Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Serious Deer Talk Forum Safe to shoot Doe Deer - Fawns will live

Right or wrong my thinking also.

Might go ahead and take both if need be if no spots. Just hope the neighbors don't shoot everything too. I harvested a yearling that weighed about 60 pounds one year and found out small deer just was to much work with little reward meat wise for me.

They sure are tender though

When you drag a deer, you might give an extra strong heave on the strap to get it started moving. If when you do that, it almost knocks you down, it was too small to shoot.

I was hunting with a fella one time shot both doe and young one. After making the appropriate udder and milk jokes, offered to drag the little. He went to put a strap on it. I said don't bother and reached down for a leg as I walked past and kept on walking. He said I didn't have to do it like that.

I about lost myself access to a place when the landowner showed me the one he was proud of as a bow kill. I handed his strap back and threw it over my shoulder. I guess I was supposed to pantomime it was heavier?

I shoot small deer here at the house. They eat good and dead ones don't stand around in the road for my wife to hit. But I do have a skinning rack set up. And I've always enjoyed cleaning deer. It's a sport for men.

First year in my club, a dude shoots a "doe" off a greenfield. He was sitting there with his son who was having a fit about it. Same "doe" I wouldn't let my son shoot. It weighed 37 pounds. Being aggressive about shooting doe's creates a "brown and down" situation. People end up shooting buttons and short spikes, and you don't know what those deer could have been.

If you are covered up with doe's, I get it. The problem is when you take the position you need to kill doe's, people end up killing buttons and spikes. It's really tough to tell at 100 yards in the last 15 minutes of legal shooting light if you are killing a doe, or a short spike. How many people do you think honestly list a short spike they thought was a doe as an antlered deer on their harvest record? I have a nice 4 year old buck running around on my lease. He's alive because he wasn't mistakenly shot as a "doe". He is easily the best looking buck I have gotten a pic of since I was on the lease in 2018.

Just food for thought.

It's true that they can be hard to ID. I've told more than one club president that if he wanted my crew to shoot more does, then he's going to see some dead buttons. Some of us can swing alpha glass but few to none can do it for an entire family. One club I'm in currently, he complains about lack of does shot and also discourages teens sitting by themselves; hamstringing the bringing up of his most likely doe shooters.The which is why mine prefer to hunt the lesser properties we have access to. I think this is another facet of how antler farming gums up the works.

I guess you have to answer the question of whether your property is large enough that those buttons and spikes won't leave you entirely.

If you got plenty of deer it dont really matter if you do kill a few buttons . Most aint staying there no way .

If you thin wisely you won't kill many yearling bucks or short spikes .

Its not difficult to identify a mature doe from a yearling button buck...

Don't know what you consider a yearling buck??




Will be between a yearling button buck and a yearling doe .


A year old buck and a doe is too.

No it's not if your hunters are educated. It is more difficult to judge a lone deer in a field or in the woods at distance though. I had to learn this myself, and then teach my kids.

I have been in clubs where the Prez busts illegal deer. Be it bucks to small, or this little bitty 40 pound fawns that just lost their spots. They are real remorseful, but they continue to to do it. Or where clubs say you can't shoot a doe off a greenfield, and everyone goes "as soon as it steps off the greenfield, I am hammering it".

Then they complain they never see any bucks. The problem is people shoot every doe that walks out on a greenfield. If you are covered up with them, I get it, but when you have a timber co lease, can't do habitat improvement, have a limited amount of acreage you can plant, and you can't bait, plus Yotes, wholesale doe slaughter is the path to never seeing deer in a couple years, in my opinion.

The 90-100 pound "doe" walking through the woods or into a field by themselves ain't a doe. This is simply just understanding deer behavior but I've known people who NEVER get this and shot button bucks every year.

There are physical characteristics that distinguish a 100 lb doe from a 100 lb button buck that are easily learned.

No better way to thin future bucks from the herd... smh

There are often solo does in the woods/plots, fawn mortality and depredation cause that.

In the areas I've hunted in Alabama, that lone doe will be a button buck 9 out of 10 times. Watch them for a little while and you'll see the differences. Its just best to not shoot that loner and wait for a mama with little ones to walk by before squeezing the trigger.

There was a guy in our hunting club when I was young that shot a button buck 4 years in a row thinking it was a doe. I helped him drag one out and he told me he'd never actually shot a doe, they always ended up being buttons. People in the club were getting tired of this and on the fourth one he tried to cover it up and got caught. Finally gave the club leaders a good reason to kick him out.

AU338MAG,,,, you right, that lone doe or the first one out in the green field is a good bet a spike.


The biggest doe in a group of does will be a buck too most times .


Don't matter how hard you try if you thinning does you gonna kill a yearling buck once in awhile .

Doe Rules :
Never shoot a Doe at long range.
Never shoot a Doe that is alone.
Never shoot a Doe in low light.
Never shoot a Doe when rushed.

If you follow this, you can avoid Buttons. The tufts of hair around their Buttons are a different color. You must be able to really examine their forehead with magnification.

What gets me is the fact that people are doing their best to not shoot a button, because it is a future buck but have no issues killing the doe that can produce the bucks.

cause ,,,,, theres no issues to be had !!!!