This isnt meant to be about the QDMA……its just a comparison of two different harvest methods.

I think the age based system that has been engrained in our hunting community hasn’t really been that great for promoting proper age structure in our herd. I think we would have been for better off if everyone would have stuck to score or “big bucks” as being how hunters defined a trophy….. like it was back in the day before QDM redefined it. Everyone was fine with it until they were taught to believe differently.

The result has been that even the most strict management we have these days shoots any buck 4 years old or older…..which in most cases from what I’ve seen, results in a bunch of 3 year olds getting killed as well. You don’t really end up with any kind of true age structure…..You mostly just shift the kill a little bit from 2 year olds to 3 year olds or something of that nature.

We would have better age structure if all of these same folks that are shooting for age were shooting for score……100% of the bucks in the herd have the potential to reach 4 years old……there’s a only a portion of them that have the potential to reach 115 or 120…..125…..etc…..If you’re shooting for score then you’re letting a lot of bucks walk and get older……not so with age based harvesting. On a state level, everyone shooting bucks by an age based system is just ensuring that few will make it past 3-4 to have any kind of real age structure…….From the standpoint of age structure we’d be better off with state full of a bunch of 5,6,7, 8 year old “culls” versus the way we have it now.

I like a combination of the 2. I don’t mind letting inferior older bucks live as long as they are not a known bully. I will say that I was in a club for awhile that had a goal of shooting every 4+ year old buck you could up to a 3 buck per member limit. And based on camera pics, we weren’t able to kill anywhere close to all of them. And after the first year of applying this rule, they pretty much stopped the 3 year old oopsies. Bucks were anywhere from 4-8 years old.

Same thing at my brother in laws place. They shoot any 4 year old buck and they still kill plenty of 5-8 year olds every year.

I usually judge mine by how many spots they have. The more the better

Yep!! Axis is way better then whitetail anyway.

Bucks or does
Big horns, small horns, no horns or unicorns
Does not matter.
To the freezer it goes.

I generally shoot the unlucky sonofa gun that steps out when my finger goes to itching. Sometimes ihave restraint. Sometimes the bloodlust is more than i can handle. No desire whatsoever to shoot a doe though, that just dont do it for me.

antler size is a stupid way to age bucks.

The short answer is all you can do is have antler point limits.

Nobody on here can tell the difference between a 4 year old and a 2.5 year old. I mean C'mon Man. Being serious. They can't.

You say now Goat... you can't make a statement like that. BS I can't. Ever been to the deer processor during hunting season? I have. Kid hunting with me has the biggest deer in there dead or ready to pick up....

TRUTH.

1/2 people here can't shoot either.... that's another train car load of dumbassery we can discuss elsewhere.

I dont think that there is anything wrong with age based harvesting. Once bucks get to be 4 yrs old and beyond, they become fairly hard to kill during legal shooting hours. Rare is the situation where you can overharvest fully mature bucks or shoot out an entire age class of mature bucks. More die from old age, injury and sickness than hunter's weapons once they get past 4. At least in Alabama.

I also dont think that there is anything at all wrong with harvesting bucks from all age classes in a heavily managed environment and if it is done in moderation. One where you know what you have and what and how many from each age class are actually being harvested and how many you are carrying forward in each age class.

I'm 100% against harvesting by score. Harvesting by score leads to high grading and removing your best genetics from your herd at ages 2 and 3 when they are producing some very good headgear for their age but still young, dumb and easily killable and haven't gotten "mature smart" yet. It's exceptionally easy to overharvest the younger age classes of 1-3 yr old bucks. They are very visible and very easy to kill and that's why very few bucks make it into the older age classes in AL. Goes back to that lack of trigger restraint and the "might as well kill that pretty rack deer because if I dont kill that rack buck, my neighbor will, plus I can brag to my buddies that I killed an 8 pt last weekend" that we discuss so often on here.

This and if you can't tell the difference in a 2.5yo and 4.5yo buck you will never maximize your potential

How you manage harvest is entirely dependent on objectives. There’s no wrong way, unless it’s not objective based, then there’s lots of wrong ways.

For most applications with multiple members a minimum beam or inside spread limit is likely the best way.

Or, you can decide not to harvest more than 20-30% of each age class, in all age classes, ensuring recruitment across the board.

In trophy management, which is rarely practiced, it takes an age based approach AND selective harvest of certain bucks in younger age classes, to work like it should. Most folks are not agreeable to what this takes and either give up or never commit from the beginning.

Our guys can. It’s really not THAT hard. Some will make mistakes but most can tell the difference. Every once in awhile a 3 year old will die but it does cut out ALL 2 year olds. Some bucks we don’t have a history with we think are younger than they are though. Killed a few we thought to be 4 but the cementum aging had them older.

Just curious, what young bucks do you select and why?

This method really works best on areas with limited ingress and egress. It could be islands, geographically isolated properties, LARGE free range properties and enclosures. If you’re trying to get bucks to the upper age classes, like 6-8 years old, then you simply can’t allow all of them to get there without an extraordinary amount of social stress and competition. Usually selecting deer at younger age classes in the lower 1/2 of antler development is what is done. It removes mouths, competition, stress and allows deer in the upper percentile from each age class to thrive. Most folks will not successfully do this because they can’t buy in fully and it takes commitment. It’s pretty common in fenced properties, but works amazingly well on large cooperatives too.

Some of the best clubs I know of with the best hunting just shoot it if they want to mount it…….

What abolt said - if he gets to 5 - he ain't gonna b lining up to die - lucky if you kill him

I hav killed some old ones - but some got away. Had one on ckarke i finally did not see this year - would hav been 9-10. Had a 7 in camden - will be 8 next year if he made it

For my objectives - 4 plus is way to go and i leaning heavy to 5 - max potential starts. Had 2 stud 4 year olds n clarke - one of em i just spotted late this year - showed up lot last year. He would hav been hard not to shoot. The other i passed - if he would hav not lost long brow or broke a tine - been hard to pass him too!! Next year i would hav watched them both for 3 years - and next year at 5 - they likely mounters - if the neighbors dont get em under a street light!! 🤣🤣🤣

Got to remember - they dont wear name tags 😀

I think I'd add 125" plus or anything you want to mount.......None of this "he needed shooting" kinda stuff.....

That makes sense.

Using antler size/score can result in high grading. You can wind up killing the bucks with superior genes at a young age. We used to go by 8 pts or better and outside the ears. I killed a perfect 10 pt, great mass, long g2s and g3s, scored mid to upper 120's. Turned out he was a 140 lb 2 yr old. No doubt in my mind he could have topped 150 in a couple of years if he survived. A big if, but I guaranteed he wouldn't reach maturity when I pulled the trigger on him. That completely changed my way of thinking

😉