Just looking for a survey on if you prefer quality deer (Larger racks) when you hunt or if you could care less about the rack, and just cut the rack off, hang it next to the rest of them in the garage. I prefer quality myself I really wish I could get the neighbors on board but it seems to be a lost cause. They try but every year there are several small bucks and fawn bucks that are shoot. Very few make it to 3 1/2 or 4 1/2, any of you that prefer quailty have any suggestions please let me know what has worked for you.
Quality Deer or not?
- Thread starter streamer
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noharleyyet
Well-known member
QDM benefits everyone. Mature and older bucks grounded while keeping the doe/buck ratio in check works, it just isn't adhered to in my neck of the woods.
Gunner46
Well-known member
Pop a doe 1st (or 3)......then take some time to Hunt !
tarheel
Well-known member
Research here in NC has shown that this obsession with only harvesting trophy heads is detrimental to the overall health of the population and suggest harvesting more does and 2 1/2 & 3 1/2 year olds. If I can find the article I'll try to post a scan or at least quote more details in order to avoid some copyright issues.
bow hunter
New member
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- Dec 29, 2009
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my brother is persident of the central mississippi chapter of qdma. give him a call. his name is jay herrington. 601-291-7180
I'm from Minnesota and we all love to get are hands on a nice buck. But I feel that most MN hunters want to have meat ont the table rather than a nice rack on the wall. I've been told by the neighbors that a fork tastes just as good as a doe, true I say, but would you shoot the doe and pass on the fork thats following behind. I wish I could convence them that you can have both if you give it some time. Doe's are great eating and passing on those little ones each year will give these hunting partys a chance at a nice deer more often. How do I get them to try this for at least three years?
noharleyyet
Well-known member
....wish I knew.
bow hunter
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the way you just explained it sounds good to me. in my eyes, its common sense. they will never get big if they dont have a chance. we have a biologists come to our place every year and he does an assesment of what he thinks we need to kill. one lease we had back in mississippi was 5,000 acres and we killed 75 does and 60 6pts or better deer every year to keep the ratio in check. this was with 50 members ill add. now a days its definetly better to kill by age instead of antler size. on our place we have now, we only shoot 4 1/2 year old deer or older. there are great seminars provided by your local wildlife agency that will help folks judge a deers age on the hoof. so, as you can tell, im all for deer management. as far as how to make them believe, i would do my research. find out which clubs, states, ect are on a qdma program and record their records from before and after. get enough data and present that to them. thats all i can think of. best of luck!
174in
Well-known member
I tried in the past for years to shoot only three year old deer and better.Wisconsin hunting in the sw has alot of broken up acerage and the public spots are small (200 acres and less most of the time) and mostly overhunted.I hunt one farm that is private 292 acres with neighbors that say they practice shooting only mature bucks but every year I see them shooting 1 1/2 year old deer just to fill tags so they can say they shot a buck.About 5 years ago I decided to lower my standards and just try to get a buck that is 2 1/2 years or better.Even having over 200 hours in a stand some years I still dont get a chance at a buck.When you dont have big acreage it is tough unless you have good neighbors.You almost have to get to a point where you must be realistic with yourself and shoot something you still will be happy with.
unless someone can come up with a recipe for the rack, don't care how big the rack is. for me, it's about the hunt, not the rack size. have no problem with people who want to kill only big racked animals. but let the rest of us who hunt kill what we want to kill. qdm only works if you have large tracts of land where everyone is willing to do the same thing. give up killing an animal because the rack doesn't measure up.
I may have miss quoted my self by saying a big rack is what I'm after, my second quote states that you need at least three years to see MATURE deer that in my area should be 180 lbs to over 200 lbs this is what I'm really trying to push. The larger rack on a deer would just be a bonus, and letting them get to 3 1/2 to 5 1/2 you WILL see larger racks on deer. I know may area could do this I talk to over 2000 acres of land that is willing to try but they just would stick to it. I thought about a landowner buck contest amongest the 2000 acres with weight and rack score to determine winner, one rule must be NO cross tagging, you get to shot one buck only.
so you're talking weight of the deer, not the rack size? interesting. most folks I know do not care for the bigger size deer(bucks)because they are usually not fit to eat unless you make sausage or burger out of them. as far as bigger racks on older deer. for the most part, this may be true. but you still have to have the genetics AND nutrition to have the deer grow big racks. and bodies. have seen plenty of 2, 3, 4, and even 5 year old spikes. the one that went thru my truck was 3 1/2 year old that was a nothing more than a spike. 13 1/2 inches.
