Your thoughts on Lakosky, Glesinger?

[Sligh1]

“Average farms” with medium to high hunting pressure & “a few loose ends” for neighbors….. would seem like way way way less with 200” potential. Because: those bucks do have 150” racks with kickers at 3.5. Or 180” bombers at 4.5. They usually get killed. In “medium pressure areas” - those bucks get targeted and shot. So it seems like “we never see 200’s”. Which, agree- it usually takes 6 or 7 years old to get to most 200’s IMO.
Here’s what happens on “the best farms” ….. the visible & very killable 150’s 3 year old gets passed over & over & over. At 4, he gets passed over & over & over. All bucks like that get passed so those areas would “appear” like they have way more 200” potential bucks.

A side note- absolutely I’ve seen pockets of poor genetics. For whatever reason I’ve seen areas where deer max at “170’s” as “the biggest around”. Probably a combo of: that’s the genetic pool of that region that’s simply deeply rooted in that wide area. Big enough area where the genetics don’t change wildly from year to year. No doubt genetic traits can be & are regional. Next: there’s likely nutrition elements involved. Maybe the crops are there but the browse sucks. Or maybe the cover is there but the crops are lacking & cows degraded the area. Maybe there’s social stress or too many Deer. Lot of variables but on other side of this- I agree 100% there’s regions with far lessor potential than other areas even 20 miles away.

 

[Rous14]

I definitely agree with you that any given say 1000 acre farm, no matter where it is, is not guaranteed to have 200"er on it every year. BUT...I do also disagree with you to the extent that some places, and they aren't just 1000 acres normally, nearly always have a buck, or even more than one, on them each year that if it isn't 200"+, it is darn close to that.

These places are as TMayer13 described above in post #117.

So Winkes old farm for example…..1000acres, highly managed, prime area, ….seemed like the last 6-8 years he had it there wasn’t anything over 170ish, at least that I recall. I asked him about it a few times. That’s the kind of scenario I’m referencing I guess and even his situation put him in the less than 1% of hunters/managers.

I’d tend to agree that if you gave me a couple thousand contiguous acres in a good area (the one I’m in now) that I’d have a 180”+ buck to hunt every fall. Maybe even 2 of them.
Guess I didn’t think that even the guys we’ve mentioned had that kinda contiguous area that they own/manage. My perception, maybe wrongly so, was that they have a 500 here, an 80 over there, a 250, a 120 etc….

 

[Daver]

So Winkes old farm for example…..1000acres, highly managed, prime area, ….seemed like the last 6-8 years he had it there wasn’t anything over 170ish, at least that I recall. I asked him about it a few times. That’s the kind of scenario I’m referencing I guess and even his situation put him in the less than 1% of hunters/managers.

I’d tend to agree that if you gave me a couple thousand contiguous acres in a good area (the one I’m in now) that I’d have a 180”+ buck to hunt every fall. Maybe even 2 of them.
Guess I didn’t think that even the guys we’ve mentioned had that kinda contiguous area that they own/manage. My perception, maybe wrongly so, was that they have a 500 here, an 80 over there, a 250, a 120 etc….

While I have some understanding of what was going on with the Winke farm in SE Iowa, I am by no means fully informed, but I will take this stab at it.

Bill, as well as MANY other people in that region, got HAMMERED by EHD not once, but twice, maybe even three times there in a few year time span. The reason he was "missing" those giants in his last few years there was primarily because of EHD...not really all of the other factors in play. He may also have had some "prospects" disappear from his radar as knowledge and hunting pressure increased in that area too.

If you look back at the earlier years of his MW Whitetail days, he would have 15+ magnum shooters on cam going into a season with 1-3 of them in 200" range, or just a shade below that. That would really be the norm around there, assuming no reoccurrence of EHD or the suchlike.

I think you have a point that a given person doesn't have to necessarily own ALL of the acres to make it work, they just have to be in an area where the neighbors aren't dropping the nice 3 and 4 year olds with abandon. (Easier said that done, yes, but these areas do exist.) A really big one can come off a small acre farm...but more often than not, that farm is pretty tricked out in terms of keeping Mr. Big "home" as much as possible.

 

[Buckscrape]

Just read this whole thread for the first time. I hope @Daver doesn't take this the wrong way but you don't need thousands of acres locked up, you just need the genetics and a bunch of "davers" for neighbors that pass up the 230s.

 

[Daver]

Just read this whole thread for the first time. I hope @Daver doesn't take this the wrong way but you don't need thousands of acres locked up, you just need the genetics and a bunch of "davers" for neighbors that pass up the 230s.

