When to shoot does?

[PrairieShadow]

I always say I’ll shoot a doe early in the season, I end up not for fear of messing up my opportunities at “the one”

Late season is usually when I shoot one when I’m fairly certain a big one isn’t around.

This year has been different for me though, my goal I’ve been striving for for 13 years of wintering some deer has finally come to fruition. I’ve got about 40 staying at my place this year. No way I’m going out to shoot a doe now for fear of running all the rest off never to return.

 

[356]

If deer management goals are a reduction in the number of deer due to overpopulation, harvesting fawns is a sound way to provide great meat (that is easy to process) and to keep those fawns from competing for available food and entering the reproduction cycle. Here the goal is a reduction of mouths, and is not gender specific.

I was recently part of a doe management project in northern Missouri. The coop set a goal of 40 "Additional Does" through the DMAP program. The state biologist noted, "while early season is our preference, if doe management is needed, harvesting any legal doe at any legal time advances the management goals." I believe I quoted that verbatim.

 

[Telemark]

I usually take a fawn or doe the first day of gune season in Ohio. Then I can relax and try for a buck the rest of the season, and Ontario is buck only for me. If I get a crossbow buck before gun season, then all the better.

 

[j-bird]

I don't hunt early season (October) anymore, but that is more of a hunt smarter not harder issue on my place. Otherwise.....deer is THE red meat in my household so we will shoot a nice doe...as soon as she stands still long enough. I prefer to try to wait until later in an effort to use the does as bait for the bucks....but the need to fill the freezer exceeds the need for antlers on the wall. I am not covered up in does either, so we tend to have to seize an opportunity when it presents itself. The whole 1 in the hand vs 2 in the bush sort of thing....

 

[roymunson]

I'm part of a group of about 15 guys who hunts a really large piece and the dairy farmer said "if you don't kill 70 deer off of this farm this year, I'll get someone who will"

So they went hard and shot 40+ before Thanksgiving. They killed a couple nice bucks early, but I think they stomped it all up and the rut hunting was probably compromised.

At our place we generally try to get them late in the year. We tried, with limited success, to have a "doe blitz" on the last night of firearms season, but while I was sitting my youngest shot a buck with grandpa and we got down and gave up our night to go tracking.

 

[yoderjac]

When is the best time to take some does from a property? Most of my buddies who practice management shoot does late in the season. My thinking is that I’m running the risk of killing bred does with buck fawns. I talked to a biologist and she said that there are so many factors involved that the fear of killing does with buck fawns is negligible.

Thoughts?

How much acreage to you own? Several thousand acres? If not, those buck fawn will not likely be your mature bucks. If a doe has a fawn buck and you shoot her, it is less likely that fawn will translocate, but in most cases buck fawn born on a couple hundred acre property will relocate and establish a new home range well outside your property before they are mature.

I personally prefer to shoot does based on other factors. In a situation with very high deer densities like we were in when I first got the property, the best time to shoot a doe was as soon as we saw one. We wanted to maximize our doe harvest. If we saw a fawn we would shoot it even if we could not identify it as a male or female fawn. Or objective was to reduce population. As we increased the BCC and our population began to stabilize, our position on doe harvest changed. We had a perfect storm one year. We had a mast crop failure so deer were forced to use our food plots in spite of hunting pressure. That year, we doubled our average annual female harvest. Then, with the does left not in great condition, we had ice storms that winter making winter food scarce. While coyotes had been in our general area for a number of years, we had almost zero pictures of them at our farm up until that winter. That winter we began to get regular pictures of coyotes on the farm day an night. Recruitment the following year was poor, likely due to the coyotes. We actually limited doe harvest for 2 seasons. Our population then stabilized and over the entire period, we were doing large scale strategic timber harvests to improve the BCC. Our objective now is to stabilize the population. Our guidance to hunters now is to shoot a doe if you want to. We have always limited our young buck harvest to kids and new hunters.

