Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 864: A Doe Hunting Call to Action with Kip Adams

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Ep. 864: A Doe Hunting Call to Action with Kip Adams · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: the White Tail Woods presented by First Light, creating proven
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: the show, I'm joined by Kip Adams of the National
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: Deer Association to discuss what very well might be the
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: most important action you can take this hunting season, filling
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: a doteg all right, welcome back to the Wired to
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: Hunt podcast, brought to you by First Light and their
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Cameo for Conservation initiative, And as we are wrapping up
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: the year, we need to talk about a very important issue,
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: something that is important for your future deer hunting. The
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: habitat where you deer hunt, the odds of seeing a
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: killing mature bucks in the future, the future of deer
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: hunting as a privilege that we can participate in the future,
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: of our ability to effectively manage deer populations here in
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: America as hunters, rather than having some other group of
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: folks or service manage deer. That's how important our conversation
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: is today because we are discussing antlerlus's deer harvest. Why
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: it's becoming something that is increasingly of concern for folks
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: within the deer hunting and conservation world. Why we are
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: seeing deer harvest and antlerlass harvest in particular declining so
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: substantially across many parts of the country. Why that's a risk,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Why that's a problem, Why that could lead to worse
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: deer hunting opportunities for you, and all those other things
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: I mentioned. All of this we discuss with my guest today,
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: mister Kip Adams, the top dog when it comes to conservation.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: Chief Conservation Officer I believe is his title at the
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: Nation Deer Association, and he's going to detail for us
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: all these things, explain why for almost all of us
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: in the United States of America, other than a few
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: areas of the northern reaches of the country where there
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: are some lower deer populations, but most of the country
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: we have a very very healthy deer population, if not
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: too healthy, too many deer that are impacting the health
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: of the deer herd, impacting the health of the habitat,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: and impacting all of the things. So that's the game
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: plan today, discussing why all that's of concern, Why that's
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: a problem, and then how we can do something about it,
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: discussing everything from you know, how to determine whether or
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: not all of this applies to you and your property.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: That's a key thing. Which kinds of places do need
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: increased dough harvest? Which places don't. I want to make
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: sure you can answer that question effectively. Number two, which
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: dose should you be shooting the mature dough the young dough?
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: How do you determine if it's a buck, fawn or
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: a mature dough? How do you make sure that this
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: is not a shed buck and it is a dough.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: All of these different questions we cover, as well as
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: many others, and then finally we talk through some techniques,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: some strategies, from ideas for how you can fill those
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: ante list tags. So we're gonna talk why, we're gonna talk, how,
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: we're gonna talk when, and hopefully gets you all up
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: to speed on what you can do to make a
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: positive difference as a deer hunter and also sharing the meat,
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: sharing this other folks who might be in need as well.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: That is the plan. This is how we're gonna wrap
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: up the year. It's going to be an important episode.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: If you have a week left of the season, two
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: weeks left of the season. I know some of you
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: guys have more whatever it is, Please if this applies
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: to you in your area, if you live in one
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: of those places where you have those growing deer populations
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: where not enough doughs are getting killed, please join me
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: in participating in filling another dough tag or two. I
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: know that I have goals of getting five plus more.
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: We have an extended dough season this year in Michigan,
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: so our season is going to go into mid January.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: It is, and I'm gonna be participating right on through
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: the gory end of it. Hopefully gonna put some more
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: meat in the freezer, share some with some family and friends,
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: and have a really good time on the way. So
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: that's the plan. Without any further ado, here's my chat
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: with Kip Adams. All right here with me back on
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: the line is Kip Adams. Thank you Kip for being here.
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  Speaker 3: Again, absolutely Mark, thanks for having me.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: I always enjoy our chats. I always appreciate you making
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: the time to do this, and today we are here
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: with I think what's fair to say is an urgent
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: call to action for anyone listening and I'm titling this episode.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: I think by saying something, by titling it as maybe
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: the most important action you can take this hunting season.
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  Speaker 2: Something like that, Kip, And I'm curious, from your perspective,
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: is killing an ant list deer filling an antlyst deer tag?
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  Speaker 2: Would that qualify as one of the most important actions
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  Speaker 2: a deer hunter can take this season in your mind.
