Hunt 365 January 2018-A New Year, and new questions to answer
As I left off in the December article of last year, this year will be different in that I will be attempting to answer questions from our readers. Because I write articles a month and a half ahead of the month they are published, I had wondered what I would write about this January. I wanted to write about buck dispersal because it is an important topic that so few hunters understand. Well, as luck would have it, we got a question from Wayne about setting up a cull program on your property…which it turns out is directly related to buck dispersal. So let’s go!
Wayne from Davenport Iowa asks “Is it really worth setting up a cull program (shooting unwanted deer in the herd) on your property in Iowa? What would be the pro’s, con’s, how do you actually do so, time frame for results, etc?”
So…I’ll try to break this question down into chunks so that I can best answer the questions within the question. I’ll start with the peripheral questions first. What would be the pros and cons…how would you actually do it, and what would be the time frame? The answer to this question applies to any where you hunt whitetails…not just Iowa.
THE CONS
The theory popular on the TV shows and on hunting DVD’s is that a mature or close to mature buck offers a shot for the hunter, only by the hunter’s estimation he has something less than desirable antler attributes. We all know these deer exist, there’s no denying that. So the hunter harvests the buck and proclaims that he took a cull buck out of the herd and thus the local genetic pool is helped by his sacrifice. There’s a very real problem with this line of thinking. First, there is very little accuracy in identifying bucks that have poor racks because of genetics at younger than age 5 or maybe 6 years old. You absolutely CANNOT tell a whitetails antler genetics in the adolescent years of 1.5 and 2.5 years of age and even at 3.5 and 4.5 you’d be surprised at what a “below average” buck can still turn into. Abnormal racks (you know the spike on one side and beautiful 5 points on the other) are very often times injury related and will go away in future years…again you don’t know.
Because it is nearly impossible to determine genetics of a buck until it reaches the ripe old age of 5 or 6, they have already spent many years doing the breeding that you are attempting to prevent them from doing in the first place. The little good you might have done will be greatly overshadowed by the amount of mistakes you could make in the process of harvesting younger deer that you thought were “culls” but actually weren’t. Think I’m wrong? Think of it this way…cattle and horse breeders have to document and breed for generations in completely controlled environments to get traits that they are targeting. If that breeding is left to chance, the genetic traits they sought will revert back to generic traits of those animals in a very short time. Artificial insemination of dairy cows by prized bulls is a very controlled and scientific way of breeding for dairy production…it works but it is done in a controlled environment matches heifers and cows to documented bulls. Let it go to chance for even a generation or two and you’ll be right back to where you started. Now think you’re going to do this in the wild?
How Would You Actually Do It?
To do this in the wild would require scientifically documenting every buck from age 1.5 on up and determining their antler potential. Then, it would require very intense harvests of the magnitude you can hardly imagine to make sure only “trophy” class bucks do the breeding. Thus, the only bucks that could be shot would be the culls (which you won’t know until 5 or 6 years old) and the “trophies” would then have to be left to do the breeding. If that 200” 4 year old walks past…let him go, he is your prized breeder! Because of the uncertainty of which bucks to cull until they reach a mature age, this type of program would have to be intensely ran for decades or even longer to even begin to see changes to the deer herd. And because the does carry half the genetic makeup of any offspring they produce, how would you possibly document and cull inferior does? Breeding genetics requires intense documentation and controlled environments…something no hunters have at least not on a scale ever attempted before in the wild in Iowa. And, because bucks disperse (next topic), you would need the cooperation of landowners in a nearly 10 mile radius to be like minded in what is becoming an experiment at best.
There have been attempts at manipulating antlered buck potential by using harvest methods (including intense harvests of “cull” bucks) in Texas for example. Even there, with thousands of acres in extreme management efforts to cull bucks of inferior antlers and no improvement was seen in the amount of smaller antlered bucks still being produced. This is intense private land occupying thousands of acres…not even close to what normal hunters see in states across the Midwest.
Buck Dispersal
So you see the cons of trying to establish a “cull” program on free ranging wild animals by everyday hunters. But let’s suppose as a hunter, you can get thousands, even tens of thousands of acres of private lands all in cooperation to cull bucks of inferior antler growth at a mature age with few mistakes…and that you can keep this practice going for decades so it doesn’t revert back in a generation …then you might start to see minimal results in 10-20 years. Well, there’s still another problem…Buck Dispersal. Bucks on your property in large part were not born there and came from miles away. Most bucks will disperse and leave the home ranges they were born into and wonder aimlessly looking for a new area that they will call home for the rest of their lives. They do this when they reach their first birthday in the spring—through the fall of their first antler growing season. Studies show that this can be as high as 90% of bucks dispersing and traveling a mile or two away to as far as five or even twenty miles. Each year, from spring through fall, yearling bucks will begin this journey to find their new home that they will call home for the rest of their live. This makes the practice of “culling” for a better genetic pool impossible in free ranging whitetails…IMPOSSIBLE. The idea seems logical, but impractical once you understand the complexities of trying something like this in wild animals. Buck dispersal is so common, yet arbitrary in where these bucks relocate that trying to manage genetics through what you harvest would simply not work.
However…let’s take a different look at buck dispersal and how it can actually help you in a different way. We know that bucks disperse based on radio collared deer studies. But what else do these studies tell us that we can exploit. Well, the science also tells us that although bucks disperse at very high rates, orphaned bucks do not. That’s right, bucks that lose their mothers stay home also at very high rates. So, in very simple terms…bucks with mothers disperse, orphaned bucks do not! At this point I don’t really care why this happens. I’ve read many theories but as a hunter the reason why doesn’t matter all that much. This is HUGE! So…once you understand this it would seem logical to harvest does that have one or more buck fawns with them in the fall. By harvesting these does, you are greatly increasing the odds that those buck fawns will remain in the home ranges they were born into. These same studies show that bucks that don’t disperse also have higher survival rates in their first year and a half too. This makes sense because they aren’t leaving familiar territory and bumbling around making them susceptible to cars, predators, or less picky hunters. If you want more bucks to set up shop on your farm, make it a priority to harvest does that have buck fawns with them. And, by spending your efforts on creating the best habitat you can on your farm, you also increase the odds that the bumbling bucks that disperse from neighboring farms find your place appealing if they happen by!
The Answer
Although an appealing concept for hunters trying to grow giant bucks with large high scoring racks, using any kind of “cull” program simply won’t work on wild deer in Iowa or any other free roaming herds. Heavily managed areas containing thousands of acres in areas like Texas have already tried with little to no success. Instead, hunters seeking to grow bucks with large antlers should focus on things we can control like making sure every buck reaches full maturity, has ample food, and has great cover. This will make sure every buck can reach its full potential. Once these bucks reach maturity, you can then have the fun of hunting all of them, both low and high scoring. If you concentrate on the things you can control, rest assured your hunting will get better and you’ll also start seeing more and bigger deer.
Make sure to send any questions or ideas about what you’d like me to write about to tapeppy@gmail.com.