Help - Deer Number Estimate??

[Sika]

I will stress the point about not collecting observational records while sitting at feeders as they are dominated by bucks.

I think this is generally true during the rut but I have not made that observation from Spring through September.

[doghouse]

My corn feeders this time of year are dominated by the does, but the free choice protein feeder is dominated by the bucks. That's February thru yesterday. I have game cams on all feeders and pull cards every two days.

[cehorn]

My corn feeders this time of year are dominated by the does, but the free choice protein feeder is dominated by the bucks. That's February thru yesterday. I have game cams on all feeders and pull cards every two days.

Seems like both (corn and timed protein) right now are being used more by bucks than does but the does still show up. I have cameras on all feeders but only get to pull cards every 2 weeks in general. I think I'm pretty close and definitely as close as I'm going to get with the ratios that I'm applying based on what we have seen so far since we have owned the place. From sight we are seeing really close to a 1:1 ratio and cams are a little skewed towards the bucks. I have adjusted my ratio to be just over 1 doe per buck as that seems most consistent with what we observe.

I started with the last set of pics I got from 2 weeks ago. We are going again this weekend so I'm going to try to do an "official" count based on those numbers over the last 2 weeks. We moved a feeder and stand about a month ago and set up a new water station so I think the deer should be used to the new changes now.

[Blackmouth]

The above is all solid gold information.

I will stress the point about not collecting observational records while sitting at feeders as they are dominated by bucks.

Here's a great place to get on the ground help from your TPWD Technical Guidance Biologist.

https://tpwd.texas.gov/landwater/land/habitats/county/

That should provide you with everything you need to get started. If that still doesn't satisfy, please shoot me a private message. My name is Jeff Bonner. I just started my own consulting business after retiring from TPWD with 22 years in the field providing assistance to landowners, 5 years managing a private ranch, Bachelors and Masters degrees in Rangeland Science and Wildlife Management.

Congratulations Jeff!

This guy let me ride along a few surveys when I first started my undergrad at SWT in the late 90's.

[cehorn]

As mentioned above, I think I'm pretty close with my deer count for this year. I'm adjusting the numbers seen slightly but not too much given we are in a drought and the deer are coming more to water troughs and feed. I think in a wetter year I will see less and have to adjust my ratios from deer seen to actual deer up a little to compensate. We will see though as this is the first time these deer have been fed consistently. The people that leased it before we bought it filled feeders for deer season and that was it. Nothing was year round and no protein. Hopefully they like the year round feed and stay coming in consistently.

[cehorn]

Text me if you need help

Forgot to reply to this one. I definitely will. I still plan to get y'all out at some point but we need to stop the monetary bleeding on the cabin first. Once we have that built we can start focusing on other things. Thanks for all help already provided.

[Deerguy]

Also don't forget that feeders are sometimes not the ideal locations to run the cameras. While you want to place the cameras over bait (corn), there are some deer, especially bucks, that do not come to feeders regularly. This is especially true in heavily hunted areas. For these areas, it is better to simply put feed on the ground and that's why most camera survey photos you see have corn piled on the ground. The exception to this is in areas where deer are dependent on the feed (areas with excessive deer densities and poor habitat). In these areas, deer heavily use protein (because they have to) and this is a good place to get photos.

Also, don't drag out the survey too long on low-fenced properties. An ideal survey would be just a snapshot of all deer using the property, and the replicate to take an average. This of course is not possible so you make do by extending the survey to get everybody photographed. But, the longer you run the survey, the greater the chance of deer immigrating and emmigrating the property during the normal course of home range movement. While the density stays relatively constant, you absolutely do see deer movement in and out of the area. That's why many properties will see some bucks during the survey but not necessarily see those deer during the hunting season. Similarly, you may see deer during the hunting season that you didn't see when the survey was conducted. So, the longer you run the survey, the greater the likelihood of artificially increasing the density estimates. Remember that the survey is telling you how many deer are using the property at any given time, not necessarily the total number of deer that use the property over an extended period of time.

[cehorn]

Also don't forget that feeders are sometimes not the ideal locations to run the cameras. While you want to place the cameras over bait (corn), there are some deer, especially bucks, that do not come to feeders regularly. This is especially true in heavily hunted areas. For these areas, it is better to simply put feed on the ground and that's why most camera survey photos you see have corn piled on the ground. The exception to this is in areas where deer are dependent on the feed (areas with excessive deer densities and poor habitat). In these areas, deer heavily use protein (because they have to) and this is a good place to get photos.