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, And there are certainly places across the white Tails
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: range where deer herd, you know, we're very low and
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: antelyst harvest is you know, a light harvest is appropriate,
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: but those places are few and far between. Most places
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: where we have white tails because of the reproductive rate is
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: so high, it just necessitates that hunters fill more ant
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: list tags. Then we've been filling across much of the
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: range over most of the past decade. So yeah, I
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: agree with you, that's one of the most important things
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: we can do to ensure the future. You know, we
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: have a healthy deer herd next year and well into
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: the future.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: So this is something that I'm seeing pop up more
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: and more with a sense of urgency from people in
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: the whitetail hunting conservation community. Definitely from the National Deer
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: Association and other agencies on the country related to deer
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: organizations related to deer. This this kind of flashing red
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: light saying we need to take more antlers deer, we
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: need to shoot more does we need to manage the
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: populations more. What's going on for people who maybe have
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: not been hearing this, who haven't been paying attention. What
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: are these things that are making this so concerning where
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: we are right now? And why has there been this increasing,
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: you know, level of concern around if we're taking enough
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: dos and people saying, hey, take more dos, take more dos?
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: I mean we and in the state of Michigan, our
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: deer lead deer biologists sent a very explicit letter I
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: think it was last year to all hunters in the
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: state of Michigan saying like, hey, you have to start
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: taking more does otherwise we will not be able to
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: have deer hunting as a management tool in the way
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: we are right now. So it's getting to a pretty
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: serious level here. Now. Can you just catch people up
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: the speed if they have not been paying attention to
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: this and not have been seeing this. What is causing
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: this level of concern? Why is this becoming in the shoot.
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: Sure. Well, you know, as hunter is one of the
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: most important things we can do is, you know, make
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: sure that we harvest enough antalysts deer to balance deer
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: herds with what our habitats can support. And that often
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: is it odds with what hunters want to see. And
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: I'm the same way when I go hunting, I want
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: to see deer and if I can see a lot
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: of deer, you know, that's fun. I get it, that's fun.
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: So as hunters, you know, nobody wants to go and says, man,
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: I hope I don't see very many deer today. Well,
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: we equate that to how many handless do we shoot. Well,
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: if we shoot that deer, then there's fewer deer in
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: the landscape, so we can't see as much. But the
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: reality of it is we need to shoot appropriate numbers
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: of antalysts deer to not have more than our areas
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  Speaker 3: can support, not as many as we want to see,
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: because most areas cannot support as many deer as we
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: would like to see as hunters. So historically we did
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: a great job shooting bucks and not shooting dos, and
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: that worked really well when we were trying to recover
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: herds across most of the range. And it's funny to
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: think back. You know, nineteen ninety nine is the first
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: year in the US that we shot more analysts deer
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: than bucks. Now, I know a lot of your listeners
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: weren't born in nineteen ninety nine yet, and there's a
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: lot of new hunters that makes that sounds like ancient times.
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  Speaker 3: But think about it. You know, we've been hunting white tails,
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: you know, in the US almost one hundred years under
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: you know, regulated hunting before we shot more dos in bucks.
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: And that's really the whole QDM movement. That's when you know,
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: the QDMA was was started. So hey, let's let's teach
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: people the value of shooting dough. So fast forward, Mark
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: with a lot of the education from when we're out
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  Speaker 3: the year two thousand up to the year about twenty ten,
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: hunters really answer the call and we're harvested more analysts
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: deer than bucks every year through that time, which was great.
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  Speaker 3: For the first time ever, we were getting deer herds
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: pretty much in balance with what our habitats could support.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: That was awesome.
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: Well, somewhere around you know, twenty eleven, in twenty twelve,
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  Speaker 3: we had a couple of terrible hemorrhagic disease years. We
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: had some other things going on where hunters had reduced
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: deer herds. Other side of mortality kind of took over,
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  Speaker 3: and suddenly deer herds dipped a little bit in many places,
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  Speaker 3: and it scared the heck out of hunters. So that's
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: when they said, WHOA, let's back off. And since the
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: early twenty tens, we have just been harvested and fewer
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: and fewer and fewer analysts deer. That's what really brings
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: us to where we are today because with everything, you know,
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: that pendulum kind of swings, swings one way or man,
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  Speaker 3: we're harvesting a lot of analysts deer. Folks get nervous
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: right now, it's kind of swung all the way to
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: the other end where we're just protecting them too much.
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  Speaker 3: And as proof of this, we look at percentage of
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: hunters in the US that are successful. A decade ago,
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: it was about forty eight percent of all hunters would
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: shoot a deer annually. You know, that's just one. You know,
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: most people think man hunters are going out where everybody's
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: killing them old. The reality is over half of the
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: hunters don't shoot a single deer. If you look at
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: now today, that's only about forty percent of hunters are successful.
