Thinning out does

[losthunter]

Ive been following a few topics in this forum and hear people talk about thinning out their doe herd on private land. Can someone explain to me why having too many does is a problem? I always assumed the more deer around the better? Im all for killing, just don't understand the logic.

 

[Os2 Outdoors]

If you had 4 women laying in your bed, would you ever venture out to your front yard?

Above scenario involves having a slow, trickle rut. With a balanced herd you see a more pronounced rut, which increases your odds of killing a mature deer.

The late rut could also bring into play very late bred does, which would equal late born Fawns coming into the next winter.

Not to mention the struggle for resources, with way to many does its hard for your buck herd or deer herd for that matter to get enough high quality forage.

Hope this little quick summary helped you out.

 

[deerhunter10]

If you had 4 women laying in your bed, would you ever venture out to your front yard?

Above scenario involves having a slow, trickle rut. With a balanced herd you see a more pronounced rut, which increases your odds of killing a mature deer.

The late rut could also bring into play very late bred does, which would equal late born Fawns coming into the next winter.

Not to mention the struggle for resources, with way to many does its hard for your buck herd or deer herd for that matter to get enough high quality forage.

Hope this little quick summary helped you out.

^^ this hit the nail on the head. It is a very important part of managing.

 

[losthunter]

Now that makes perfect sense. Thanks

 

[BSK]

losthunter,

Numerous reasons exist for removing females from a deer population, some biological and some socio-biological. Biologically, females are the young producers and rearers. The only way to limit the size of a deer population is by removing females. Although it's not the healthiest situation, a deer population will exist and even continue to grow even if the adult male population is nearly completely killed off each year. A few young bucks can eventually breed all of the does, producing massive and enlarging fawn crops every year. And although from a hunter's standpoint it would seem that more deer is always better, the habitat can only support so many deer. The more deer you have, the more mouths are sharing the limited high-quality foods available, and the higher the percentage of each deer's diet that is made up of lower quality foods. The result is that as the population density rises, the health of the individual animals in the population declines, as each individual deer has a diet made up of more lower quality foods than higher quality foods. Holding deer population growth in check through doe harvests prevents the herd from decreasing in health due to eating up all of its best resources.

Doe harvests not only control population growth, but they also effect what is called "herd dynamics"--the composition of the deer population, as in sex ratio, age structure, etc. A deer population with too many females and not enough males will produce reproductive problems that have long-term effects. With few bucks and many does, bucks have to conduct much more and much longer rutting activity to breed all of the does. Not only does this greatly increase rut stress on bucks--which reduces their body and antler growth in the future, as well as increase buck mortality--it will spread breeding dates over a longer period of time. Strung out breeding times can reduce fawn survival, as predators can take a larger percentage of the total fawn crop each year if defenseless newborn fawns are available over a longer time period.

If all of this sounds overly complicated, I can assure you I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of deer management complexities. Deer population dynamics are far more complicated than most assume. And to make matters worse, "everything effects everything else"--change one thing and many things change like a string of falling dominos. Adult sex ratio, male and female age structures, population density in relation to habitat quality, natural mortality, variations in annual climate, hunter kill, changing hunter desires, etc. are all interconnected, and often some of these interactions are not as predictable as we think they will be until they occur. What I'm getting at is detailed management of an ever-changing deer population and human dynamic is an extremely complicated process--far more complicated than most hunters assume.

 

[Andy S.]

........detailed management of an ever-changing deer population and human dynamic is an extremely complicated process--far more complicated than most hunters assume.

Truer words have never been spoken, spot on!

 

[landman]

If you had 4 women laying in your bed, would you ever venture out to your front yard?

Above scenario involves having a slow, trickle rut. With a balanced herd you see a more pronounced rut, which increases your odds of killing a mature deer.

The late rut could also bring into play very late bred does, which would equal late born Fawns coming into the next winter.

Not to mention the struggle for resources, with way to many does its hard for your buck herd or deer herd for that matter to get enough high quality forage.

Hope this little quick summary helped you out.

