re-reading this thread kinda makes me feel stupid for passing on some bucks I've passed on here in RI on my property. Like I mentioned in an earlier post, i think this is a great discussion and has really opened my eyes.
I have to disagree.....by not killing them, you give them a chance to get there....so o course you increase your odds
I'm not sure how many different ways I can say the same thing.........we don't care that we didn't get to shoot the bucks we let walk. What we DO care about is that we did it for nothing. We don't believe what we did will change anything in the future for us encountering bigger bucks. The thread exists because I'm looking for something maybe we overlooked.........a way they are in fact definitely linked and not just through wishful thinking or just hoping it will. Our plan for the year is about to begin and we're trying to decide if we screwed up or moved in the right direction. Not sure if Mike meant he sees those 10% the next year or just sometime in the future but it seems what you are saying is we can just watch a small percentage of our bucks grow before our eyes every year. I have already stated that we have ZERO repeat encounters with bucks of any recognition in the 6 years we have hunted there and that is with tens of thousands of cam pics and 4 guys in the woods for every season. I'm sure we've seen a couple yearlings later that we wouldn't recognize but as I said no bucks of any stature..........and trust me we track them like a hawk. I'm trying to figure out why we should expect that to happen now when the last 6 years it has not. We have passed EVERY small buck we've seen there for 6 years now........dad shot a smaller buck a few years ago but really we have let 50 walk for every one we kill. Shouldn't this have had the effect you stated already?? In reality it hasn't upped our sightings or killings of bigger bucks. We see pretty much the same thing every year........a bunch of small bucks, a handful of solid medium bucks and a random glimpse of a hoss. I don't know what made us think passing medium bucks would equal more bigger ones when passing small bucks for 6 years hasn't resulted in more medium ones.
Not killing a buck IS NOT what bothers us. Wasting a year of our time and thousands of dollars just to opt out of hunting season for no reason is.
It'll take years ....you haven't owned it with letting 3 1/2 year olds walk for long at all, correct?
By how much Tony??.......knowing what's already been stated. Of course if you kill him there is no chance but are we really pretending that you letting him go is somehow anything other then 1 of a 1,000 other variables that have to line up for you to see that same buck 2-3 years later. If you ran in the street as a child and a car narrowly missed you that would be a definite reason why you didn't die young but a million other variables will factor into your longevity from that point on. Your luck that day as a kid would be why you didn't go so young but overall have very little if anything to do with you living to be 80. None of its possible if the car pancakes you but the fact it didn't has no input on your life from that moment on.
All of them??..........no. But we have seen a bunch of them over that 6 years that we didn't kill because they didn't offer a shot. Why haven't they returned bigger in the years after they slipped the gallows??
Dad killed a small buck but other then that they have all walked. Shouldn't there be more good sized mid level bucks now following your logic. Seriously dude, I wish there were but it's just not the case.
Adding food plots would be the only thing I would say has upped our sightings both scouting and hunting in the last 6 years. Even then the bucks hammer the plots all summer then disappear in the fall and pop out again come later in winter when they are desperate for food. The big boys don't care much for wandering out into a plot in the daytime..........dawn and dusk maybe but we have actually done much better setting up ambush spots around our plots then we ever would sitting over them. The bucks cruise the perimeter and scent check the does that are almost always present. A hot doe will pull them out for a look but even that is remote as the bucks rarely give them enough time to eat if they are ready to roll. As soon as someone sees legit rut action or the deer car accidents pick up we get in the woods and stay there as the plots are just full of mommas, fawns and small bucks.
Just throwing this out there for thought...how do you know none of the bucks you passed made it to maturity? Have you verified this with trail cams? Remember once a buck turns 4 he is a different animal. Likely mostly nocturnal...especially considering the amount of hunting pressure you described.
Also.....we can manage 3 out of the 4 determining factors for having big deer....age, sex ratio, and nutrition. The first two are totally dependent on the trigger finger. Talk to your neighbors. If they know you are passing young deer they will be more apt to do the same
I never said none made it. I said we've never seen a recognizable buck of any size return to our land. We run tons of cameras and it's not uncommon for each to have over 2,000 pics........the cams on food plots are frequently so full of pics it takes hours to go through them. What amount of pressure did I describe?? No doubt we get more slammers at night..........that's what keeps them slammers.
It sounds to me like your issue could be more related to seeing big deer as opposed to the land having them on it. That could be a habitat issue or a stress (pressure) issue. What type of terrain do you have? What percentage of cover/open woods/ fields etc. is there? And maybe more importantly...what is the habitat makeup within a 2 mile radius of you? Does a neighboring property have something deer need that your property doesnt have? These are all important questions, because if you are actively passing young deer but not seeing very many bigger ones....they are going somewhere....where are they going and why? Even if they are only walking onto the neighbors and getting shot right after you pass them...WHY are they going there? What do they want that your property doesn't have?