Also, don't drag out the survey too long on low-fenced properties. An ideal survey would be just a snapshot of all deer using the property, and the replicate to take an average. This of course is not possible so you make do by extending the survey to get everybody photographed. But, the longer you run the survey, the greater the chance of deer immigrating and emmigrating the property during the normal course of home range movement. While the density stays relatively constant, you absolutely do see deer movement in and out of the area. That's why many properties will see some bucks during the survey but not necessarily see those deer during the hunting season. Similarly, you may see deer during the hunting season that you didn't see when the survey was conducted. So, the longer you run the survey, the greater the likelihood of artificially increasing the density estimates. Remember that the survey is telling you how many deer are using the property at any given time, not necessarily the total number of deer that use the property over an extended period of time.

Good stuff. While I would like to not use feeders, I don't think that is an option given I can only be there every 2 weeks (not in between) and the number of pigs we have. Piles of corn would be gone in a day or 2 if not in pens which is where the feeders are. In a normal year given the numbers of deer I think we have (currently I'm calculating 1 deer per 12 ac but as I said I'm going to update based on the past 2 weeks) I don't see the deer being dependent on feed. Especially given the feed is new to them as I previously mentioned. BUT, given we are in a drought I think the deer are more dependent this year on the feeders and water stations we have out (especially since we have a couple of tanks that have gone dry). As a result, I think I'm at the upper end of the spectrum as far as deer seen at a feeder vs deer that don't visit feeders. The bucks are definitely more prevalent at the protein feeders than the does.

My plan is to take the data from late July/early August (last 2 week period) and use that as a back check or something to average with the 2 weeks we are currently in. I checked cameras on Aug 6 and I will check them again this weekend. I will go thru the entire exercise of counting individual bucks and does from these 2 periods and see where I sit. I may do it 1 more time and have 3 different surveys to average together but I'll have to see how time allows.

Currently I am saying I have 80% of bucks on camera and 70% of does on camera as my adjustment factor. It is a guess but I think it is going to be close based on what we saw during deer season. I also think the more time we have the property the more I'll be able to zero in on the numbers. We have only been on the place 10 months right now. I am excited to get a full hunting season in without dozers and a bunch of work going on concurrently. Only time will tell how that will clear things up but last season we had A LOT of activity on the place doing work, etc and I think that influenced deer sightings some. Also, some places we didn't even get a feeder out until late November. So, this deer season should give us a little more clarity on where we sit as well.

[Top Of Texas]

Congratulations Jeff!

This guy let me ride along a few surveys when I first started my undergrad at SWT in the late 90's.

How cool! My deepest apologies, if you would please refresh my memory. I've done a couple of surveys since then with multitudes of people.

[kyle1974]

I use cameras and blind surveys for estimates, and like some have said, it's pretty easy. I don't use a 10 day span, but other wise it's pretty straight forward.

after I count bucks, we work on ratios by blind observations with road feeding large areas of the lease, and putting people in as many spots as possible in the area we feed. At a specific time, we count what's out there. (6 bucks, 8 does, 5 fawns, whatever it may be).

after we do that a couple times at numerous locations, it gives a pretty good idea on buck/doe ratios and fawn crop %.

it's not exact, but neither is a helicopter survey and counting deer on cameras doesn't cost $5500.

[bfree]

We do camera surveys, not to bad and it really helps identify shooters and the ones to protect another year................

[cehorn]

I finally finished going thru my initial set of pics from 8-6 and have those numbers. That was for a 2 week stretch. I am going back to the ranch today and will do another run at numbers based on the last week (Saturday to Saturday). I plan to combine the results and see what I have. So far slightly more bucks than does but I think we are real close to 1:1 from what we have visibly seen. I will adjust to something similar and then get a total number. Once I have that I'll post those to see what y'all think of the numbers and what y'all think needs to be shot.

To get a head start, if I have 45 does and 45 bucks and I want to keep the numbers the same how many does would you suggest shooting?

[cehorn]

I just checked the TPWD mld tag estimator. It says 22 doe, 3 spikes and 7 bucks. I think that is a little high all around, especially given the drought conditions/low fawn crop.

[kyle1974]

I finally finished going thru my initial set of pics from 8-6 and have those numbers. That was for a 2 week stretch. I am going back to the ranch today and will do another run at numbers based on the last week (Saturday to Saturday). I plan to combine the results and see what I have. So far slightly more bucks than does but I think we are real close to 1:1 from what we have visibly seen. I will adjust to something similar and then get a total number. Once I have that I'll post those to see what y'all think of the numbers and what y'all think needs to be shot.

To get a head start, if I have 40 does and 40 bucks and I want to keep the numbers the same how many does would you suggest shooting?

If you want to keep numbers the same you need to shoot whatever your fawn crop is. +/-


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[cehorn]

If you want to keep numbers the same you need to shoot whatever your fawn crop is. +/-


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Agree, but it would be whatever next year's fawn crop is correct? I'm already counting this year's crop in my numbers I want to keep. So I guess I'm looking for a guess on next year's fawn crop with 45 does.

Given 1 fawn per doe and 30% survival rate that would be about 13 deer to shot. I'm just not sure on the accuracy of my fawn numbers, survival rate, etc.