Totally agree, I must not have been making myself very clear...as I don't think any one LO has to have thousands of acres locked up, etc, to then have a giant present about every year. I DO THINK though that if you have that you are very likely to have one or more giants around, but it isn't a prerequisite in my mind, but it does help...a lot.

"Neighborhood" is a big, big key...whether one person, or multiple, controls what goes down in that area.

 

[Sligh1]

HUGE farms run cycles on giant deer or lack there of. Or even have mediocre ongoing results. EHD is a monster in cycles!!! Cycles also happen for a lot of other reasons…
It’s the mistakes or lack of management that cause many cycles or lack-luster ongoing results on big farms….
1) deer #’s get out of hand & destroy browse, plots & nutrition. Social stress is a very real issue that also gets out of hand.
2) bully bucks dominate big farms if not taken out. Case in point repeated on MOST the big farms. Say u have 1000 acres. Say it’s got 12 bucks from 4.5 to 8.5 that are 100-140”. Older, aggressive & lower scoring …. Too many folks don’t shoot those deer. Won’t shoot those deer. Won’t/can’t get the right trusted guys to shoot those deer (& yes, use up a tag on a “110” buck!”). They get way out of hand. You don’t get them & next year most will still be there. A few will die & a few will others will come up that need to go. Those “12 bucks” are dominant to varying degrees but that age class will, IMO & experience, keep out: another mature buck + a couple 2-3 year olds. IMO- one dominant buck can keep 2-3 others out. BOTTOM LINE: a farm can only support a limited amount of mature bucks. Those bucks (whatever real # is) probably are the vast majority of the mature bucks on this farm. On big managed farms - when taking high scoring bucks, the low scoring MUST also be removed!!!!!! Often times, they are not. They take a farm over & “huge awesome farms” often become “huge & mediocre”…. Lots of mature bucks but they are the 100-140” that should have been shot!!!! It’s hard to understand or maybe even believe this but it’s true. It’s a HUUUGGGGEEEE issue!!!!!! Big farms have to have the low scoring bucks shot!!!!!! If no one can or will put Their tags on them (we are happy to!!!!) - they will dominate a farm & degrade the buck quality.
3) so many other issues on big farms it’s mind boggling!!!! Stuff like “oh, we don’t let anyone kill coyotes on our 1000 acres”. Or “I’m cheap so I only leave up a couple little food plots”. Not understanding & having all the browse & nutrition sources a deer needs. The diversity of it. Understanding fertility, PH, etc. Not having massive diversity of thermal cover. Letting the forest turn into an open wasteland of no browse & cover!!!!!! HUNTING THEM WRONG!!!!! On & on.

Big farms sound amazing. & they are. But don’t think that there isn’t a majority without HUGE problems. Most have huge issues. Frustrated land owners for results vs POTENTIAL.
As a young hunter me & bros always would say stuff like “if we had a 640 block over there we’d have 200’s every year!!!!” “Bet if we had couple thousand we’d each shoot a couple booners each every year!!!” You name it, we thought it & said it. It’s so far away from the truth!!!!! Big farms are awesome & pry most people’s dreams. But I assure u- most that have achieved those dreams struggle way worse than anyone might imagine. I say all this understanding these are “amazing problems to have”. But they are very real & common issues.

 

[Rous14]

HUGE farms run cycles on giant deer or lack there of. Or even have mediocre ongoing results. EHD is a monster in cycles!!! Cycles also happen for a lot of other reasons…
It’s the mistakes or lack of management that cause many cycles or lack-luster ongoing results on big farms….
1) deer #’s get out of hand & destroy browse, plots & nutrition. Social stress is a very real issue that also gets out of hand.
2) bully bucks dominate big farms if not taken out. Case in point repeated on MOST the big farms. Say u have 1000 acres. Say it’s got 12 bucks from 4.5 to 8.5 that are 100-140”. Older, aggressive & lower scoring …. Too many folks don’t shoot those deer. Won’t shoot those deer. Won’t/can’t get the right trusted guys to shoot those deer (& yes, use up a tag on a “110” buck!”). They get way out of hand. You don’t get them & next year most will still be there. A few will die & a few will others will come up that need to go. Those “12 bucks” are dominant to varying degrees but that age class will, IMO & experience, keep out: another mature buck + a couple 2-3 year olds. IMO- one dominant buck can keep 2-3 others out. BOTTOM LINE: a farm can only support a limited amount of mature bucks. Those bucks (whatever real # is) probably are the vast majority of the mature bucks on this farm. On big managed farms - when taking high scoring bucks, the low scoring MUST also be removed!!!!!! Often times, they are not. They take a farm over & “huge awesome farms” often become “huge & mediocre”…. Lots of mature bucks but they are the 100-140” that should have been shot!!!! It’s hard to understand or maybe even believe this but it’s true. It’s a HUUUGGGGEEEE issue!!!!!! Big farms have to have the low scoring bucks shot!!!!!! If no one can or will put Their tags on them (we are happy to!!!!) - they will dominate a farm & degrade the buck quality.
3) so many other issues on big farms it’s mind boggling!!!! Stuff like “oh, we don’t let anyone kill coyotes on our 1000 acres”. Or “I’m cheap so I only leave up a couple little food plots”. Not understanding & having all the browse & nutrition sources a deer needs. The diversity of it. Understanding fertility, PH, etc. Not having massive diversity of thermal cover. Letting the forest turn into an open wasteland of no browse & cover!!!!!! HUNTING THEM WRONG!!!!! On & on.