Matt
You need a picture to prove this.... :rotf:

 

[Deer Assassin]

if i had 4 in the bed id never make it to the front yard

 

[Deer Assassin]

if i had 4 in the bed id never make it to the front yard

i stand corrected eventually one will want to talk




you have to kill the does to keep the bucks on their feet looking for it

the problem is when you kill a lot of does the other does get smart nocturnal (like bucks) then you people crying cause the are not seeing deer no more

if you want to kill mature bucks you have to kill some does

 

[BSK]

if you want to kill mature bucks you have to kill some does

Within reason, it certainly helps. But I tell you what, I've backed off a bit on how far to take adult sex ratios through doe harvests. After watching the results of many different experiments, I'm leaning more towards a compromise between seeing more deer and trying maximize mature buck movement. We can definitely take balancing the sex ratio so far that all hunting results suffer, including mature buck sightings.

 

[muddyboots]

We only kill does on our lease in bow season then they are off limits. We see 5 times the Bucks since we started doing this. Personally I believe if your neighbors are shooting does and ur property is not the does migrate to your property and they bring most of he bucks with them. This strategy has worked great for us.

 

[Os2 Outdoors]

if you want to kill mature bucks you have to kill some does

Within reason, it certainly helps. But I tell you what, I've backed off a bit on how far to take adult sex ratios through doe harvests. After watching the results of many different experiments, I'm leaning more towards a compromise between seeing more deer and trying maximize mature buck movement. We can definitely take balancing the sex ratio so far that all hunting results suffer, including mature buck sightings.

X2

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[Mike Belt]

In theory, killing does, balancing the sex ratio, and enhancing the rut all sound like a winning proposition... and it can be. I question how much is enough and I know that can be site specific. I can only speak of where I hunt. After 10 years of killing 3-4 times as many does/year as bucks it stands to reason that you're going to eventually reach that "ideal" balance. It also stands to reason that beyond that you're going to be tipping the scales in the opposite direction. Contrary to our club sightings records I believe that's where we are now. It's hard to argue with success in that we continue to maintain that yearly average but I really think our sightings records are restrictive and relative to individual sightings. For instance, a couple of hunters hunting a specific area both morning and afternoon for 1 solid week (5 days) may each see the same doe family group of 8 on both daily hunts all week long. Their sightings would record a total of 160 does and fawns sighted when in reality, only 8 individuals were seen. Meanwhile, a couple of other hunters in other areas during the same time frame may only see a total of 20 individual deer. That's a 180 count for 28 deer. Now we have too many does. Hammer them!

 

[Headhunter]

if i had 4 in the bed id never make it to the front yard

i stand corrected eventually one will want to talk




you have to kill the does to keep the bucks on their feet looking for it

the problem is when you kill a lot of does the other does get smart nocturnal (like bucks) then you people crying cause the are not seeing deer no more

if you want to kill mature bucks you have to kill some does

This is so true, also at times, you have to cut back on killing does or possible kill none for a year or 2 or more and it can depend on many different factors.

 

[dirtyhands]

What would happen if you didn't kill any does or bucks? Would nature take over and do what it's been doing since the beginning of time or would we be sitting in traffic jams because a herd of 300 deer were strolling down the road?

 

[BSK]

What would happen if you didn't kill any does or bucks? Would nature take over and do what it's been doing since the beginning of time or would we be sitting in traffic jams because a herd of 300 deer were strolling down the road?

On an individual property or everywhere? On an individual property, most of the excess deer would probably disperse onto less populated neighboring properties. We currently have many properties large and small scattered around that allow no hunting and these properties aren't too much of a problem, as long as the properties aren't huge. In fact, scattered gentlemen farms with no hunting is one of the reasons northern Williamson County produces so many huge bucks. All that agriculture growing in some of the best soils in the state, and many small sanctuaries (no hunting properties) that allow deer to evade hunters means more large-antlered mature bucks.