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: So what's happening is hunters are just choosing not to
• 10:10
  Speaker 3: shoot deer. This isn't a matter of there's no deer available,
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: deer herds a two. This is hunters making conscious decisions.
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  Speaker 3: I am not going to pull the trigger on in
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: many cases that dough. So that's what's led us to
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: where we are today. We're just harvesting deer at a
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: lower rate at a time when deer herds are growing
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: across most of the range. That's why you have more
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: state wilife agencies than ever before today's imploring their hunters
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: please take an ant list deer. So that's what really
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: probably brings you and I to sitting together here this
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: morning talking.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so are there any I guess, what are the
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: signs that this is actually happening? So I know people
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: are worried about it. I know the state agencies are
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: worried about it. Have we seen this in the actual
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: harvest reports? I mean I believe we have, because I
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: think you and I have talked about this during some
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: of our deer or conversations. But it seems like this
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: is now translating to lower harvest numbers in the states
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: that they're reporting. I think I've saw in Michigan like
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: you said, or maybe this is something I was reading
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: earlier today just about the fact that our deer harvest
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: numbers have been going down dramatically in Michigan, like something
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: like twenty five percent decline maybe last year or something
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: along those lines. So this is translating. This isn't just
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: like a vibes thing. This is like a real data
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: thing too, correct.
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: That's absolutely right. And states are measuring this with reduced
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: ante list harvest, and this is at a time mark
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: we are at historically high buck harvest, So we are
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: killing as many or more bucks today than you know
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: that we have almost every year in the past hundred years.
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: So what that means is that shows us that deer
• 11:49
  Speaker 3: herds are continued to expand that's how you have more
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: bucks on the landscape. So we have actual data showing
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: reduced antelyst harvest in many states, increasing buckharts in many states.
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: That shows the deer herd is growing. We have reduced
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: nutritional planes in many states. As they're collecting biological data
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: on deer so they know, you know, kidney fat indexes
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: showing deer going into winter with with lower fat levels,
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: body weights by age class dropping. There's lots of different
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: indicators showing we clearly have more deer and in many
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: places more deer than we have good, high quality food available.
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: So yeah, there's you know, states measure this stuff differently,
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: but you know many, many states that they have absolute
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: solid data showing deer herds are growing like crazy. We're
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: shooting fewer dose. We're not shooting fewer bucks, We're shooting
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: fewer dos. And that's why we really have to You know,
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: it's fun to be shooting these bucks. That's awesome. I
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: love too. Now's where the step is. Hey, as hunters,
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: you know you got that, but like, that's awesome. Now,
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: let's follow that up and make sure you get a
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: dough or in many cases, you know, a couple of
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: dose for each of those bucks that you're shooting.
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: Okay, so what does this look like if this trend continues?
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: I guess what I'm getting at here. What I want
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: to better understand is what is the risk of inaction
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: if we don't change this trend? If the deer populations
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: continue to swell and we as hunters cannot manage them
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: in balance with the habitat and balance with the herd.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: What negative ramifications might be in store.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: Well, first of all, if we're if we're not harvesting
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: enough dose so that deer herds get too high. The
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: first ramification is, you know, our deer herd health starts
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: to suffer. They're just not getting you know, enough food
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: to meet you know, their their growth requirements are certainly
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: not to meet what their potential is. So that means
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: body weights get smaller, means they can raise fewer fonds.
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: It means anglers get smaller, you know, none of which
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: hunters want. So that is the impact to deer. Then
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: there's the impact to the habitat. If there's more deer
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: than there should be, our habitats become degraded and then
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: they can it can hold even if you were deer
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: in the future. So that's the bad part to habitat.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: All those other wildlife species out there that share that
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: habitat with deer now they're negatively impacted. So it's negatively
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: impacting those And then from a hunter end, you know,
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: we continue to have higher crop damage dollar amounts because
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: of deer. We continue to have more other deer human
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: conflicts like deer vehicle collisions, et cetera. So as those
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: things increase, that just makes hunting become less important if
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: we're not doing the job that we want. You know,
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: only about four percent of our society hunts. You know,
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: You and I are in the distinct minority in our kids,
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: you know, and we don't get to do anything in
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: this country because four percent of us want to do it.
