The good thing I guess is with fewer and fewer people hunting around here eventually the deer population will recover
And there is a lot less illegal deer hunting of all types. No more night hunting or shooting from the road with nothing to shoot at. What I thought I would see with a lower population would be larger bucks. I can't say about body weights because we never weighed them in the past but they appear about the same. Antler size has shown no significant change.
We have been weighing and pulling jawbones on our deer for over 20 years. The net result of having a lot less deer is having a lot less deer lol, but seriously the body weights are up slightly, but as far as bucks just a lot less them killed while the antler size has stayed the same. The deer in South Alabama were never held back from a lack of food with the mild winters there has always been plenty of browse for the deer. So without nutrition being a limiting factor it was basically genetics and age hence any South Alabama lease that already had trigger control on their bucks then the liberal doe harvest that was pushed by the State and biologists only served as a detriment to the hunting experience with zero upside.......hindsight is 20/20.
