Do you have a visible browse line on your native vegetation? All greenbriar nipped off, all honeysuckle eaten up to about 5-6 ft high, all preferred deer foods pretty much heavily browsed or gone? If not, you probably don’t have too many. If you do, you need to kill some does. Food plots are supposed to be preferred foods and draw deer to them. They are supposed to be eaten down, that’s the whole point. What’s happening with your natural vegetation is a far better indicator.

I haven't seen anyone mention our extremely dry summer and fall as a possible contributor to this as well. I have a small plot of brassica's and they were being hammered, but now, the deer have eased off them a bit. They are wearing out the cereal rye and winter wheat that is coming up though.


If they have consumed alot of the browse in the woods, they are going to pound a food plot. I wish I had a 5 acre field to plant on my lease.

Killem all!

Here's what it boils down to….Depending on soil fertility, 1 acre of food plot will produce “X” amount of forage……which will only support “Y” amount of deer…….That “Y” number really has no relation to what the carrying capacity of the land around that 1 acre will support……Just to put an arbitrary number in the equation……The land may easily support 100 deer while the 1 acre plot can only feed 5……Unless you’re talking about HUGE plantings, of which very few people do, then you’re not using good information if you use food plots as an indicator of too many deer. Its just something that’s good for show and tell…… and a reason for someone to shoot a bunch of deer and call it “managing”.

That’s a good point CNC. Add roving sounders of hogs to the mix and it gets real complicated as 5-6 medium pigs can do a two weeks worth of feeding in the average plot overnight. I currently have 4 resident does that stay tight to my personal property and are regulars in my little plots. They make their living in the abundant forage around the adjoining properties and I’m always looking to increase the browse availability. I have several bucks as well from October through early March but they are conspicuously absent the rest of the year. I’ll occasionally get one in a plot but it’s uncommon. They don’t come to the feeders much either. They are just passing through. There are a few other does that occasionally hit the plots but they mostly cross our property N/S and miss the plantings. It’s the ones that make a long E/W loop that I see regularly in the field.

There’s a ton of does around here

Where is your place at Lauderdale or Colbert. I imagine y’all had a good acorn crop too. Everywhere I’ve looked acorns have been a plenty.

Very few years have I seen the acorn production I’m seeing now.

Worst crop down here I've ever seen

It’s the biggest crop o ever seen. Especially on Choccolocco.

This is the assumption I have tended to operate on, which is one of the reasons I like to put lime out and plant just about any plantable ground I can. My thought process being I am providing forage that is able to pull nutrients out of the soil and thus is higher quality than the native vegetation. I am not sure that plan is the best plan for deer movement, however. I am limited on plot size by the timber co, they just aren't going to knock down 5 acres of trees and let me plant a food plot on it. Depending on what I plant, I can get a lot of traffic in it, whitetail clover is a good one. Deer that feed in my plots that are heavy with Whitetail clover often spend an hour or more in the field at a time and they usually visit it more than 1 time a day.

I keep the majority of my cell cams on green fields on my lease. I do that to monitor traffic on them. What I don't have happening yet is multiple deer on all the fields I have monitored at the same time, which tells me I don't have a boat load of deer. Some of my plots get pounded, and what I have noticed is any plot that has dark black or brown soil, whatever grows in it, the deer seem to prefer over what is growing in the of the plot.

I had 8 deer out in a new plot we just did this year, which is the most I have seen at any one time in a field. It's across from a pine thicket, so I suspect as the field fills in, it will get more traffic because of its location. My norm is to see 3 to 5 deer in a field. Anytime I see 6 or more, that makes me happy.

Too many deer or too few food plot acres. The first pics could simply be the results of drought. The summer planting of beans is also irrelevant. In my experience, even with a well balanced deer herd for the habitat, you can't grow beans in small fields. They all get eaten, even in low deer density areas. As abolt said "Do you have a visible browse line on your native vegetation? All greenbriar nipped off, all honeysuckle eaten up to about 5-6 ft high, all preferred deer foods pretty much heavily browsed or gone? If not, you probably don’t have too many. If you do, you need to kill some does. Food plots are supposed to be preferred foods and draw deer to them. They are supposed to be eaten down, that’s the whole point. What’s happening with your natural vegetation is a far better indicator." Food plot browse is a poor indicator of deer density.

It’s not about deer deer just getting by, it’s about managing populations and habitat so that each deer can have an abundance.

The ideal scenario is for does to never be nutritionally stressed at any point of the year (especially when lactating), bucks to have abundant nutrients to recover after the rut and plenty of protein/minerals to grow antlers, fawns to not be nutritionally stressed (especially ours that are born in late summer stress period).

In situations like I posted above, there is definitely stress on the whole heard in the two nutritional stress periods and in more severe cases, year around. Similarly, many bucks in areas of too high deer numbers and/or bad habitat, may not even be fully recovered from the rut when they start growing their next set of antlers. It’s not about having as many deer on your property as possible, it’s about having the healthiest herd and biggest bucks. Stress plays a much larger part in antler growth than most realize.

Put the kool-aid down man and back away slowly........

Some of our does look very poor. Had one in the field with ribs showing but her fawn had a pot belly. I will shoot a few like every year but I’m the only one that’ll shoot does in our crowd. People should try not shooting immature bucks.

Ask yourself, are chances better of growing healthier, bigger bucks higher in…

1. An area with high competition for resources and more stress
2. An area with low competition for resources and less stress

Also, will your rut be as intense and prime for hunting in…

1. An area with a too many does and heavily skewed sex ratios
2. An area with a healthy amount of does and balanced sex ratios

Also, will your bucks be healthier/more likely to thrive in…

1. An area with skewed sex ratios wherein some does don’t get bred on their first cycle and effectively cause an additional chase phase, greatly increasing the rut stress on bucks
2. An area with balanced sex ratios wherein all does get bred on their first cycle thus avoiding additional stress on bucks

We’re in Winston. Very healthy acorn crop this year for sure.

Which part of the county?

I’ve said too much lol. Can’t be giving too much detail for any possible ALDEER outlaws to exploit.

Sounds complicated

And all based off food plots getting eaten like they’re designed to do.

I’m just kidding. What do you estimate your deer per square mile to be? 80? 100?

Large swaths of Bama have closer to 10 or 20.