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: And you hear people say it's my God given right
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: to hunt, and man, I wish it was, but that's
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: not true. We get to hunt today because between seventy
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: five and eighty percent of American adults support legal, ethical,
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: regulated hunting, and they support that even though most of
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: those donut support it, because they see hunters providing that
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: free service to society. Part of that, or a big
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: part of that, is harvesting enough antlyst deer to keep
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: deer herds healthy. So as hunters, we want to do
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: the best job possible to be providing that service to
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: society so that we get to continue to do it,
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: because if we don't, society is going to find an
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: answer somehow. I'm doing everything possible every day of work
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: to make sure that hunters are the champions and the
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: ones that continue. So that's why we try to educate
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: hunters on Hey, this is why it's in our best
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: benefit to be shooting antlysts deer and be mentoring other
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: people and encouraging them to shoot analysts deer. You know,
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: we're not looking to get rid of all the deer.
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: We're just looking to harvest enough so that we have
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: a deer herd in balance, whether it's habitat, so it's
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: very healthy deer herds, healthy habitat, and then you know
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: that is what will allow us to hunt into perpetuity.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you know, it's what's concerning, or one of
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: the things that's really concerning when you look down the
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: road is what happens when whitetailed deer are looked at
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: as more of a nuisance and a pest and a
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: detriment than as a benefit to the natural world and
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: to society. And all right, we've heard from many years,
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: like insurance companies not wanting there to be so many deer.
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: Because of that, you're hearing more and more in city
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: and suburban environments where deer are damaging not only cars
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: and people's lives, but then also landscaping, whatever might be.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: But I think a thing that's popping up more and more,
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: at least in my world in areas that I'm reading
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: about and studying, I'm reading more and more about people
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: within the environmental community and the larger conservation world looking
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: at deer as one of the largest detriments to biodiversity
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: and ecosystem health across the country, as this vast overpopulation
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: of deer is destroying important habitat types that are important
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: to pollinating insects, or it's all these other critters that
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: need a healthy, thriving habitat. In areas where deer are
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: overpopulated and we're not managing them, they're just crushing habitat,
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: which then is impacting all these other at risk species.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: And like you said, if hunters aren't seen as a
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: viable way to manage these deer in balance with the habitat,
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: people are going to seek out other solutions and we
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: will lose our opportunities because of that. So I think
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: you know you've seen some of these things happen in
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: suburban environments and city environments where cities and townships are
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: hiring sharpshooters to manage deer populations. I don't know what
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: that's going to look like and if that will continue
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: to scale in some kind of way if we don't
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: step up to the plate. But what are your thoughts
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: on this biodiversity impact that I continue to read more
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: and more about people looking at white tailed deer as
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: a threat to many other species of wildlife because they're,
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: you know, in some areas, just really leveling the vegetation.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: You see these browselines that are clearly define the lines
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: across the landscape where there's hardly anything beneath it. Can
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: you can you discuss that a little bit.
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: More sure, And that's absolutely true what you're saying. And
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: you know that's one of the reasons deer are known
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: to be a keystone species. They have the ability to
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: negatively or positively impact, you know, the area that they're living.
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: There's very few other species that can can impact it
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: to that level. Beaver's are one example. You know, beaver
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: can come in and absolutely change the habitat where they are. Uh,
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: deer are at the top of that list because deer
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: are so good at surviving. Think about this deer, the
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: oldest well white tails are the oldest deer species we have.
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: You know, they've been around for over four million years.
