I am not new to hunting. I have been hunting since I was in my teens. I like to shoot enough deer to have a freezer full. I am savvy enough to know 2 mature bucks give way more meat than 4 doe's. I will agree to your point about it is probably healthier for multiple bucks to breed doe's, but that doesn't correct the issue I still say exists. Which is the way the limits are, the state has diminshed the doe herd significantly. And since they have capped the number of bucks a person can kill, they have created a scenario where there are now more bucks in the state than doe's. I realize my lease doesn't represent the entire state, but let's just say for the sake of discussion, it does.
I am saying what I say based upon a certain set of data. For instance, I know the deer denisity in shelby co is lower than other parts of the state. Our range based upon what I have been able to see is 30 to 60 deer per square mile. I think if I was at 60, I wouldn't be saying a word, that would give me a pool of nearly 100 deer to shoot from. But at 30, I am really closer to 50 deer. Say 5 are mature bucks. Even at a 1 to 1 ratio, I only have 25 doe's on my lease. If I have 25, killing some wouldn't be a big deal. We killed 5 or 6 this year. Most of the doe's I see have twins too.
See where I am going? If I had 25 doe's, and 20 survived and are bred, then theoretically, I should add 10 more doe fawns this year if they just have 1, more if there are twins. Yes I know coyotes will get some. But I think with the low kill ratio, I should be seeing more of them, but I am not. So what I am saying is I have more bucks than doe's, and shooting any doe seems to negatively impact the herd. But if I took out some immature bucks for a year or maybe 2, that should give the doe's a chance to bounce back, especially if we aren't killing any. Then when I have a better ratio, we pass on the immature bucks and limit the doe kills for the next 2 years.
I have put alot into this lease. And I think it just needs to be managed a little differently. Yes less pressure. Yes we probably don't need to shoot a doe next season and see what happens. But I also think I need to get rid of some of the deer herd that isn't going to benefit me greatly. And I see shooting some of the immature bucks as a faster way to rebalance the herd. What no one has been able to say is why that isn't a good idea. Aside from the fact I would be taking a buck out of the mix that could turn into a nice one down the road. It could also turn into a cow horn spike, or a car fatality.
Let's say I have 50 deer, and 30 are bucks. We killed 2. And 6 doe's. If all the remaining doe's are bred, and they have 1 fawn at a 5050 ratio, which is what will happen, my total doe population only increases by 1. Assuming no predation. My buck population goes up by 5. So now I have 21 doe's and 35 bucks. That is what I think has happened. Only I think it has gone on longer than 1 year. I think its been a slow gradual shift from having more doe's than bucks to now having more bucks. Caused by the liberal doe harvest and restricted buck harvest. And in my case, even if we don't shoot a doe, there is only a 50% chance that doe will have a female fawn, so while my doe numbers will go up, so will my buck numbers. That is the rationale I have for wanting to take out some immature bucks for a year or two. It gets the ratio back inlime with something that can be managed better.
