The same approach that CNC has to natural vegetation management also applies to natural herd management. The only way to be overrun with does is if the bucks are dead. That's just how it works. In the absence of human intervention there would be the correct balance. Using your trigger finger to manage a deer population is the same mentality to me..... as tillage is to CNC. You have been told your whole life that you need to kill some of those pesky does because you've got "too many".

To me that's nothing but a load of BS. If you want more bucks you gotta figure out how they are dying. Because they are dying at a faster rate than the does. Simple as that. We have been blasting does so long that people deer hunt like we use to rabbit hunt and it's gotten us NOWHERE. I hear the exact same tune today as we heard 20 years ago. Need to kill some of these does, blah, blah. Show me the improvement that has made somewhere. The average buck's age class killed in this state is still probably a 2.5 year old just like it was in 1990.


I would say the bucks are just not at your feeder. They will show up shortly I would imagine. Most are going to be 2.5 year olds. A 5 year old buck in Alabama is just a little more common than finding Bigfoot.