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: You know, they are good at surviving in many cases
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: at the exclusion of other things that they share the
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: area with. So you know, even if we do a
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: poor job managing them, they continue to find a way
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: to at least survive, maybe at lower levels than they
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: are now, but they're going to continue now as they
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: do that. This is where they are negatively impacting that
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: for all those other wildlife species are out there, and
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: where this whole biodiversity concern comes in, you know, in
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: that conversation. Conversely, you know, if we do a good
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: job managing them, they can be the champion for everything else.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: That's why the value of deer campaign, you know that
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: we're so proud of in our spearheading now, is to
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: let all those people out there that talk about the
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: biodiversity or a concern to that that may not hunt,
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: to make them aware of all of the positive things
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: that deer provide in large part funding for our wildlife programs,
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: you know, to protect all of those other species out there,
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: butterflies and bees and non game and small game. So
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: when hunters, when we get it right, Oh my gosh,
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: we are, you know, the champion of champions. Deer are
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: the vehicle to make that happen. So as managers, let's
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: we know how to put a game plan together, we
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: need the hunters to implement it. And then when hunters
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: implement it correctly by shooting appropriate numbers of analysts deer,
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: man it is so good for all of that biological diversity.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: When we fail to implement that part correctly, that's when
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: it all starts to fall apart, and that huge segment
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: of public that doesn't hunt starts looking at hunting in
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: a negative light. So that's what we're trying to guard
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: against here.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think we're starting to see a larger
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: proportion of our community recognizing the positive impact that we
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: can have right on the larger natural world on the environment,
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: especially those of us who are fortunate to have land
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: that we can manage and improve. Like we've seen many
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: of us have seen the absolutely tangible impacts we can
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: have on the landscape by you know, improving the early
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: successional habitat component or planning food plots, or managing timber
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: or whatever might be. All of those things help deer
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: and they help all of these other creatures, and so
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: many of us are starting to see the value there
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: and how we can benefit the everything. We can benefit
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: the biodiversity. But a really important piece, like one of
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: the very most important things we can do, maybe more
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: important than making some of these habitat improvements or just
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: as is this dear antlelus harvest management component of it.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: If you just improve habitat but you're not managing the
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: dell population, you probably are. You know, you're missing out
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: on a huge upside that could be there if you
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: were to do both right. So they go hand in hand. Now,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: another thing here that I have heard increasingly getting bandied around,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: and something that I think is concerning to many hunters,
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: is one of the more aggressive proposals that I have
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: been hearing for those people within the government or otherwise
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: trying to manage the deer population. People saying, hey, we
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: got to get these deer populations down. It's becoming dangerous,
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: it's damaging the environment, it's etc. Etc. The idea of
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: putting a dollar value on on deer again and allowing
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: folks to monetize them, and opening up market hunting to
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: some degree again to try to incentivize harvest can you
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: speak to how viable that is? Is that? Is that?
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: Is that a real threat? Is that actually possible down
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: the line, and why is that concerning if it were
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: to happen.
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: I think that it I'll answered the first question is
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: is that a real threat? I think absolutely. You know,
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: we have markets in wildlife in other places. You know,
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: you're allowed to sell muskrat meat in Maryland, that's done
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: all the time. We sell hides of fur bearers, we
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: sell fish, so uh, you know, uh, deer are not
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: allowed in that. You know when we ended the whole
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: market hunting back in the early nineteen hundred, you know,
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: that's what saved deer populations and it's been such an
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: integral part of our North American model of wildlife conservation.
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: You know, no markets for that, well, there's always been
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: loopholes around that, not for deer, but for other species.
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: So is it a viable discussion? I think absolutely. I
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: think it's something you know, that should scare the heck
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: out of a lot of hunters. You know, we have
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: the opportunity to fix this right now that in my opinion,
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: commercializing white tails would be a bad idea for the
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: future of wildlife management. I don't think that's good. And
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: I'm not somebody that's a traditionalist and just has to
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: go by what we have done in the past. I
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: am all about finding solutions and thinking out of the box.
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: I just personally don't think that is a good one
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: for white tails, at least not now. You know, maybe
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: in the future that may be necessary, but right now,
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: I don't. I do not think that's a positive thing
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: for deer or the future of our over wildlife management programs.
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: But it's absolutely something that's being talked about more and
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: as the number of hunters that are at least the
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: percentage of the US population the hunts continues to decline,
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: that is something that would become a more real and
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: real discussion and something that could absolutely be on the
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: table for hunters in the future.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So again another clear reason why we need to
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: take control this issue now ourselves, rather than let somebody
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: else take control of the narrative and put those kinds
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: of solutions on the.
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: Table, right for sure, for sure.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: Okay, So, one of the things that we always hear
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: when the topic of antelus harvest comes up is well,
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: there's no deer in my area or everyone already shoots
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: all the dos where I am, or this will crush
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: the deer population where I live. I'm not going to
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: do that. How can someone determine whether or not this
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: issue applies to them? How can you determine whether or
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: not you should be harvesting antelus deer where you hunt?
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that you know, what hunters need to
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: recognize is that all of our state wildlife agencies, you know,
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: implement our hunting seasons, and they manage deer on a
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: wildlife management unit or a deer management unit or deer
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: management zone basis. You know, as hunters, we hunt at
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: the property level. Our wildlife agens aren't managing deer at
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: the level that we hunt. They're managing them on a
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: larger scale. And then we need to realize that in
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: across those units, there are places where there's more deer
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: than there should be. There may be some places where
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: there's fewer deer than they should be in somewhere it's
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: right about in balance. So that's where you have someone
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: to say, there are no deer in my unit. Well
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: maybe there's no deer on your property. That's probably not true,
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: but just understand that, you know what throughout that unit
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: you're hunting in, there has been a lot of data
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: collected by your state wilife agency, and that's why they
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: have applied that harvest the level, whether you know it's
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: moderate or high or whatever. So don't be arguing that
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: that's wrong for that whole unit. Now within the property
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: that you hunt on and pay I hunt at the
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: property level, and so do you, and so do every
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: other hunter from that. There are ways to be able
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: to figure out, you know, should I shoot any dose,
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: should it be one, should it be multiple? And there's
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: some scientific information that I can give you. The easiest
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: thing mark is actually on our website, we have a
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: dough harvest diagnosis. It's a page you can look at
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: and there's a bunch of questions. You just answer yes
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: or no to each and at the end you count
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: up the number of yes as the number of nos,
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: and it tells you should you be harvested more deer
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: in your area or not. So if folks want to
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: go do that, that's an easy way to do that.