So, the best time to shot a doe for us changed from "any time you see one" to "never" then to "when you want to". Time of season has little impact.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Teeder]

Here's something interesting. Some of you may have seen the picture I posted of my brother's buck this year. I finally got the whole story of that morning. He had been up in a box blind and saw a doe that was obviously hurt. He shot her and went to tag and gut her. When he was done he figured he may as well still hunt his way to the barn for the tractor. He didn't get 150 yards away and walked up on this buck as he was rubbing a tree. Moral of the story is, maybe shooting a doe won't scare the big boy away.

 

[Kooch]

Forget about the buck. Look at those pants!!!


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[rocksnstumps]

The ole wool red plaid! I know an old(er) coot that still wears em ice fishn
Edit: With a Stormy Kromer for a hat of course

 

[Kooch]

The ole wool red plaid! I know an old(er) coot that still wears em ice fishn

I approve of them.

 

[g squared 23]

I think the question should not be WHEN but instead WHERE which is much more important.


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[westonwhitetail]

Here's something interesting. Some of you may have seen the picture I posted of my brother's buck this year. I finally got the whole story of that morning. He had been up in a box blind and saw a doe that was obviously hurt. He shot her and went to tag and gut her. When he was done he figured he may as well still hunt his way to the barn for the tractor. He didn't get 150 yards away and walked up on this buck as he was rubbing a tree. Moral of the story is, maybe shooting a doe won't scare the big boy away.

I usually say anytime but the rut, but thus year played out different for me.

I shot a doe November 4th this year early in the afternoon because I had put in a bunch of time in the stand and wanted some venison to show for it. Well, I saw 2 bucks within 45 minutes after that and shot the second one, a nice 8! The doe had hair missing on her back, freshly kicked off her where she laid. I think my buck or the other found her laying and was harassing her

 

[yoderjac]

The ole wool red plaid! I know an old(er) coot that still wears em ice fishn
Edit: With a Stormy Kromer for a hat of course

Got mine from the Woolrich outlet in PA years and years ago.

 

[Bill]

Based on the weather today I would say last week would have a been a good time…..brrrrr

 

[Howboutthemdawgs]

Based on the weather today I would say last week would have a been a good time…..brrrrr

Yep last Sunday. This crap is brutal.

 

[b116757]

I don’t generally ever shoot does I might if I saw a wounded one but otherwise I leave them be but I don’t believe our buck to doe ratio is completely screwed as it is in other states with the ridiculous issuance of multiple buck tags that some states throw at people basically begging to ruin the trophy hunting in those states.

 

[BenA]

I take it you've already answered the most important question of, "do I need to or want to shoot does." If your property has enough of the native "ice cream" plants for your region available, then you don't "need" to shoot any. If it's a matter of wanting to, then shoot them if it doesn't mess up any other opportunities for you.

 

[Howboutthemdawgs]

I don’t generally ever shoot does I might if I saw a wounded one but otherwise I leave them be but I don’t believe our buck to doe ratio is completely screwed as it is in other states with the ridiculous issuance of multiple buck tags that some states throw at people basically begging to ruin the trophy hunting in those states.

As I’m sure I’ve complained thoroughly enough about I have an outfitter behind me. Guarantee they don’t shoot a single doe. And then on another side I have a couple guys who come for rifle season to shoot 2.5 year bucks and they don’t shoot a single doe. So as a result we are covered up. I have a real good neighbor on another side that is on the same page from a management perspective. We talked yesterday and we are going to take 20 next year between us. That is such a pain but I can’t have the numbers I had this year. They eat me out of house and home and you can’t get in and out of the stand cleanly

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Here's something interesting. Some of you may have seen the picture I posted of my brother's buck this year. I finally got the whole story of that morning. He had been up in a box blind and saw a doe that was obviously hurt. He shot her and went to tag and gut her. When he was done he figured he may as well still hunt his way to the barn for the tractor. He didn't get 150 yards away and walked up on this buck as he was rubbing a tree. Moral of the story is, maybe shooting a doe won't scare the big boy away.

Maybe standing in an open field during a thunderstorm wont get you lightning struck either but I'd rather not roll the dice and play the odds lol

 

[Bassattackr]

I think the question should not be WHEN but instead WHERE which is much more important.


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This.