What do you think they would have concluded? I’m being genuinely curious as to your thoughts, because I had access to the entirety of the data, and the only thing it showed with consistency was that there are vast acreages in AL with an over harvest of bucks, leading to drawn out breeding dates that could easily be shortened with better herd management. Even in south AL with later breeding times, if second and third estrous cycles were removed from the data set, the majority of breeding takes place in January, not February. That’s not isolated to south AL. It’s also true anywhere there’s several does to bucks in the overall population. That’s why I was so opposed to Feb extension in North AL. It’s one of the worst management decisions deer managers could make. Let’s increase buck harvest, during the recovery period, oh, and add corn to as long as they’ll pay. Compounds the problem. It created a scenario that ensures sex ratios stay skewed heavily toward females. It’s so jacked up. Most states try to limit buck harvest when they’re most vulnerable. We opened the flood gates.

I’d like to remind folks, in case they’ve forgotten, that hunting isn’t supposed to be easy. As a society we have trained ourselves to expect ease, comfort, lack of effort, etc. Maybe we’ve forgotten that things worth having are worth working hard for. By making deer so easy to kill and extending the season so long I think we’ve devalued the resource and ppl take it for granted. I’ve heard it 1 million times, “But our bucks move well in February. The cameras let me know when they’re there so I’m not wasting time hunting when I shouldn’t. Small landowners don’t have a way to attract deer. We have to bait.” All those things are true. Indeed. And I’m a guilty part of the problem! But what have we to gain in any area of life by taking the easiest route? I think we’ve turned sportsmanship into a thing of the past. I know I’m ranting, but it’s all tied up in the reason I think we need good solid reproductive data, and a strong evaluation of what it tells us.