Managing your own farm

[TheTruth2]

The length of new Yorks gun season is a huge factor. Many Midwest states firearms season is roughly a week or two weekends.

[burmjohn]

It's absolutely possible. Just have to train them not to venture off your property AND to watch for traffic when crossing roads!

 

 

Just don't put any deer crossing signs up, and they will have to stay on your land.

 

[Doc]

I have thought about the length of our gun seasons, and from what I have seen in recent years, the final weeks of the season really don't seem to have much of an impact. I have seen deer return to their pre-season diurnal patterns long before the season is over. The gun shots seem to dwindle down to less than you would hear on an average day of early small game season. I really wonder what the actual numbers show for deer harvests in the last couple weeks of gun season. It might just be that we are concerned over something that really has no impact on the deer herd.

[G-Man]

soils, habitat really? age and season legnth with total number of hunters. are a lot bigger factor. nys 2006 resident deer hunter numbers 452,000 , iowa 159,000, kansas 85,000. As stated by others earlier much shorter seasons closed during the rut for gun, and 1buck limits. You cant compare NY to Midwest states. But the potential is here. With a co-op or a large enough parcel bucks with record status are possible here. The genetics are here look at the lucky buck, world record at one time.

[WesternNY]

I agree that our season is way too long, but we have high deer numbers for the quality of habitat and population density both human and whitetail.  

 

If you want better bucks in NY people need to make the decision to let 1.5 year olds pass.  Simple as that.

 

In 2011 the National Average of 1.5 year bucks making up the total Buck harvest was 25%.  Every 4th buck harvested was a 1.5 year old.  In New York it was 54%,  that is slightly more 1/2 of all buck harvests in NY are 1.5 years old.   That is where we can improve our hunting, well part of it.  Arkansas leads at 10%.

 

Think about you season, how many 1,5 year olds do you see or get on cam a year???

For ease sake lets say 4, (we know it is likely 3-4 times that)  in NY more than half of the 1.5 year old bucks will be harvested, what if that number was lower say 25%.... you have just increased the potential for a deer to get to 2.5

 

People are heavily against change and legislation, but more and more people are passing on 1.5 year olds on a volunteer basis in NY and it does work.   A 1.5 year old is roughly the equivalent of a 13 year old boy, in fact that 1.5 year old buck still has his milk teeth.  He is far easier to hunt than any 2.5 year old or any doe.

 

Last number to throw at you.  In 2011  NY harvested 110,002 bucks of those 59,401 were just 1.5 year olds.

Nearly 60,000 first bucks that if simply given one more year, would be easily twice the animal of not more in antler development.   A 1.5 year buck shows 10% of antler potential,  a 2.5 year old shows 25 to 35% of it's antler potential.

 

Hold off on 1.5 year olds! 

 

 

[WesternNY]

soils, habitat really? age and season legnth with total number of hunters. are a lot bigger factor. nys 2006 resident deer hunter numbers 452,000 , iowa 159,000, kansas 85,000. As stated by others earlier much shorter seasons closed during the rut for gun, and 1buck limits. You cant compare NY to Midwest states. But the potential is here. With a co-op or a large enough parcel bucks with record status are possible here. The genetics are here look at the lucky buck, world record at one time.

 

 

Soils and habitat have a factor... but we agree on age and season length.

 

This is a multi-factor issue.

[growalot]

If you look in the new DEC booklet(hunting regs.) I believe it gives a map of Big buck entries by unit map...if Larry is in any of those areas I believe it's more than believable ...I can't find it on line ..if someone could and print it  you'd see what I mean...

[phade]

Interesting debate for sure.

Give me 200 proper acres with food bedding cover and creek bottoms with good access and exit in iowa or eastern kansas. Illinois and Nebraska would be after that. Then kentucky indiana wisconsin and ohio after that.

All of these states...although not perfect, are better off from a statewide perspective than ny.

[BizCT]

Any state with both whitetails and mule deer really intrigues me.

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[NFA-ADK]

Growing and managing your own farm for deer sounds great!  In reality you will not hold many big bucks on that property during rut.  It is a fact that you can not keep a large amount of quality bucks in one area.  The rut will prevent this.  Dominance and breading rights will cause the dominant buck to push out lesser ranking individuals.  That causes them to roam and find another area where they can be the dominant buck or at least participate in the rut.  That being said you can grow doe and they will stay and they attract bucks...  They have a much smaller home range and many older doe will not leave their core area.  Having set up a great habitat for deer will only help but you can not "Hold" bucks on a few hundred acres of land when they roam about 4000 when healthy and seeking doe in heat.  That does not mean you cant have bucks on your property or even set up good sanctuaries that they frequent or consider their core area.  You can and should do this but come rut time you can bet they will be seeking out many doe groups.  Much of this information obtained through Deer&Deer hunting...

 

Some of our western counties have the highest deer populations and some of the best soil in the state.  Many large racked deer are taken from these areas and the trend of passing yearlings and DQM does have an effect on producing larger racked deer.  But not everyone participates and that is a big factor in producing record class deer.  If you shoot every 3 1/2 - 5 1/2 year old that is a 130-150 class deer you will rarely see anything larger and in NY it is hard for most of us to pass on this type of animal as they are considered trophies.  Any 140 class buck I see is in trouble...  Trigger control is hard with this caliber of deer with the exception of the most seasoned hunter with many racks under his belt...

 

Hunter density and weather is a big factor in deer herd growth but I don't think the long season has as big an effect as some think.  I just feel if they shortened the season it would put more hunters in area's together resulting in more accidents due to high numbers of people hunting at the same time.  The fact that NY has such a long season I personally feel is a big factor in contributing to our safety.  Less people in the woods at the same time equals safer woods in my opinion. 

 

Comparing NY to Ohio or some other state is just not realistic.  It is like Comparing LI to the ADK or Catskill to western farm land.  Our land, soil, hunter and deer populations vary from town to town and county to county along with our weather... 

 

NY has great deer genetics  IMO.  We have many great deer, land and managers of this great resource.  If you grow enough doe, the bucks will come but the bucks are probably not grown on your land...  Good reason NOT to kill the oldest doe, she will stay in her core area the bucks know about...  Hopefully you have a sanctuary for more than one set of doe's!!!  They will KEEP bucks but only for a few days while mating...  Then the buck will look for another hot doe, hopefully your second group of them...