Negative Effects from Freeze on Whitetail

[TexasTK]

Can't say I have noticed anything noticeable on WT. The quail took at a hit at my place and have also noticed the roadrunner population got nocked back quite a bit. It also seems not as many songbirds. I hunted the King in March & saw numerous dead & sick Nilgai.

[Duane]

Deer are really healthy in Star. But had this big 8 at the feeder and his right G3 is black and his right main beam ends just past the start of his g3 and all black also. I saw this buck at a distance and thought he was broken up, but its frost damage.

Curious how you arrive at the conclusion that antlers could have suffered damage from a freeze in February?

[jt400]

The deer up north are a different subspecies. If you bring them down here they die from the heat. I'm sure the same would happen if you brought hill country deer up north.

I hunt in Western Kimble County. We have noticed an average decline in body weight for our average mature bucks. No doubt. Its always been decently consistent pre rut but its definitely a strange year. These are known deer I'm referring to. That wasn't just a cold snap. I'd say it didn't kill many if any at all but from what I'VE seen it had an impact. Just my 2 cents.

[S-3 Ranch]

We took some brush damage in Schleicher , sterling and Kenndall counties, that is making a late come back , but things seem normal with white tail!

This is after mid summer what the good scrub brush looks like

[kry226]

About the only difference I've seen is less hogs. I probably haven't had a dozen on camera since the freeze.

But the deer look otherwise healthy and the fawn recruitment has been awesome. Lots of mature does and I've even got a donkey doe with triplets. Not that many mature bucks yet, but that's not unusual as my place is a doe haven.

[Deerguy]

You wouldn't expect any long-term affects from the freeze, other than perhaps frost-bitten ears. Food availability was only impacted for a short time (4 or 5 days) and the freeze fell during a normal time of limited forage availability anyway. There was an initial loss of animals, but minimal. More so on areas of poor range due to overgrazing by livestock and exotics.

[Gary Roberson]

No negative effects on whitetails that I have seen in Menard or surrounding counties. Whitetails have been here for hundreds of years and have experienced cold spells before. Exotics...not so much.
Adios,
Gary

[Tbar]

Our deer have a thick layer of fat on them and the numbers seemed to be up from last year however our biologist doesn't think so and tightened the noose on our mld tags. We feed corn year around and cotton seed since July.

https://i.ibb.co/JHYRCNC/Fat-Deer.jpg

[Cox1]

I’ve noticed some decreased body finish on deer here in central Texas ,at least on the couple places I hunt. Don’t really know if it’s just the late hot temps or possibly the fact that our acorn crop was basically zero either from big freeze or the multiple hail storms. Either way they aren’t what I would call poor just not quite as thick as usual.

[jt400]

Reviving this thread. We had a pretty noticeable drop in body weight from years past with known aged deer. Its always been somewhat consistent. Am I alone on this? They looked healthy enough but had NO fat.

[rut-ro]

I'm thinking it hurt Leon County as well.

We're seeing deer, just no shooters

Ive seen more shooters in Leon and Madison Counties than before

[doghouse]

This current dry spell is what's hurting them on my place in Mills county. No green on the ground at all. I bet they eat double the protein this spring and summer.

[Pushbutton2]

Ive seen more shooters in Leon and Madison Counties than before

That's good.
I haven't seen a shooter since Archery Season ended.
Got a couple does coning in after dark now.....

[bossbowman]

Our East Texas deer seemed to come through it just fine and have never looked healthier.

There is one really old buck that is pushing 10 years that I didn't expect to see again, but he's still alive.

Same here, shot the fattest buck I ever have in October

[Bayouboy]

Antler mass is way down on our lease in Angelina county. Body size is real good.

Not sure what to attribute it to. Deer also stayed mostly nocturnal with the crazy heat.