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Catoosa anyone heard
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<blockquote data-quote="TheLBLman" data-source="post: 5369455" data-attributes="member: 1409"><p>It's interesting to note, that back in the 1960's before deer management suffered from severe antler high-grading from hunters, the Catoosa WMA actually produced some bucks that were registered in the B&C Book. In fact, the Foster buck killed in 1959 right outside Catoosa's boundaries was TN's #1 Typical Buck for decades thereafter.</p><p></p><p>But over the decades, a big deer management mistake was made in focusing more on growing higher deer densities to make hunters happier with more living animal targets. The habitat could support these deer densities, but both the habitat and the herd health steadily deteriorated (somewhat under the radar) over the decades. Damage to the habitat may take decades of lower deer densities to recover.</p><p></p><p>What happened was that the plants highest in soluble protein were also the plant species most preferred by the deer. While there may have still been plenty of deer "food" (plants), the best plant species were eaten into near extinction, steadily becoming, year by year, less of the deer's annual diet.</p><p></p><p>Consequently, this has contributed to our same age bucks today having smaller average racks than they had in the 1960's in the same area. Of course their are outliers, but this loss of the best plant foods is real. It takes years of fewer deer and habitat work to restore this better deer "food" environment.</p><p></p><p>At Catoosa WMA, those "oak savannas" are transforming the native food supply back to what it once was and maybe even better, if the deer density can be prevented from getting too high over the next few years. Can be a delicate balancing act.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="TheLBLman, post: 5369455, member: 1409"] It's interesting to note, that back in the 1960's before deer management suffered from severe antler high-grading from hunters, the Catoosa WMA actually produced some bucks that were registered in the B&C Book. In fact, the Foster buck killed in 1959 right outside Catoosa's boundaries was TN's #1 Typical Buck for decades thereafter. But over the decades, a big deer management mistake was made in focusing more on growing higher deer densities to make hunters happier with more living animal targets. The habitat could support these deer densities, but both the habitat and the herd health steadily deteriorated (somewhat under the radar) over the decades. Damage to the habitat may take decades of lower deer densities to recover. What happened was that the plants highest in soluble protein were also the plant species most preferred by the deer. While there may have still been plenty of deer "food" (plants), the best plant species were eaten into near extinction, steadily becoming, year by year, less of the deer's annual diet. Consequently, this has contributed to our same age bucks today having smaller average racks than they had in the 1960's in the same area. Of course their are outliers, but this loss of the best plant foods is real. It takes years of fewer deer and habitat work to restore this better deer "food" environment. At Catoosa WMA, those "oak savannas" are transforming the native food supply back to what it once was and maybe even better, if the deer density can be prevented from getting too high over the next few years. Can be a delicate balancing act. [/QUOTE]
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