You can't manage their age.............you can add your drop in the bucket of 1,000 other things that might help but in reality your input is as random as the snowfall or a car on the road not braking in time. I've already written about the doe situation. We have improved our nutrition and it helped..........but there is so much food out there that it can only be a minimal draw. One neighbor for example is a retired guy with all year to work on his land. He has over 40 food plots from 1-3 acres in size on his land. Almost everyone in our area runs food plots. It's a heavily managed area with lots of serious hunters. The neighbors don't shoot small bucks. There is no need out there. Any decent 2 1/2 115" and up has a chance to get smacked but there are plenty of guys holding out for 150's too. Kids and guests probably take some from year to year but anyone who fills a tag on a 1 1/2 buck is almost sure to regret it later on. Look at the buck I passed on page 1.........if you have respectable knowledge and ability you can expect an encounter or two with a buck like that at some point in the year. They don't always stroll out and commit suicide or even give you a chance at a shot but you will cross paths at some point however brief that may be and putting a tag on one is a realistic goal every year. It doesn't happen to all of us every year of course but we all have our days.
We could have more water but we have a nice stream going through our largest piece. We have open hay fields, food plots, TONS of acorns, thick pines and mostly flat land that pitches down in one area. Our immediate neighbors are not the issue........we see every buck they kill in pics or sipping a beer at camp. The texts go out when a buck falls and we all drive over to say congrats and check him out before dinner. Not always I'm sure but we have no reason to suspect any neighbor is hammering little bucks and not telling anyone. There is no reason to.
Sounds like your property does have potential. Managing whitetails simply means doing YOUR part to better your chances of killing a big deer. It doesnt mean everything will work as planned....heck if that were true I'd have a wall full of 200 inchers. We do what we can, and know that our chances are better than if we did nothing. That's all we can hope for. What you do with your property is up to you. I will say this.....there is a piece of the puzzle missing....find it, and your success rate will go up. Without putting boots on the ground I can't really offer more than that. That puzzle piece is what I try to find for my clients. The hunters throughout the country that kill big ones year in and year out on their own land have found what their missing piece was and fixed it.
This is where I think my friends and I have GREATLY messed up. We made food plots and have a gazillion pics of deer on them. Bucks of all sizes and a million does. So my buddies want to sit there and hope the the buck makes that once a season daylight appearance in the plot that night they are there. I'm pulling/moving 2-3 stands can and sticking them in thickest crap we have on the place and hunt that because that's how I know how to hunt. Now that is not without its own risks as the layout of our land and our only access point makes getting winded a very very very high probability if the deer are already bedded there. But in the 10 prime days of the rut, it might be worth the risk and hope I can catch one coming from far away and heading across our land. I don't how how your seasons run, BUT food plots around thanksgiving and also during the late season if it gets really cold can bring the big bucks out during daylight times. Otherwise I feel the odd of them showing up in the daylight even during the rut are very small.
If you guys are happy shooting 120's but want the chance of bigger bucks as well I suggest that you look at the specifics of "your" herd. Passing 120 inch bucks that use your land as part of their core area will allow you the opportunity of seeing and hunting that buck in future seasons. Passing the random buck in November that you have never saw or had cam pics of will have little impact on your chances with it in future seasons. Discuss with your hunting crew of letting resident bucks that use your land regularly go, giving that buck that lives on your land the chance to grow into the big buck you guys really want. Let your "local" bucks go and take those random rut bucks instead. Passing a buck that does not live on your land and only happens to be there due to the urge to seek does will most likely have no affect on you having another opportunity years down the road with him. However as mentioned passing the bucks that call your area home will in fact considerably up your chances of seeing and hunting him again.
Not sure if it was asked before but do you find many sheds on your property? How often do you jump deer while walking into your stands? I know I have had to move stands fairly often because of the deer starting to pattern me so to speak. It's in the same general area but maybe 40to 50yards up or down the trail. It sounds like you plant your food plots in the spring. Have you or do you replant in the fall? I'm just throwing out ideas blindly, but I have had success passing on smaller bucks and all I have are 10 acres that are neighboring about 2,000 acres of public woods. And the public gets slammed pretty hard.
Posting in one of your threads is like watching a dog chase it's tail... nothing is ever accomplished but here goes... Most of us that are posting in your thread... are trying to help. You mention your dad, your brother and you... a lot !! That is where I came up with 3 of you probably hunting your property. How many are hunting your property ?? 350 is small acreage. If it were big acreage... you would have a 4 year old buck living on it. They all wouldn't be a mile away getting killed by someone else. I run cameras and scout over 30,000 acres that is pretty much in one big chunk. If I can find 3 - 4 bucks that are 4 years or older... it is a great year. Most years it is 1 - 2 bucks. We see a lot of 2 and 3 year olds. It is great that you have a sanctuary. By far one of the best things you can do !!! You can't kill a 4 year old buck if you killed him when he was 3. There is just is no way of getting around that. Will it increase your odds of killing him when he is 4 ?? Most likely not. Good luck !! Tim