Now if everybody stopped killing deer the population would grow to the biological carrying capacity. At that point, the habitat would be devastated, as deer would have eaten everything they can reach that they can digest. Deer health would be so poor that fawn production would virtually cease. Just enough fawns would survive to replace the adult deer that would die every year from malnutrition-related illness. The deer population would go through repeated crash and boom cycles, with each boom being smaller and smaller as most primary deer foods were eaten into extinction.

I've seen these conditions in numerous locations (state and national parks, islands, large industrial properties), and the results are not pretty. Deer don't go extinct, but they become very small in body and antler as they have so few quality food resources. Disease is rampant in the population as low-quality foods suppress the populations immunities.

 

[Crosshairy]

What would happen if you didn't kill any does or bucks? Would nature take over and do what it's been doing since the beginning of time or would we be sitting in traffic jams because a herd of 300 deer were strolling down the road?

The major problem is the lack of large predators in the natural landscape. So what went on "since the beginning of time" wouldn't really go on anymore. Coyotes are a poor predator of adult deer, which is why hunters are so important across our state when it comes to managing the deer herd.

If we had a "good" population of mountain lions, wolves, and bears, we (hunters) wouldn't really have that "we must manage the herd" argument to make anymore.

 

[Os2 Outdoors]

What would happen if you didn't kill any does or bucks? Would nature take over and do what it's been doing since the beginning of time or would we be sitting in traffic jams because a herd of 300 deer were strolling down the road?

On an individual property or everywhere? On an individual property, most of the excess deer would probably disperse onto less populated neighboring properties. We currently have many properties large and small scattered around that allow no hunting and these properties aren't too much of a problem, as long as the properties aren't huge. In fact, scattered gentlemen farms with no hunting is one of the reasons northern Williamson County produces so many huge bucks. All that agriculture growing in some of the best soils in the state, and many small sanctuaries (no hunting properties) that allow deer to evade hunters means more large-antlered mature bucks.

Now if everybody stopped killing deer the population would grow to the biological carrying capacity. At that point, the habitat would be devastated, as deer would have eaten everything they can reach that they can digest. Deer health would be so poor that fawn production would virtually cease. Just enough fawns would survive to replace the adult deer that would die every year from malnutrition-related illness. The deer population would go through repeated crash and boom cycles, with each boom being smaller and smaller as most primary deer foods were eaten into extinction.

I've seen these conditions in numerous locations (state and national parks, islands, large industrial properties), and the results are not pretty. Deer don't go extinct, but they become very small in body and antler as they have so few quality food resources. Disease is rampant in the population as low-quality foods suppress the populations immunities.

Really!? I'm pretty sure their predator populations would grow as well and keep them in check before they eat the native wildlife into extinction. Cougars, Coyotes, bears, wolves

I don't think he meant, what would happen in a closed system/island.

 

[Roost 1]

I had a guy tell me one time "If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough." I completely dis-agree with him now. You can kill too many, and it wont take you long to figure it out when you do. With that being said, the majority of the guys that I know that consistently kill big bucks in KY (bucks that score over 150") will tell you they have tons of does on their property. I have a friend who sees 30+ does on any given day on his property, he and his dad kill big bucks each year like clock work. Obviously, their area has the carrying capacity for this many deer. All areas are not equal. The bucks are gonna be where the does are come Nov.

 

[dirtyhands]

What would happen if you didn't kill any does or bucks? Would nature take over and do what it's been doing since the beginning of time or would we be sitting in traffic jams because a herd of 300 deer were strolling down the road?

On an individual property or everywhere? On an individual property, most of the excess deer would probably disperse onto less populated neighboring properties. We currently have many properties large and small scattered around that allow no hunting and these properties aren't too much of a problem, as long as the properties aren't huge. In fact, scattered gentlemen farms with no hunting is one of the reasons northern Williamson County produces so many huge bucks. All that agriculture growing in some of the best soils in the state, and many small sanctuaries (no hunting properties) that allow deer to evade hunters means more large-antlered mature bucks.

