Originally posted by brianlg31
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I would pee my pants if I saw that many bucks at my feeder. Definitely need to get the ratios in order. Sounds like you need some more shooters to take out some culls. -
Is this place high fenced? I would think that bucks would travel away in search of more does if competition is that high. Sounds like 3 bucks for every doe, really unusual. If the bucks are a lot of 1.5 year olds, a lot of those will wander off anyway. There was study posted not long ago talking about this
Maybe a lot of those young bucks you described will be leaving this fallComment
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Low fence
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Sounds to me like y'all need to shoot more bucks to get that ratio in check. May sound great with all those bucks, but I don't think that's helping your herd improve across the board. Do the bucks mostly leave during the rut to find more does on adjacent properties? Sounds like a heckuva place to call and rattle with all the buck competition!Comment
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If the horns aren't breaking the skin he is not a year and half yr old. 6 month old fawn. Don't shoot a yearling buck.Comment
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If you have a bunch of bucks they may just be keeping your does off the feeders. Set up a camera on some hand corn and I bet you see more does.
And I wouldn’t shoot a 1 year old buck. Shoot some mature bucks if you want to cut numbers
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I am willing to waive my normal fee and help you with your bucks for free.Originally posted by brianlg31 View Post
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Originally posted by jason86 View Post
I didn’t say we didn’t have any
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Could end up being a .... 30rd point buck!
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Bucks and/or hunting pressure may be keeping does off corn. I'd set some camera's up on well used trails away from feeders or near water and see what you are looking at.Originally posted by brianlg31 View PostComment
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he's probably a late yearling. Rule of thumb should be NEVER shoot a below 3 yr old buck for any reason. You basically have no idea what they become. It's been studied extensively by A&M & the king ranch among other places including general rule for QDM. You should definitely read about it. Think the study was spike buck culling or something like that if you google it. It means absolutely nothing that his peers are 4 points.
Also if you are low fence culling does absolutely nothing and there is even less reason to cull at such a young age.Last edited by DeadEyeB; 10-14-2019, 12:29 PM.Comment
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Some biological facts to consider...
At 1.5 years, a buck should make enough testosterone to shed velvet. If you're seeing a nubbin' buck with no hardened antler, then very high odds it's only 6 months old. If he's near equal body size to bucks with hard antler, then nubbin' is likely one of the biggest fawns of the year.
Bucks dominate feeders, so that makes feeders a bad location for collecting herd composition data.
Don't use sex ratio to develop harvest goals. Doe harvest goals should be guided by the degree of foraging pressure on top quality browse plants. Buck harvest goals should be guided by targeting only mature bucks. The end result of these 2 goals will be a sex ratio of around 1 buck:1.5 doe to 1 buck:3 doe, depending on doe harvest need, which is a suitable range to ensure reproduction. The only time sex ratio becomes a guiding factor is when it becomes heavily skewed toward the doe, and the appropriate response is not to kill more doe, but rather, to stop shooting so many bucks. Sex ratio can be important anecdotally, where if I were looking for a lease, 1:1 would be inviting, but 1:6 I'd keep looking. Point being, the closer the sex ratio then the higher probability of older age bucks in the herd, thus larger antlered bucks. Finally, the only populations, on an appropriate geographical scale, that I know of in Texas that have more bucks than doe occur exclusively on high fence properties.Comment
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