Harvest Numbers Down

[TheLBLman]

How long do the acorns typically stay good?

Even in good acorn years, they are normally "gone" by mid-December or earlier. There can still be some on the ground, but they "sour" and/or lose their appeal to deer. Turkeys will still eat them.
Red oak acorns will last on the ground & appeal to deer until spring, while white oak acorns rot much sooner, usually be early December.

What's happened this year is highly unusual regarding the acorns.

 

[Longbow2240]

Plenty to eat in the woods this year and long lasting moon phases. Deer just not moving as much in daylight hours as normal. IMO

 

[PickettSFHunter]

Simply way less deer in my area and it has been decreasing for years here.

 

[Vince]

I haven't seen many deer this year...last year, I saw five fold numbers in half as many sits as this year.
I still haven't killed one this year. Shot two, one bow and one rifle - and missed both.

 

[Wolverine72]

Very interesting reading about the heavy acorn crop this year. That makes great sense. I never considered that before. You can teach an old dog new tricks.

That being said, I've had a pretty typical year for harvesting deer where I hunt in middle Tennessee. I hunt almost exclusively on deer trails in the woods. Rarely if ever field edges. I cut remember the last deer I killed on a field edge. If acorns keep them in the woods, then that makes sense why my season has been pretty typical the last 2 deer I shot had acorns in their mouth.

 

[tnanh]

It could be that hunters are not checking in their deer. One person mentioned that turkey harvest was down due to the same idea. Online checking is a good/not-so-good idea. Remember the old days when you had to physically check in a deer or turkey????

If they are too sorry to check online they are definitely too sorry to drive to the check station. No way after this many years it has contributed to a reduction in numbers since last year.

 

[Buzzard Breath]

I can't say what the local WMA's were like in November, but they've had more hunters than usual, well into December. I start squirrel hunting on the southern middle tn WMA's starting in December and I've had to do a lot more looking for an open area to hunt this year than in years past. There's been a very noticeable increase in late season hunters than before.

 

[Shooter77]

I feel like the numbers of deer are down in a lot of places. Deer in places I've hunt have less and less fawns with them and even the deer in my city neighborhood have less. I've got a group of 6 does that hang out around my house the last 2 years. I had 1 fawn last year that became a nice 3pt and this year we have 1 fawn again in this group. In early sept i'll drive around my neighborhood and see what's roaming. most doe groups of 4+ rarely have more than 1/2 as many fawns with them.

I see lots of single does through out the fall. I've got a doe on my hunting land that consistently produces 2 fawns every year for past 3 years. she's always with her 2 fawns from Sept through spring time and not another deer in her group.

 

[Chiflyguy]

I didn't even see a deer during both gun seasons in Illinois.
Statewide was down about 8,000.
A lot of deer moving during the night , nothing during the day.
Add on to it a pack of stray dogs,the farmers still harvesting corn in December and blah blah blah.
Still was nice sitting in a tree figuring life out.

 

[Knothead]

I've been checking county by county in the areas where I work (mostly western Middle TN). This region is characterized by big sections of hardwood forest. And in this region, buck harvest numbers are WAY down this year. And the reason is the massive acorn crop. This is a trend I've followed for years. As LBLman said, most hunters hunt open areas and any type of ag field or food plot. In a bumper acorn crop, deer don't use open fields or food plots. Noy only do they stay in the woods, acorns digest very slowly hence deer do not have to feed as often. In big acorn years, deer do not have to move far to find food (sometimes never leaving thick cover) and don't have to move as often.

I keep track of what the acorn crop is like each year, giving it a rating of 0 to 10. In the years the acorn crop is an 8 or above, buck harvest numbers decline significantly in my area. And not surprisingly, we see a jump in photo census buck numbers the following year. In years when the acorn crop is a 3 or below, buck harvest spike because deer have to move farther and more often to find food, exposing them to hunters more frequently.

Interesting info, BSK. But, wouldn't the rut factor into this somewhere? In other words, during the 7-10 days of rut, I would think more hunters are in the woods for longer hours..I would also think that—even in a year of heavy acorn crop—the week or so of rut, the bucks would be more interested in "other things" than gorging themselves on acorns. Thus, they'd be up on their feet roaming around, looking for a little action. Just curious if any of this plays into your data collection and analytics.

 

[taylor j]

Covid and really warm weather all hunting season

 

[Johndeere!]

Some area s were hit with the EHD last year that took slot of the herd out , THEN of coarse the warmer than normal conditions this year during season , then the big crop of acorns in certain areas (northeast acorns was very selective areas or elevations where they acorns hit), then you got the Covid situation where some more people maybe back to work now. I know even here on Dec 31 it is even suppose to be up toward the 70 degree mark today , here in northeast Tn mountains. That is unseasonably warm.!!! So, Deer are moving more at night , (cooler temps) way more than they already usually move at night. Either way the deer are going to feed around 5 main times in a 24 hour period. All 5 of those times will not be just on Acorns , even during peak white oak season , they still need other woody browse , greens, and other things to complete their daily digestive track. A lot of Biologists and a lot of studies from different Universities will back this evidence up about the "wild" , (not the fenced in ones ), whitetail deer eating habits here in Tennessee. So IMO , it is due to a lot of different factors all coming together this year.

