So I dug through the shed box last night, taking an inventory of what I've got. This knowledge will help me set realistic expectations for next season, and get a clear picture of the odds of harvesting a slammer buck next fall. I broke my sheds down into four separate piles: 0-80" bucks 80-105" bucks 105-125" bucks 125-150" bucks 150+" bucks So then, I simply counted them out, and this is what I came up with: 0-80" bucks - 59 sheds 80-105" bucks - 17 sheds 105-125" bucks - 18 sheds 125-150" bucks - 6 sheds 150+" bucks - 5 sheds So out of 103 sheds, the following percentages apply: 0-80" bucks - 57% 80-105" bucks - 16.5% 105-125" bucks - 17.4% 125-150" bucks - 6% 150+" bucks - 5% All of these sheds are from Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. I thought it would be neat to see the scoring makeup of different shed hunters' shed piles from different parts of the country, just to see whose acreage is really the thickest with big scoring bucks. It surely isn't my area, I'll tell you that much! Around here, at the end of the year, you're going to wind up hauling in big numbers of dinker sheds, with the 150+" shed bucks being spread pretty thin. Count 'em out and see how your herd stacks up against everyone else's.
interesting Fran, I like it! I have quite a few mule deer sheds this year intermixed with whitetails, one elk and one moose but over all I still found more whitetail sheds of the 86 than anything else. I dont have the time right now to measure them all but I do know this.. I had a great year for #s and a chitty one for size in my whitetail finds... I found only 5 sheds that fall into the 59-69 inch catagory. Funny too my shed hunting buddy walking a lot of the same ground as I did doubled up on me in finding the slammers this year. Oh well, I guess luck of the lines I was running.
Fran As much as I like you... ain't no way I am going through the whole shed pile !!! LOL I'll try and get through this year's sheds for you though in the next day or so. Make it the latter as I might sneak out and check a spot after work we over looked. I think I'll break mine down a little different though. I would rather go by age/score but will just stick with score to keep it close to the same as yours. Thinking... 0 - 70 70 - 105 105 - 130 130 - 150 150 plus Doing it this way keeps it a little closer to age also from what we have seen in the past here. Most of the 1.5 year olds here will fall in the 0 - 70 range. Most of the 2.5 year old will fall in the 70 - 105 range and so on. Tim
I have about 110 sheds.. maybe a few more.. I don't know. Of all of those.. just 2 come off bucks scoring greater than 150". Most of my sheds would fall in the 40-50" range. Then into the 55" range. Very few are less than that. Not because there are no small bucks where I look.. but because I suck at finding little sheds. That and I leave many of those behind for the squirrels anyway.
ok... we found 115 sheds this winter/spring. 15 sheds were old sheds so I will throw them out and we ended up with 100 fresh sheds. We matched up the mates and ended up with 24 sets and 52 singles which equals 76 bucks that we found sheds to this year. We sorted them by age first and came up with... 1.5 year olds = 26 bucks ---- 34 % 2.5 year olds = 30 bucks ---- 39 % 3.5 year olds = 13 bucks ---- 17 % 4.5 year olds = _5 bucks ------7 % 5.5 year olds = _2 bucks ------3% Since Fran wants score 0 - 69" = 22 bucks ------ 29 % 70 - 104" = 28 bucks ---- 37 % 105 - 129" = 18 bucks -- 23 % 130 - 149" = 6 bucks ---- 8 % 150 plus = 2 bucks -------- 3 % Tim
I don't consider myself a shed hunter but in my earlier day I spent roughly 3 months a year in the woods yearly hunting deer every day. I more or less never missed a day of the season for probably 8-10 year stretch. So I really spent lots of time in the woods and with that you'll find a few sheds mostly by accident. Saying all that, I only pick them up if they are big and in good condition. I have several sets that would score 150-190" if they were on the deers head but I've given away some good ones to friends and don't be alarmed when I say I gave several to my father in law to make knives. I just have so many antlers at my house that came from deer I killed that they start getting in the way so I really don't collect them like most guys do.
man i gotta get into shed hunting more. sounds like a blast and would really help to take some time in the offseason to get away from the ol' lady.
This is how I keep track of what I have. I just started scoring all my sheds. Have some catching up to do. Sheds Points-Count Spike-2 2-11 3-23 4-65 5-29 6-9 7-1 8-0 9-1 10-0 11-0 12-0 13-0 14-0 15-0 Pieces-12 Total=153
I have found around 500 sheds in the last ten years, surprisingly I have been fortunate enough to find some absolute slob sheds, sheds that rank top in the world. however I have to admit i dont find hardly any small sheds, simply put I walk way to fast and im really just looking for giant sheds or big tall tines sticking thru the grass. In the last three years I have found one set over 200" and three in the 190" range I have also found singles in the high 90" also 115"and some high 80" I know its hard to believe im no better of a shed hunter than most of you on here, I just seem to get extrememly lucky when it comes to finding big freekin hammers!! Lord knows I put in a ton of hours and alot of miles every season to chase down these sheds. The fact of the matter is alot of guys cant stand that I sell all the sheds I find but I would rather kill them than have endless piles of sheds laying in my garage.
****ie what you thinking! I will never sell my big ones and now I am glad that I have not sold them due to killing a buck this past year that I have four sheds off of with a nice match set that is very impressive. 70"+ on both sheds with 12 total points. When I killed him he was only an 11 pointer!
