Question For BSK

[Anonymous]

ok i hunt 70 acres and 25 that joins like an L shape.all ridge and bottoms. i know that everyone around me do plots. i get pics of great bucks in the weeks before season but dont see them during season,it frustrates the heck out of me.i see numerous young bucks during season.well the tornado that hit hickman county last year hit one side of this land directley, well the land owner had to log the land to pay for clean up and damage so of course you know that most of the oaks are gone.now i have tree tops everywhere.what i did gain was areas where the loggers made areas to turn around now i have food plot areas, two of them.they are 1/4 maybe 1/5 acre areas. i planted oats whaet turnips rape its was a blend at co-op.but i did plant late and ofcourse the wheat did great in both plots but in one the brascias didnt grow that one the deer use alot the other is looking untouched,wierd.i also have a six acre field but its road side.my question is this.what would be good to plant and when in the smaller plots and should i do something to the field that is road side i really want to hold these deer i know one thing i can do is mineral licks what do you recomend to start and continue those.im have only been hunting 7 years and at first it was kill at will ,brown its down,eyes it dies and to be honest the info from this site and empty spots on my wall and the deer i know are there have made me selective.i hunt alone most of the time so what i learn is by myself or on here i would almost pay someone that is very knowledgeable to tell me what to do!LOL this is great land i need help!do you since the FRUSTRATION?thanks for all the help you give me and all at TNDEER.

 

[BSK]

A couple of point:

1) It is normal--but extremely frustrating--for older bucks to move around from summer to fall. A growing body of research is showing that many bucks have different summer ranges than fall/winter ranges. Now this helps some land managers and hurts others. Some properties see a net gain in bucks when these summer to fall shifts occur and others see a net loss. Unfortunately, no one knows why bucks make these shifts. Without knowing why they do it, it's hard to manage for drawing these bucks to a given property. However, the best bet is simply to produce everything deer need, and that includes more than just food and cover. That includes sanctuary. It's all well and good to produce cover, but if hunters regularly invade that cover, it has lost its effectiveness as a critical resource. Some areas of thick cover need to be left alone (no human intrusion) so that deer can feel safe from human predation. Older deer quickly learn/find these pockets of safety and focus their daylight hours in and near them.

2) Food plots can be a great management tool, especially in predominantly hardwood environments. However, food plots do not hold deer on a property during daylight, when hunters want them there, even on fairly large properties. I've seen properties in excess of 2,000 acres that were all mid-age hardwoods interspersed with food plots, yet they could not hold older deer on the property during daylight. They could attract older deer to the food plots at night (proven by numerous nightime trail-cam pictures), but daylight trail-cam pictures of older deer were non-existant. It took producing sanctuary cover to start holding those desired deer on the property during daylight. Older hunter-wary deer will travel considerable distances to feed in food plots at night, but they will spend the majority of their daylight (legal hunting) hours in or near sanctuary cover. What I'm getting at is food plots alone are not the big answer to holding better bucks on your property.

Luckily, Nature has provided what you need. That tornado produced what your property most needs, and that's cover. Unfortunately, it will take another year or two to grow to the good cover stage. The removal of all those trees by the tornado is going to produce a jungle of early regrowth over the next couple of years. THAT is going to be the best chance of holding older hunter-wary deer on the property as well as setting aside sections of that cover as sanctuary for the deer. These sanctuaries don't have to be large--a couple of 5-10 acre sections is plenty.

3) As for minerals, I'm not sold on the idea that minerals really do anything for a deer herd. Now they very well might help, but many mineral companies has tried to prove that mineral supplementation improves the heath and antler production of free-ranging deer herds--and failed to do so. Now I do recommend creating a salt lick (and mineral supplementation can be added to that if you want to do so) on 70 acres, but primarily for the purpose of inventorying your buck population in summer. In essence, salt licks are one of the best locations for running a summer photo census of your buck population.

 

[richmanbarbeque]

good stuff!