 

[280longshot]

Monstrous acorn crop and hot weather...I hate hunting with a rifle when it's 65-70 degrees.
Deer are still hitting acorns hard where I hunt.

 

[Grainger]

Maybe guys can't find any ammo to put in their guns...

 

[BSK]

Interesting info, BSK. But, wouldn't the rut factor into this somewhere? In other words, during the 7-10 days of rut, I would think more hunters are in the woods for longer hours..I would also think that—even in a year of heavy acorn crop—the week or so of rut, the bucks would be more interested in "other things" than gorging themselves on acorns. Thus, they'd be up on their feet roaming around, looking for a little action. Just curious if any of this plays into your data collection and analytics.

Yes it does factor in, and bucks fall to hunters during that time. But when you consider what percent of bucks fall during the peak of the rut versus the other 3 months of the season, that only makes up a percentage. I haven't gone day to day through the harvest reports, but in my county, buck kill is off by about 35% this year. I'll bet that 35% decline comes from the times outside of the rut.

 

[BSK]

I feel like the numbers of deer are down in a lot of places. Deer in places I've hunt have less and less fawns with them and even the deer in my city neighborhood have less. I've got a group of 6 does that hang out around my house the last 2 years. I had 1 fawn last year that became a nice 3pt and this year we have 1 fawn again in this group. In early sept i'll drive around my neighborhood and see what's roaming. most doe groups of 4+ rarely have more than 1/2 as many fawns with them.

I see lots of single does through out the fall. I've got a doe on my hunting land that consistently produces 2 fawns every year for past 3 years. she's always with her 2 fawns from Sept through spring time and not another deer in her group.

Now THIS is a concern. Across the region - in fact across the Southeast - much lower than normal fawn survival is a major topic of conversation among biologists. And no one really has an answer. But I remember when fawn recruitment used to run near 100% in healthy deer herds (for every 10 adult does there would be 10 fawns). Now it's common to only see 40% fawn recruitment, even in healthy herds (for every 10 adult does, there are only 4 fawns). I have no doubt coyotes are playing a role. But we've always had coyotes, so there is more to the story.

 

[gary66]

I was looking at the deer harvest numbers for this season. I compared harvest numbers from the Last week of Aug (velvet hunt) to Dec 28 for both 2020 and 2021. There was around a 20-22k difference. This year was lower.

Did did covid in 2020 put that many more hunters in the woods? What do y'all think the reason for it is?

no, many states sold their natural resources by politicians for political gain. In Ohio under Kasick our herd was decimated so he could get funding for his presidential run from the biggest lobbyists in the state, Farm Bureau. I estimated 4 million antlerless tags could've been sold in just one season. Our numbers plummeted and are still a joke compared to what they could've been... the policies are still in place.

baby brother lived and hunted Va., he was a very good hunter and kept up with the states progress. He understood that when a state reaches 750,000 deer herd numbers it had reached an amount that could recover quickly, Ohio was on the cusp of reaching that when Kasick took control. Shortly after I herd a farm report where the dnr and the farm bureau reaffirmed the commitment they had made in 1986 to keep the herd at 250,000, just after that antlerless tags were cheap and plentiful.

You have to understand the state to know why hunters were duped. For decades many hunters had to live with not seeing any deer, we just didn't have many. During that period we were told by the dnr that if we sacrificed a herd would be built and we would reap the rewards, so for decades we sacrificed. When the antlerless tags became cheap and plentiful we thought our sacrifices had finally paid off, we didn't know we were being used till it was too late.

Pa. did the same thing, look at their harvest history...it's disgusting what has happened. FWIW Kasick is from Pa.

 

[BSK]

The weather has been hot in December, but for the counties where I'm noticing the largest buck harvest declines, we had nearly ideal hunting weather during the peak of the rut (November). In fact, I can't remember a year with more days of cool, dry, clear-sky weather with calm winds during November.

 

[BSK]

Just my opinion - after looking at many years of hunter observation data from numerous properties across the Southeast - but I think hunters put too much emphasis on a single year's experience. Having run a lot of photo censuses and seeing how local deer populations DON'T experience major increases or declines year to year (outside of an EHD outbreak), but hunter sightings DO see major year to year increases/declines, far more of what hunters see while hunting is about weather and food sources than about actual deer numbers. What I'm getting at is "what hunters see while hunting" often has very little to do with how many deer are out there. Now at the extremes, you can't see what isn't there, but in the real world I don't see those extremes occurring. I see minor variances in local deer population from year to year, but sometimes massive variances in how many deer hunters see from year to year. It's all about weather and food sources.

 

[Willysman]

I'm sure you could add quite a bit to the number for deer not being checked out. I think it is happening a lot a lot more than we think.