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: But I will tell you, in general, across most of
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: the white tails range, a good place to start is
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: for hunters to be harvest in at least as many
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: ante lists deer as they are bucks on the property
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: that they hunt. There's places in New England, there's places
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: you know in northern Minnesota, Wisconsin or Nebraska with deer
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: herds are you know, not real productive or at least
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: not growing quick that you just simply can't harvest as
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: many dos there. But that is not true for most
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: of the white tails range. Almost all the white tails range,
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: we need to be harvest in at least as many
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: antalysts deer, and in most cases more antalyst deer than bucks.
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: Everybody can apply that right to your property level. If
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: you're a hunt at your in Michigan camp, you know,
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: when we shot five bucks this year, I will issue
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: you should have been shooting more than five dos, and
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: in many cases probably at least twice that many. My
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: my hunting camp in northern Pennsylvania, our twenty year average
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: is we shoot between three and four ant list deer
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: for every antler buck that we shoot. And uh, and
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: we have phenomenal hunting. You know, lots of folks say, well, man,
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: you know you guys shoot nice bucks. I wish I
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: could hunt there. Well, you know, part of the good
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: hunting is we work hard on the habitat, and we
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: work really hard to shoot enough ante list deer each year,
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: so you know those those go together. But that's a
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: good place for folks to start. Start by shooting more
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: does than bucks.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: Where do we find that dough harvest diagnosis tool you
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: mentioned on the website? It does go.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: It is so at Dear Association dot com. There is
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: there under I think it's under one of our programs
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: or materials available. Gosh, it's been so long since I
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: have looked on the side. I know we have it there,
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: but it's on our site. It's a one page pdf
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: that folks can grab. I've been to make it easy.
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: Mark when I can do we get done here. I
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: can send you there or email that to you if
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: you want to include a link to it in the show.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: Notes or something. But yeah, we'll have a link.
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: I'll make it available because that's a super easy way.
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: If somebody says, hey, you know what I actually collect data?
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: I do camera surveys or I scout a lot. A
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: good rule of thumb is, if you want to stabilize
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: a deer herd, shoot twenty to thirty percent of the
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: dose each year, which means if you shoot fewer than
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: twenty to thirty percent, that deer herd is likely going
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: to grow. If you want to reduce the deer herd,
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: shoot more than twenty to thirty percent of the dose.
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: So you know, say you do a camera survey and hey,
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: I got ten dos using my property. If you shoot
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: two or three, you probably keep that deer herd right there.
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: If you shoot you know, four to five us a
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: chance show you're going to reduce it. So that's a
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: good rule of thumb as well. And that's what I
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: have used. We do summer camera surveys on our Pennsylvania farm.
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: I have every year for over twenty years. That is
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: exactly what I do to estimate, Hey, here's probably how
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: many different bucks are using our farm during the year,
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: and then this is how many doughs we're going to shoot.
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: We go into every deer season with a plan and
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: I tell all the guys hount in our land, you know,
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: we're going to shoot you know, eight to ten dos
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: this year. We're going to shoot you know, eighteen to
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: twenty dos this year. So that comes from that camera survey.
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: Not everybody can do that, So that's why we also
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: developed that dough harvest diagnosis sheet I mentioned, So you
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: just go through it and answer yes or no, and
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: then come up with with what your strategy should be.
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: Terrific And like you said, for probably three quarters of
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: the nation, the answer is an obvious yes. Definitely for
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: anyone in the bottom two thirds of my home state.
