Isn't much better in North Marshall County @Fur

Exactly. I started shooting coyotes early season for the past five years instead of does.

Something that no one really talks about now but I believe they will in the future is the impact that coyotes have on deer behavior......It can be the same as applying hunting pressure from humans. Also something else that I think will get more attention especially from bowhunters is leaving your deer for several hours or overnight after a marginal shot........Its getting more and more common to go back and either find an eaten carcass or worse find where the coyotes got the deer up out of its bed it was gonna die in and started chasing it.........For both of these reasons if I were in a club or owned some land that was intensely managed......thinning the yotes out in late summer or early fall would be something I'd definitely consider.......

I shot a deer with a rifle in a club in bibb county. Saw blood coming out the opposite side as it ran off. Waited about 45 minutes and then got down and tracked it. Got within 20 yards and it took off. Went and got some tracking help, and we found it about 30 minutes later and the yotes had already been eating on it.

The best time to kill yotes is late spring, so you decrease the population during the time fawns are born. They will always repopulate but impacting their numbers then helps.

And I do not shoot any doe's with a spotted fawn. If I observe a doe with a fawn or fawns in a green field, and the fawns are eating in the field, then the doe is fair game.

I mentioned being naïve to the current situation in an earlier post and what I think will come of that will be a lot like our situation a decade or two ago when we thought we couldn’t kill too many does……..It’ll be another situation that slaps a lot of folks in the face before they see it coming…….

Now this is just my personal observations and theories but what I see happening is I see us in an evolutionary period of time where the southeastern coyote is learning how to pack up and impact the deer herd much more dramatically than this idea we’ve been debating over about merely fawn survival. Something to really keep in mind with this too is that when I say evolutionary change or evolutionary time period we have to start thinking in terms of 10 years really being nothing……We’re talking about a slow change over at minimum of a few decades or maybe a century or more to reach a point of equilibrium and even still then the coyote will remain a highly adaptive creature to any further change……..

So right now I believe we find ourselves in the early years of coyotes learning to pack up and target any deer they deem to be “the weak”… What you end up getting is basically a few dogs or packs here and there across the landscape learning the behavior out ahead of the rest of the population and having a disproportionate impact within the range where they exist than what others may be seeing where this behavior is not occurring. This is why I think some may be slapped in the face overnight at some point…..That dynamic in the coyote population may suddenly change within their particular area with one pack that uses their property……

A lot of this comes from the things I see while out tracking for folks……It’s a really common story for folks to tell me that while they were searching the night before that they had coyotes just going crazy in the direction where there deer ran……It never fails…..those tracks typically end up with no deer to be found or at best a carcass a good ways from where the deer was shot…….

One particular buck this happened on was a massive horned buck I tracked for a guy a couple years ago……He had shot it with a 300 mag and we would later find out that he hit way back in the hind quarter and the back of the guts…….The search led us 300 yards to a bed but no buck in it…….The guy tells me that the there was a pack of yotes going crazy in that same spot the night before……When we finally found his buck the next day and a lot of searching later…….it was just shy of 1200 yards away and not much left but hide and coyote poop.

This is where I think some trapping would really be beneficial in ways that we havent previously considered and I’ll even recant my past opinion on shooting random yotes as making an impact…….I think it could have a huge impact for some folks who are in the range of one of these packs by simply breaking it up……..keeping any coyotes that use the property constantly be new coyotes and young dogs, etc…….I think the worst case scenarios are where these packs figure it out and then go unchecked for several seasons and begin to basically start producing offspring that perpetuate the practice within a territory that they are very familiar with.

I also think there is some dynamic in this that is just like the wolf documentaries you see about Yellowstone and how the wolfs are very much individuals…….I think coyotes are likely not much different in this regard and therefore you may have some coyotes packs even amongst the ones who have figured it out that are worse than others…….This is why I say don’t be naïve and get complacent because I feel like its just a matter of time before everyone sees it happen…….Again though, were talking about nature’s time clock so this change may play out for a good while yet into the future.

There are a few cold hearted hunters here. I don't mind shooting a spotted fawn IF... IF it's a does and you NEED to harvest some does. But I'm not into killing mama and letting a spotted fawn face the elements alone. I would not hunt with you Globe or you'd be kicked out of any club I've ever been a part of. We don't disrespect our game.

The only real way to tell if it’s weaned is to shoot it and see if it has milk on its lips

I only shoot a doe with twins, no spots. I figure they'll still have company.
My daughter refuses to shoot a "momma".

Thats them ol nasty tender ones... I had a buddy at work would shoot the momma and go to that same tree and hunt them till they're spots fell off and shoot them too.... He'd kill the whole family....

Watch Facebook this weekend and you’ll see how many non weened fawns are alone and set up for a coyote buffet. Everybody will be running to post a picture of the first one they “ let the air out of” , “ got one for the freezer”. They’ll have hundreds of pictures of does with a full milk sack.

I just don't understand the fascination with killing does I shot one a few years ago hunting with a buddy and that's the last one I'll ever kill. I shot a pile of them when I was younger and thought that's what hunting was all about but with the way the deer population is headed I'd just as soon let them make more babies.

Its not fascination. It’s necessity. And it is what hunting is about. Killing deer. If the area being hunted can support it it’s not bad. I will never understand the mentality of frowning on someone for killing a doe. It blows my mind. I smile every time I do it because it’s fun, puts meat on the table and helps manage the sex ratio and population.

Where are you hunting where the population is trending downward? The areas I work and hunt its the opposite. We’ve seen deer explosion over the last decade.

Several years ago on opening weekend of bow season I had a big doe walking right toward my shooting lane, She stepped in at 20 yards and as I was drawing back a little spotted fawn came running up to her. I just sat back down. So glad I didn’t shoot her and then see that baby run up to its dead momma. Only way I’ll shoot a doe early season is if there are several grown ones together and no spotted.

If you had ever hunted an area that was fracked due to too many does being shot it would no longer blow your mind. I'm glad many people have recognized the error where I hunt and deer numbers are finally rebounding.

Ease on over to the national forest In oakmulgee and hunt for a few seasons you might develop a different perspective on this subject.

That’s a product of poor management and not having the knowledge of knowing when to quit. Killing does is not an evil or bad thing. It’s a critical part of deer hunting and population management that can be done wrong just as easily as it can be done right. Moderation is the key to successful deer management. There’s plenty of places that can support it, just like there’s others that don’t need it. I’ve seen places mismanaged before and it can take years to recover. The point of what I’m saying is all doe killing is not the problem here. It can be in some places. That’s why limited opportunity to kill does exist on some public lands and zones in the state. In others killing does is not hurting a thing.

Yes that is a product of poor management. We were all told by the state and QDMA crowd that we could never shoot too many does. People believed it, and so did I for a while, until about the second year of the season long doe season(around 2000?), when deer numbers dropped dramatically. Unfortunately it took another 10-15 years for others to recognized the problem. I find it hard to believe that there are places that "need" does to be shot left in Alabama. Maybe in small pockets, but not large areas. If you want to shoot a doe, and the population will support it where you are hunting, fine, shoot one. But don't pretend like you are helping anything by doing it. and telling others to do the same.