Originally Posted by mman
Originally Posted by abolt300
Originally Posted by mman
Originally Posted by mike35549
That sounds about right. When you start putting actuall numbers to this it makes you realize why you see so few 4+ year old deer compared to 1-2 year olds. The answer to what happen to all those young deer I let go last year is they are dead. That is one reason it is very hard for a club to go from a 6 or 8 point or better club to a only kill 4 or 5 year old bucks. The pool of bucks you are able to kill shrinks dramatically, and most people can't deal with only killing a buck every 2-3 years. But if you have a piece of property big enough to hold 90 bucks but have only 10 or so mature deer out of those 90 it don't give you very many opportunities to kill a buck.


That's exactly right!!! Especially when you are paying 2000+ for a club, it's difficult not to shoot something.


Perfect example. That mentality right there ^^^, along with the 90+ days of gun hunting, coupled with all the "meat hunting" that goes on in Alabama is why we do not have very many older age class bucks in our herd. It's really easy not to shoot something. Sometimes I may go 3 years without killing a buck. Not because I didnt have 15-20 chances each year to kill a good rack buck but because I was specifically hunting older mature deer and usually one or two specific bucks.


In a season I may see up to 25 bucks that I think are 3 1/2. Of course I see a LOT more of 2 1/2 and younger. I don't see that many 4 1/2+ deer. I don't know if their patterns change, they become totally nocturnal or what, but often I don't even get them on camera. They seem to often disappear after 3 1/2. We (me and a few others) try to shoot mature deer but a lot of even 2 1/2 year old deer will meet our standards. While I pass up deer that I think are 3 1/2 or younger, it is tough when the next guy doesn't.

I guess we try to have a balance between seldom shooting anything and killing a few. Every year, we have a couple really good deer killed and everything else, in my opinion, is marginal. We also have some older class bucks that are killed that aren't that impressive, as far as the rack is concerned.

The older I get the more I am concerned about enjoying the hunt. If that means killing a buck in the heat of the moment, that is hot on the trail of a doe, then so be it. I also enjoy watching deer and am usually very slow to pull the trigger. Whatever the case it, the simple fact is that not many bucks make it to 5 1/2+ and those that do didn't get there by being careless.


You don't see those good 2.5 - 3.5 year old bucks the next season because a large % of them just die before next year gets here.

If you're gonna be stupid you better be tough.