Big farms sound amazing. & they are. But don’t think that there isn’t a majority without HUGE problems. Most have huge issues. Frustrated land owners for results vs POTENTIAL.
As a young hunter me & bros always would say stuff like “if we had a 640 block over there we’d have 200’s every year!!!!” “Bet if we had couple thousand we’d each shoot a couple booners each every year!!!” You name it, we thought it & said it. It’s so far away from the truth!!!!! Big farms are awesome & pry most people’s dreams. But I assure u- most that have achieved those dreams struggle way worse than anyone might imagine. I say all this understanding these are “amazing problems to have”. But they are very real & common issues.

Point 2 is spot on imo. Don Higgins talked about this some on his farm too. Super important to try and harvest the inferior 3 and 4 yr olds on any given farm. Perfect way to bring kids in to hunt, friends/family that have never killed a 130” deer before, etc….

side note on “bully bucks”….I feel like any avg to below avg older buck gets that label when in reality I’m not sure that rack size has any influence on a particular deers personality. Just as good a chance a 170” 5 yr old is a “bully” as there is a 130” 5 yr old. I think as hunters we just label all the poor genetic ones as bulllies. Probably not true. But doesn’t change the fact at all that they should be harvested if you’re trying to manage for high end bucks. Totally subscribe to that. Great point Skip.

 

[tall@wide]

HUGE farms run cycles on giant deer or lack there of. Or even have mediocre ongoing results. EHD is a monster in cycles!!! Cycles also happen for a lot of other reasons…
It’s the mistakes or lack of management that cause many cycles or lack-luster ongoing results on big farms….
1) deer #’s get out of hand & destroy browse, plots & nutrition. Social stress is a very real issue that also gets out of hand.
2) bully bucks dominate big farms if not taken out. Case in point repeated on MOST the big farms. Say u have 1000 acres. Say it’s got 12 bucks from 4.5 to 8.5 that are 100-140”. Older, aggressive & lower scoring …. Too many folks don’t shoot those deer. Won’t shoot those deer. Won’t/can’t get the right trusted guys to shoot those deer (& yes, use up a tag on a “110” buck!”). They get way out of hand. You don’t get them & next year most will still be there. A few will die & a few will others will come up that need to go. Those “12 bucks” are dominant to varying degrees but that age class will, IMO & experience, keep out: another mature buck + a couple 2-3 year olds. IMO- one dominant buck can keep 2-3 others out. BOTTOM LINE: a farm can only support a limited amount of mature bucks. Those bucks (whatever real # is) probably are the vast majority of the mature bucks on this farm. On big managed farms - when taking high scoring bucks, the low scoring MUST also be removed!!!!!! Often times, they are not. They take a farm over & “huge awesome farms” often become “huge & mediocre”…. Lots of mature bucks but they are the 100-140” that should have been shot!!!! It’s hard to understand or maybe even believe this but it’s true. It’s a HUUUGGGGEEEE issue!!!!!! Big farms have to have the low scoring bucks shot!!!!!! If no one can or will put Their tags on them (we are happy to!!!!) - they will dominate a farm & degrade the buck quality.
3) so many other issues on big farms it’s mind boggling!!!! Stuff like “oh, we don’t let anyone kill coyotes on our 1000 acres”. Or “I’m cheap so I only leave up a couple little food plots”. Not understanding & having all the browse & nutrition sources a deer needs. The diversity of it. Understanding fertility, PH, etc. Not having massive diversity of thermal cover. Letting the forest turn into an open wasteland of no browse & cover!!!!!! HUNTING THEM WRONG!!!!! On & on.