Now if everybody stopped killing deer the population would grow to the biological carrying capacity. At that point, the habitat would be devastated, as deer would have eaten everything they can reach that they can digest. Deer health would be so poor that fawn production would virtually cease. Just enough fawns would survive to replace the adult deer that would die every year from malnutrition-related illness. The deer population would go through repeated crash and boom cycles, with each boom being smaller and smaller as most primary deer foods were eaten into extinction.

I've seen these conditions in numerous locations (state and national parks, islands, large industrial properties), and the results are not pretty. Deer don't go extinct, but they become very small in body and antler as they have so few quality food resources. Disease is rampant in the population as low-quality foods suppress the populations immunities.

Do you think that after the the population tipped over the carrying capacity that the coyotes would bring the herd back in check? I can see how basically the deer would eat themselves out of good health. With does delivering less fawns and the overall poor health of the herd making them easy picking don't you think the coyotes would really start making a dent in the population? Picking off the weaker deer meaning only the biggest strongest smartest deer were left to do all the breeding.Wouldn't that in a round about way make the herd stronger in the end? I guess what I'm trying to convey is a buffalo theory type scenario.

 

[muddyboots]

I had a guy tell me one time "If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough." I completely dis-agree with him now. You can kill too many, and it wont take you long to figure it out when you do. With that being said, the majority of the guys that I know that consistently kill big bucks in KY (bucks that score over 150") will tell you they have tons of does on their property. I have a friend who sees 30+ does on any given day on his property, he and his dad kill big bucks each year like clock work. Obviously, their area has the carrying capacity for this many deer. All areas are not equal. The bucks are gonna be where the does are come Nov.

This. Roost says it better than I did. I get tickled at the guys on my other lease when they say we never see any big bucks as they drive out with a doe in the back of there truck. Roost and I agree on something lol

 

[Headhunter]

I had a guy tell me one time "If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough." I completely dis-agree with him now. You can kill too many, and it wont take you long to figure it out when you do. With that being said, the majority of the guys that I know that consistently kill big bucks in KY (bucks that score over 150") will tell you they have tons of does on their property. I have a friend who sees 30+ does on any given day on his property, he and his dad kill big bucks each year like clock work. Obviously, their area has the carrying capacity for this many deer. All areas are not equal. The bucks are gonna be where the does are come Nov.

This. Roost says it better than I did. I get tickled at the guys on my other lease when they say we never see any big bucks as they drive out with a doe in the back of there truck. Roost and I agree on something lol

I disagree. From my experience, and yes you can for sure kill to many, but killing does is one of the best ways to see more bucks and especially better bucks. I have several years experience helping a couple farm owners cull does. I do not kill bucks and do not care to on either property, but I help kill momma does and if you talk to either one they will tell you one of the best things they do is keep the does in check. With that said they cut back on killing does every so often (they have quality biologist helping them out), some years they do not kill any does at all, but they for sure control their doe population to the best of their ability and they both never want the days of seeing 30, 40 or 50+ does everyday on their properties.

 

[Roost 1]

So, what class of bucks are they killing? Sounds like to me they still got plenty of does, which was my point exactly..

 

[Headhunter]

So, what class of bucks are they killing? Sounds like to me they still got plenty of does, which was my point exactly..

They kill many does, almost to many even IMO, and only back off when the biologist tells them to, I have seen years where they killed more than you would even think are on the land much less leave any.

The bucks they are killing are way better than average. 130, 140, 150 and up and every so often a great buck. One of these is in a so called area that "bucks can't grow that big because of soil, genetics, etc.".

 

[BSK]

In theory, killing does, balancing the sex ratio, and enhancing the rut all sound like a winning proposition... and it can be. I question how much is enough and I know that can be site specific. I can only speak of where I hunt. After 10 years of killing 3-4 times as many does/year as bucks it stands to reason that you're going to eventually reach that "ideal" balance. It also stands to reason that beyond that you're going to be tipping the scales in the opposite direction. Contrary to our club sightings records I believe that's where we are now. It's hard to argue with success in that we continue to maintain that yearly average but I really think our sightings records are restrictive and relative to individual sightings. For instance, a couple of hunters hunting a specific area both morning and afternoon for 1 solid week (5 days) may each see the same doe family group of 8 on both daily hunts all week long. Their sightings would record a total of 160 does and fawns sighted when in reality, only 8 individuals were seen. Meanwhile, a couple of other hunters in other areas during the same time frame may only see a total of 20 individual deer. That's a 180 count for 28 deer. Now we have too many does. Hammer them!

