Man there’s some jacked up harvest strategies in here. But as Wild Bill says, “It works for us.”😂
Matt what do you think about killing does after the rut in that February extension vs at the beginning of the season?
It’s very difficult to kill does late in the season, if you’re after a target number or quota. More often than not, you’ll come up short. Kill them as soon as you legally can, and anywhere you can, then coast through the season with no pressure, hunt your rut with fewer does (so much more fun to actually see intense rutting behavior), and you’ve removed those mouths consuming resources, yes. People don’t understand the stress placed on bucks when they have to breed does hitting estrus for 2-3 cycles. It actually places stress on the entire herd, and not just the bucks. They need a narrow breeding window so they can get back to food consumption to recover for the following season. Antler growth and body condition is a direct reflection of breeding stress and duration. Improving habitat, correcting sex ratios and keeping populations below a level where they’re competing for high quality food has tremendous benefits for deer and for hunters. I’ve got several properties where does are killed on plots and around feeders early, and then it’s over. Guess what? They kill the piss out of mature bucks on plots and feeders too, because they have a break between the doe harvests and rut, given the plots zero pressure until it’s time to go kill a buck being silly. Killing a doe or two off each plot a season is NOT pressure. Sitting on a plot 3x a week and never pulling the trigger, yet busting deer every time you climb down to walk out, is. That has way more impact on deer usage in daylight than killing a doe or two. People confuse the two. You can bust does on food plots every year, hit your harvest quota, and place less pressure on a property, than hunting the fool out of the plots each week and killing your does in the “woods” away from plots. Presence is pressure. Not trigger pulling.
