's generally 4-5 telling signs a buck is a bully.
I don't think most guys shoot poor genetic bucks to change the gene pool- certainly not on their own land. Land just can't hold infinate mature bucks. Get rid of a poor genetic "bullly" and u'll have a better environment for keeping the younger bucks w/good genetics around or even other mature big ones. Might as well be good genetic bucks that take up the limited space on my land.

Think about the term "DOMINATE BUCK"- its their goal to dominate over others. Often includes to running them off. Obviously a 200 acre farm isn't going to have 10 Dominate bucks. The bad genetic bucks can easily b the dominate bucks. U want that buck to take and keep those positions or a great genetic buck?

I personally have seen mature deer that haven't left a 80 acre core area all year (that I know of). I'll get them on camera in small core areas all year and no where else. Much like people- deer have personalities that r aggressive to timid. Wanderers and home bodies and I know I've seen this on my farms.
 
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Raven: I think "bully" bucks are far more common than most hunters realize. My experience with them, (I'm no expert) is that they tend to be big bodied deer, aggressive, and a smaller rack than they should have (maybe they suffer from what humans call "little man syndrome")

As Sligh says they find a core area and keep other bucks out. They move more during daylight hours than other deer. I think that yes you can take them out to help your farm.

The amount of acres, is not always that important, as I mentioned earlier on my 45 acre farm. That buck, which I passed once or twice, finally got an arrow as I figured out what he was doing. Then shortly after he was shot, and yes I was proud of him (125 inch 8) other bucks moved in.
 
dedgeez said:
Your buck to doe ratio is not bad at all (2-1) roughly. so IMO I would concentrate on removing some of the older bucks. It may mean a year or 2 of putting your tag on something that may not meet your standards, but it will be well worth it.
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Dedgeez,
This is saying that he is seeing all the deer.

I personally think if he is seeing that many deer a sit that he needs to still take out a few does. That is a lot of deer to see at one time. IMO.

I do agree on the bully bucks.

With less does I think he will see more shooter bucks during the daytime hours. Otherwise the shooters never need to leave their confines until dark after shooting hours.

It will also make sure the superior bucks do the breeding. I have a high number of does and actually watched a 3.5 year old breed a deer this year while the superior bucks were in the woods somewhere breeding does.

Great topic and great posts. :way:
 
My estimate was based on what HE said he thought the total deer numbers were on his property, not what he was seeing per sit. I agree that if he has 25 bucks and 60 does he could take a few does without hurting anything, but his ratio isn't that out of whack IMO. Also if you figure 30 of the 60 are fawns (probably more), than he definitely isn't out of balance that bad at all.
 
It is a big misconception that the "older" bucks do all of the breeding. If he has 40 "breedable" does on his farm and 25 bucks of various ages, chances are the younger deer are doing way more breeding than the older bucks are. Not sure why some guys think that is a bad thing? A buck has the same genetics from the time he is born to the time he has a 200" rack on his head. So if he breeds 2-5 does as a 2 year old, that is essentially just as good as him breeding 2-5 does when he is a 6 year old. That's why IMO, there are no substitutes for AGE when it comes to management. With older age comes bigger racks plain and simple. There is no perfect formula for managing a farm, but the one common denominator in killing big bucks will always be letting them get older.

My woman and I were hanging a stand in Mid November this year at 1 pm. We were half way done and heard grunting coming down the ridge. Long story short, a 3 point chased a doe right by us and stopped at 20 yards and bred her. She was bigger body wise than he was and this is on a farm that has plenty of BIG bucks. Just goes to show, when a doe is ready, she is ready and she's not going to wait around for the best looking buck to breed her. It was definitely neat to watch.
 
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