Big farms sound amazing. & they are. But don’t think that there isn’t a majority without HUGE problems. Most have huge issues. Frustrated land owners for results vs POTENTIAL.
As a young hunter me & bros always would say stuff like “if we had a 640 block over there we’d have 200’s every year!!!!” “Bet if we had couple thousand we’d each shoot a couple booners each every year!!!” You name it, we thought it & said it. It’s so far away from the truth!!!!! Big farms are awesome & pry most people’s dreams. But I assure u- most that have achieved those dreams struggle way worse than anyone might imagine. I say all this understanding these are “amazing problems to have”. But they are very real & common issues.

Skip, I think you hit on some great points. Cull bucks are a huge issue.. Top end buck killers don't want to shoot them and the hunters who usually shoot the high scoring young bucks don't want to shoot them. Therefore, they survive year after year. Doe overpopulation is a big issue too on some farms because no one is shooting them.. On my main hunting farm it's a big issue and I worked with neighbors to really hammer them this year, and we did. We'll see if it helps. There is so much to this management thing when your after the true giants.. It just feels like we are such a small % of the hunters out there hunting and up against a loosing battle sometimes. sometimes.

 

[IowaBowHunter1983]

Splitting hairs a little I guess and maybe our experiences are just different.

If you think of all the bucks in a county or a given township the % of 4.5yr old bucks or older that are walking around with a 180 or larger rack has to be less than 5-10% and when you talk about 200” I’m saying less than 1%

Maybe I’m wrong. You seem to think differently and you may be right, just doesn’t align w my experiences even remotely and that’s 20 years in w central IL (admittedly not Iowa so maybe that’s the difference).

My point was simply that I’ve had in the neighborhood of 30-35 bucks that were 5 or older on my farms over the last 5 seasons and 3 were probably in the 170” range, the rest ranged from 120-160. So despite age, great soil, great habitat and 30 plus mature bucks NONE of them were 180”.
Know of a few 180-200” killed within a mile of me in last few years so there’s a few around but just extremely rare.

I think people's realities are just that. Specific to where they live and hunt. Personally, I don’t think 170-180+ deer are unicorns at all. A friend of mine killed 3 of them THIS year.

 

[Buckscrape]

Your friend should have stopped at one and waited another year on the other two.

 

[Rous14]

I think people's realities are just that. Specific to where they live and hunt. Personally, I don’t think 170-180+ deer are unicorns at all. A friend of mine killed 3 of them THIS year.

So you changed my 180-200 category to 170-180. Splitting hairs, no big deal. If you go back and read the first page or two of skips post here he seems to agree that deer that caliber are still awfully rare. Unicorns probably apply to that 200 number obviously more so than 180. Guy I know in IL that hunts same county as me and not far from me killed a 197 and a 205 this fall. So we can all point to the exceptions to the rule and anecdotal examples and I do think there are certain pockets/areas where guys have the best deer hunting/genetics in the country (many of these small pockets are in IA hence your differing viewpoint probably) and are hunting 180-200” almost every year. I still say those deer and those types of farms are in the 5% or less of all hunting land in the Midwest. Which if true certainly qualifies as very rare.

 

[IowaBowHunter1983]

So you changed my 180-200 category to 170-180. Splitting hairs, no big deal. If you go back and read the first page or two of skips post here he seems to agree that deer that caliber are still awfully rare. Unicorns probably apply to that 200 number obviously more so than 180. Guy I know in IL that hunts same county as me and not far from me killed a 197 and a 205 this fall. So we can all point to the exceptions to the rule and anecdotal examples and I do think there are certain pockets/areas where guys have the best deer hunting/genetics in the country (many of these small pockets are in IA hence your differing viewpoint probably) and are hunting 180-200” almost every year. I still say those deer and those types of farms are in the 5% or less of all hunting land in the Midwest. Which if true certainly qualifies as very rare.

Sorry. Mis quoted ya if you will.

I think 180-200+ are tough to kill but I am not sure how rare they really are in good parts of Iowa (my reality). Dozens and dozens of pictures get shared with me every year of those types of deer. Thats a really wide range tho. You start talking legit 200+ and the number starts shrinking dramatically. Still more of those than I think folks realize tho.

 

[TheBig8]

I think there are probably 10 different 170" deer for every 190" deer. There are probably 20 different 170's for every 200". That's just my opinion.

 

[Buckscrape]

The ratio is most likely higher than that. My buddy scores for B&C and says he measures 15 to 20 175s for every buck over 180. He is talking net though.

 

[seven twenty]

Looks to me like you’d be feeding all the neighbor deer. All the big timber surrounds you and you wouldn’t own any of it. Actually looks like out of 1k+ acres, that’s the only crop ground.