How many does should be killed.

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280longshot

280longshot

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Tn, Tipton
Just curious as a club how many does should we be killing??? It is a 4,000 acre club in Hardenman County in Whiteville, unit L.
 
It all depends on the deer herd there. If you want to take a season learning more about the deer density on your specific club through a camera consensus and browse (all food source) pressure, just start by shooting a doe for every buck
 
HatchieLuvr said:
4000 acres really needs and justifies hiring/consulting a professional manager rather than just guessing or following the latest "internet crazy" style of mgmt.
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Agreed. Figuring out how many does to harvest is a highly site specific answer that requires detailed measurement over a number of years. That's best done by a professional.
 
Most areas guys will get tired of killing before you have killed enough. On our club the first two years I believe we killed 80 something deer. That is on a 1k acres. Sure was fun.
 
Yes the 4,000 acres are all together and is a combination of hills, botton land with at least 1500 acres that is farmed. I guess I am looking for a easy answer when it looks like there isn't a easy answer.
So far our club has killed 22 does for the year and our land owner thinks we are killing to many, Ha.
I was just curious if there was a way to get a average doe kill without the help of a professional.
 
280longshot said:
I was just curious if there was a way to get a average doe kill without the help of a professional.
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Not really.

In some regions, a doe per 100 acres is way too many. In other regions, a doe per 100 acres isn't even scratching the surface.

Everything has to be based on how well the food resources are holding up against deer browse pressure, and that needs to be measured at the lowest food resource time of year--late winter.
 
Since most DON'T have enough funds or acreage to justify hiring a professional, here's some simple "rules of thumb":

1) Kill at least as many female as male deer on your QDM property.

2) If you have plenty of "cover" habitat and "appear" to have plenty of deer, taking one female deer per 100 acres is probably not too many, and probably not enough.

3) Simply by following #1 above, this is somewhat self-regulating in that if you have more deer, you will kill more bucks; less deer, you will kill fewer.

As long as you have plenty of cover habitat, it will be near impossible to kill way too many females. As you approach "enough", the surviving females tend to be the wiser ones that have become much wiser, and mostly nocturnal, meaning near impossible to kill them. It may "appear" you've wiped them out, when all that's really going on is they've become mostly nocturnal and are wise enough to avoid where the hunters hunt most.
 
I'm not too far from you (Hardeman also) and in addition to the sound advice already offered, I'll 2nd the earlier comments about not killing enough and considering what your neighbors are doing. With as much ground as you have in rowcrop, you might be surprised what your carrying capacity is.

I continue to be perfectly amazed at the sheer productivity of places adjacent to rivers like the Wolf and Hatchie.
 
All depends on the property. We had a 600 acre farm once that we bow killed 50 does a yr off of for 5 years, and still saw herds of does regularly. It was a doe sink and you simply couldnt kill enough. Other places can be overkilled easily.
 
I know this isn't site specific but since it's unit L and the regulations for that county are 3doe/day I would say that county has to many does. How do they determine that???
As a club I am sure we all see to many does, some as many as 20-30 on a morning hunt and some days as little as 2-6 per hunt. And that's not every time but I can assure you that we have to many does.
One of the ajoining properties had a doe killing spree I believe 2yrs ago, does were eatting the crops up so they got permission to conduct a doe kill.
 
They have a mandated goal at Ames to kill 140 does for 18,000 acres and this is down some from previous years. For the last 7 or 8 years they have killed 140-180 does and around 20-30 bucks. The ratio is about 1:1.5. Seems extreme, but somehow the does come back strong every year. In some areas, its hard to kill too many does and it easy to be over run with them. Every extra doe equals one less buck and one more reason a buck doesn't have to compete.
 
Just out of curiosity 280longshot, what is in the ag fields in winter? Are they allowed to go fallow or do the farmers plant a winter/spring crop?
 
BSK, in the past the farmer has been putting in winter wheat in almost all the fields. The weather this year kept him from doing that.
BTW, the row crops this year and last year were corn, beans, and cotton split up between the ~ 1500 acres of crops.
 
Considering no winter wheat was planted this year, it would be a very good late winter to conduct a browse survey (to estimate the relationship between deer density and available food during the lowest food availability time of year). Did you have much of an acorn crop on the property this year?
 
I cant comment on the acorn crop as I don't think I ever stepped foot in the woods during the season (tough season for me). I really think we have too many does, but I also think its not bad enough to the point where over browsing or food availability is a big issue. Over the last few years, we've killed twice as many does as bucks. This year thats not likely to happen unless something changes fast.

We're up against several things. We have a 7 pt rule, but we have one segment of the membership that will shoot anything thats legal and wants to "buck out".

We also have some members that do not want to shoot their 2 does minimum per member, even in the presence of fines.

Lastly, the landowner is way to involved in the decision making process, and changes things "on the fly". He also has an old-school mentality.

Its a great club, but I guess nothings perfect.
 
I have seen alot of acorns but not as many as last year, last year was a abundant of acorns and deer didn't have to travel far to feed. We do have what I would call above average amount of oak trees. Oaks everywhere you look. Every deer I have killed this year was full of acorns.
 
BigAl,

What you detailed is THE biggest problem with clubs everywhere--different goals of different hunters. That's why it's so importnat--when trying to establish a club--to CLEARLY establish the goals from day one, so that every hunter joining knows which direction the club is going in.
 
HatchieLuvr said:
Well from the sounds of it the 4000 acres will never have any meaningful mgmt if some of the members dont kill their share of does, some members are just there whacking toy bucks and lastly, the landowner is worried about ANYTHING. Under that scenario my FIRST concern would be the landowner, piss he/them off and EVERYONE is in danger of loosing the entire tract!

Personally I'd get with a few other of the more serious members and chip in a hundred or two bucks a piece and perhaps have a true professional come in for a day or so to just do some light investigating, guestimating and give them the last decade or so of annual harvest summaries. Then have them meet for less than an hour with the landowner to explain what that mgr. feels has been done, could be done and what SHOULD done starting nextyear.

Perhaps the landower is simpy mis-informed or never knew to begin with about what proper mgmt can do for his property. Sitting down with a professional can help put to rest any fears or worries the landowner might have and it could also help the landowner understand that you and the members who brought in the professional CARE which might give you that owners ears over those other "problem" members!

Just a thought,
HL
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I think that would piss the landowner off too. You started off sounding like you know who this land owner is because he does seem to be worried about every thing.
The land owner is an older man and he's getting fed a lot from one of his sons who thinks we kill to many deer. He says the old saying that "the does are where the bucks come from". See my sig. I have no problem killing does.
 
I know and all the club members know the biggest challenge we have is dealing with the land owner. There is no reasoning with this man, it's his way or the highway. All we can do as a club is half ass try to manage this place.

Well as of today we only added 2 more does to the list so that makes about 24 so far for the year.
 
3 per day just like the regulations say............. ;) :whistle:
or as many as D. A. can pull the trigger on........ :D
 

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