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: Here in Michigan, I think you'd be hard pressed to
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: find anywhere in this state other than the far northern
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: reaches where there's just not a pile of deer in
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: most areas that need this kind of action. But despite
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: that fact, people my you know, I have friends and
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: folks that I know who had the same questions, concerns,
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: or excuses for not shooting. Does beyond just well there's
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: not enough. So you wrote an article recently for the
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: NBA's website that covered some of these. I wanted to
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: talk through a few with you, and one of them
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: is something I've heard from people, which is, well, my
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: state has such a crazy high bag limit. You know
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: they they't like in Michigan. I think you can buy
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: ten dough tags. They're trying to shoot every day deer
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: out there. All these deer must be getting killed. There's
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: no way I should shoot a bunch of them because
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: everybody else is, or you know that I've been hearing
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: there's depredation tags being given out. I've heard of some
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: farmers shooting fifty deer every year over here. I better
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: not do it myself. Can you speak to that one
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: a little bit?
• 30:38
  Speaker 3: Sure? And you know when I get it, You know,
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: I'm the same way if I'm hearing what's going on
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: in my town or down at the you know, the
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: local bar or local coffee shop. You know, yeah, I
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: heard Mark shot three and he had people over his
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: private shot ten, and that story gets shared. Suddenly you
• 30:53
  Speaker 3: wonder why there's any deer left in your in your
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: whole township, the other gone. The reality of it is,
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: that's not true. The reality of it is, we monitor
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: harvest success rates from every state in the country annually,
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: and you know, less than half of the hunters that
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: go afield any year shoot a single deer, and about
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: half of those that do shoot bucks. You know, if
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: you're only going to shoot one deer, many people prefer
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: a buck, so most won't shoot any A good percentage
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: shoot a bux, which means then there's a large percentage
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: that don't shoot any dough. So we share some data
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: to show, hey, most people don't kill a single dough,
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: even though you have the opportunities to kill multiple dose
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: you know, all those years. The reality of it is
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: most are not. So that's the first thing to let
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: we try to share our folks, just to make them
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: aware we're not making this up. Here's what the data
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: actually says. You don't need to be afraid to shoot
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: one because you think they're all gone or that they're
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: over harvested. You know, most people just simply aren't shooting
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: that at all. So we try to make that available
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: because if hunters see that and start to understand that,
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: that's the first step to reduce in those barriers that
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: maybe we can convince them to pull the trigger on
• 32:02
  Speaker 3: a dough.
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: All right, here's another one. Well, I don't want to
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: shoot a dough in the late season when we're discussing
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: this right now, because that dough has already been bred
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: by the big giant buck that I hope is running
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: around out here, and I don't want to lose that
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: future buck. I don't want the genetics from that big
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: buck to disappear because I shoot the dough that he bred.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: What about that one.
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: I think from that one. I say, you know what,
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: You're right, you should have shot that dough back in
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: September or October. Then you wouldn't have had to worry
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: about it. There's a lot of benefits to early antler
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: this harvest, and I would love if we could shoot
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: all the dos on us, you know, in October. The
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: reality of it is that just doesn't happen. So we
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: get into you know, the rut, and then we're postbruck.
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: From a biological standpoint, it makes absolutely no difference to
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: that deer herd whether you shot that dough early in
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: the year or after she had been bred. Think about
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: like this. We know that a lot of the bucks
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: out there get in and on the breeding, and in fact,
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: research shows at about a quarter of all the twin
• 33:01
  Speaker 3: fawns we see aren't real twins, they have different fathers.
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: So we know that not only are a lot of
• 33:07
  Speaker 3: bucks breeding, we know that some does are bred by
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: multiple bucks. So between that we know and the other
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: research done on actual antler growth and who's siren who,
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: But from a hunting standpoint, mark we can't do anything
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: to impact antler genetics in the wild. We can absolutely
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: impact antler growth by making sure that there's not too
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: many deer for anaria, and making sure that bucks are
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: getting into older age classes. Those are two things that
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: hunters can do every single day. We can do absolutely
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: nothing about the actual genetics of what those those faons have,
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: you know, from the sires. So from that, if somebody
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: is saying, man, I don't want to shoot a dough
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: now that's bred from it, maybe have bred by the
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: biggest buck, you don't know, that probably was not bred
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: by him. And even if he was, you don't that's
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: not a guarantee that that faon will have big antlers
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: if it is a buck fund. So that doesn't even
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: need to come into you know what, the conversation at all.
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: So I want to reiterate or have you reiterate something
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: you said there for those people listening who are really
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: fired up about big giant bucks, they can't influence how
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: many big giant bucks they're going to have by shooting
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: call bucks. Because we've talked in the past about how
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: the as you just said, we can't really influence genetics.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: You can't influence it by making sure that the genetics
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: of a certain buck are passed on by not shooting
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: a dough. But there was something you did say could
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: influence the antlers of future deer, which is making sure
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: there's not too many deer in the landscape. Right, that's correct.