You're going to get two somewhat conflicting answers from me Mike:

Yes, the same group of does seen over and over again get recorded in observation data as many does. But the same fork-horn yearling buck that everybody hunting the area sees also gets recorded multiple times as a buck, hence the two sets of repeat sightings--the repeat sightings of the same doe group and the repeat sighting of the same yearling buck--cancel each other out and the ratio numbers stay the same.

That said, I no longer use observation data for anything pertaining to biology. Deer observation rates by hunters are a measure of hunter satisfaction, and that's all. THEY VERY OFTEN DO NOT CORRELATE TO DEER POPULATIONS OR HERD STRUCTURE. Time and again I've got very solid camera census data that clearly indicates a stable population or herd structure number, yet hunter observation data is all over the place. Or worse yet, I've seen many instances of hunter observations of a particular herd data point that are trending the complete opposite direction of real-world data. I no longer recommend hunters use hunter observation data to calculate anything but their own hunting experiences.

 

[BSK]

dirtyhands, Crosshairy, and Os2 Outdoors,

Here's the problem with the idea that predator populations would increase to control the number of deer: It doesn't happen. Deer were astoundingly over-populated in the Deep South back in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Predator numbers didn't "control" those exploding deer populations, even though those areas were loaded with bobcat and coyotes.

And here's the reason why. We've all been taught that predators control the number of prey animals. And we've been taught that the reason we need to hunt is to control deer numbers because we eliminated all of their "natural" predators, hence we have to take on the role of the predators. Problem is, neither of those ideas are true. After years and years of study the relationship between wolves and moose on Isle Royal in MI, and big cat populations versus prey animal numbers in Africa, researchers finally realized why they couldn't make the predicted predator-prey numbers match up. They wouldn't match up because predators DON'T control the number of prey animals. It's actually the opposite. The number of prey animals controls the number of predators. Everything comes down to food. All species are controlled by their resources, especially food. The number of moose on Isle Royal were not controlled by the wolf population. They were controlled by the earliest frost date. That first frost date determined how much of a critical food resource there would be going into the winter, and that controlled the moose population (an early frost killed the food source, reduce its abundance during the winter, which decreased moose health, which increased malnutrition-related mortality). In turn, moose were the food source of wolves, and when moose populations declined, wolf populations declined with a one year lag time. When late frost dates increased the amount of critical food sources going into winter, and moose over-winter survival rates increased, wolf populations increased (with a one year lag time) because there was more food (more moose to eat, increasing young production, survival and ultimately adult population). The same relationships were found in Africa. Seasonal rains, which control plant growth rates, turned out to be the determining factor in prey species populations, not predator numbers. Poor rains mean less food which in turn means declining prey numbers. Declining prey numbers in turn means declining predator numbers the following year. Good seasonal rains increased prey numbers which in turn produced a boom in predator numbers the following year. The number of prey animals controls predator numbers. Predator numbers do not control prey numbers.

 

[BSK]

I had a guy tell me one time "If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough." I completely dis-agree with him now. You can kill too many, and it wont take you long to figure it out when you do. With that being said, the majority of the guys that I know that consistently kill big bucks in KY (bucks that score over 150") will tell you they have tons of does on their property. I have a friend who sees 30+ does on any given day on his property, he and his dad kill big bucks each year like clock work. Obviously, their area has the carrying capacity for this many deer. All areas are not equal. The bucks are gonna be where the does are come Nov.

Roost 1,

Good deer management is always site specific. It would absolutely NOT be true to say that hunters have to kill a lot of does to have big bucks. Everything comes down to food resources. If you have 100 deer per square mile, but the land can feed 200 deer per square mile, than no doe killing would be needed to grow big bucks. But at the same time, it's also absolutely wrong to assume you need lots of doe to grow big bucks. Those properties in KY you talk about would grow 150 bucks whether they had 10 does or 100 does (as long as 100 does isn't close to the carrying capacity). I grow 150-class bucks on my place and we regularly have a sex ratio favoring bucks (considerably more bucks than does).

That said, I do agree that ""If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough" can be VERY wrong statement in many situations. In a discussion I was having on another site, I began to list all of the wildlife management mistakes I've seen in the past, some of which I was deeply involved in (and guilty of promoting). However, many of these mistakes were made due to either insufficient data at the time, or the actually weren't mistakes at the time but BECAME mistakes with time. Heavy doe harvests are one of those mistakes. To keep from having to rewrite that discourse, I'll just cut and paste it here. My comments:

"Back in the early days of QDM research, numerous research groups experimented with doe harvests. Everyone was trying to figure out what the right amount of doe harvests were for individual properties. These studies were primarily conducted in over-populated areas, and these areas were over-populated because NOBODY was shooting does. In this situation, numerous research groups all found that you literally couldn't shoot too many does. Even if the doe population on the research project were nearly shot out of existence, all of the excess does on the surrounding properties filtered into the population gap and filled the density back up by the following year. Thus began talk of the 'doe sink' problem. If your neighbors aren't shooting does, and does are over-populated in the area, you simply can't over-shoot them on your property. The neighbors' does will just fill in any gaps in population you create on your property.

But here again, because of early strong resistance to new ideas, we completely underestimated how fast hunters would accept and practice the methods of modern deer management. Within just a decade, many hunters began shooting does, and LOTS of them! And remember the doe sink conditions occur only if your neighbors are NOT shooting does. If they do start shooting does, there is no excess population to fill in the gaps on your property, and if you continue to hammer does, you can knock your population down in VERY short order! We DEFINITELY failed to see that rapid change in hunter behavior coming, and some serious harm was done to individual managed properties before we realized what the problem was."

Now I still see doe sink problems in TN on individual properties. However, so many hunters have embraced killing does that doe sink problems are become far more rare than they used to be. AT THE TIME, "you can't kill too many does" was accurate. However, conditions have changed. Now with most hunters willing to shoot does, and doing so, you absolutely CAN shoot too many does, and produce some serious harm in the process. EVERYTHING is site specific.

 

[deadeye 77]

I was once told that a doe is a doe is a doe when thinking the herd.some people say to take out the alpha does and some say to leave them and work on the younger ones what do y'all think.

 

[deerhunter10]

I had a guy tell me one time "If you killed every doe you saw, it wouldn't be enough." I completely dis-agree with him now. You can kill too many, and it wont take you long to figure it out when you do. With that being said, the majority of the guys that I know that consistently kill big bucks in KY (bucks that score over 150") will tell you they have tons of does on their property. I have a friend who sees 30+ does on any given day on his property, he and his dad kill big bucks each year like clock work. Obviously, their area has the carrying capacity for this many deer. All areas are not equal. The bucks are gonna be where the does are come Nov.

This we do kill does but not that many. We are consistent with killing big deer year in and year out now we are not killing 150's but consistent in kill good deer in the 120-140's and we see several does every sit. Were we are lacking in deer sightings is behind the house close to public land where if its brown its down deer numbers are low very low for the area. Turkey numbers as well. But our other farms. We have a decent deer density and it seems to help but we also have a ton of food water and bedding for them and even more food. But we don't kill 5-20 does a year off of it just a couple and it seems to work good for Us. We also take then during bow season. We haven't killed a doe with a gun in several years. Except for kids we when take them we let then have fun and make the decisions

 

[BSK]

I was once told that a doe is a doe is a doe when thinking the herd.some people say to take out the alpha does and some say to leave them and work on the younger ones what do y'all think.

In theory, reasons exist for targeting particular age-classes of females. However, I really don't think most hunters have as much control over their local deer population as they think they do. For that reason, I wouldn't worry about it. If you need to reduce or control the female population, then a female is a female.