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: Age is the biggest influence for antler size, just letting
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: them get old enough to express what their potential is.
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: The next biggest thing is just nutrition, making sure they
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: you know what, And I will say this, I've been
• 34:49
  Speaker 3: blessed to travel across the country actually and across the
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: world to talk about white tails and work with white tails.
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: In almost every place I have been, those deer would
• 34:59
  Speaker 3: have been benefited from more nutrition, even in Southeast Ive.
• 35:04
  Speaker 3: I have been in some of the best whitetail country
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: in the world that grows some of the biggest whitetails,
• 35:08
  Speaker 3: and in those areas, those bucks could be even bigger
• 35:11
  Speaker 3: if there were fewer deer there and they had more food. So,
• 35:14
  Speaker 3: as hunters, we do that by enhancing habitat and by
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: shooting dos so that we reduce the number of miles
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: competing for that good food that we provide.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, moving down the list, how about well,
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: I don't want to shoot does right now or at
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: any time of year, because I don't want to accidentally
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: shoot a button buck, which will then be my future
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: booner that I'm working towards and spending all this money
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: on improving habitat for and got all my fancy hunting
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: gear to shoot. I don't want to shoot my bucks
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: by accident. What do you say to someone who's worried
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: about that, and how can we prepare? What can we
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: do to ensure that doesn't happen?
• 35:51
  Speaker 3: I think one tell them, hey, thank you for at
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: least considering shooting an analyst deer. Thank you for being
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: cognizant enough to understand the difference between buck vah dough
• 36:00
  Speaker 3: fonds and adult doughs, you know, and try to do
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: a better job from a manager standpoint, and shoot a
• 36:06
  Speaker 3: dough as opposed to a future buck, because by passing
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: buck fonnds, yes, you can have more bucks on the landscape.
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: But also by shooting that adult dough you are doing
• 36:17
  Speaker 3: a better job helping manage that deer herd by reducing,
• 36:20
  Speaker 3: you know, one of the breeding females. So that is
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: all very good. There's nothing wrong with being concerned about that.
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: In fact, it shows that you have a little more
• 36:28
  Speaker 3: respect for that deer herd and want to do a
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: good job as a steward. Now I'll say this, there
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: is nothing wrong with shooting fonnds. Absolutely nothing wrong with
• 36:37
  Speaker 3: either buck fonnds or dough funds. So you know you
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: don't need to feel bad about that. And there's a
• 36:42
  Speaker 3: great rule of thumb that shows you know, all of
• 36:44
  Speaker 3: your antlers harvest, as long as about ten percent of
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: that are buck fawnds, you're totally fine. You're not negatively
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: impacting the future of that at all. Now, if fifty
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: or sixty percent of your handlers harvest are buck fonnds,
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: you are absolutely going to negatively impact what you have.
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: But as long long as you keep that total antless
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: harvest to about ten percent buck fawns or lower man,
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: there is nothing wrong at all. So know that going in. Okay,
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: now I see some ant let this, dear, how can
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: I do the best job picking out or making sure
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: one is a dough and not a fawn. Well, if
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: you shoot them earlier in a year, it's easier to
• 37:19
  Speaker 3: tell because there's a greater size difference.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: I like that.
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: But now, man, those buck falls can be about as
• 37:25
  Speaker 3: big as some of the adult does, particularly the one
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: and a half year old doze. So with that, there's
• 37:31
  Speaker 3: a couple of things we can look at mark from
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: a physical standpoint and a behavioral standpoint that will help us.
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: So from a physical standpoint, fawns are still a little smaller,
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: but if we look at the bodies, like and if
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: you're seeing broadside deer an adult dough, if you look
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: at the space between her front legs and her back legs,
• 37:52
  Speaker 3: it is rectangular. That same area on a fawn is
• 37:56
  Speaker 3: more square because they're just not as long as a dough.
• 37:59
  Speaker 3: That's why it helps having multiple deer available, because just
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: looking at one you can be tricked pretty easily, but
• 38:05
  Speaker 3: if you have two there to compare, that makes it
• 38:08
  Speaker 3: a lot easier. If we can see their head, the
• 38:10
  Speaker 3: distance from a fawn's forehead to its eye is about
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: the same as it's eye to its end of its nose,
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: so that if you look at then's whole head in profile,
• 38:21
  Speaker 3: the eye is about right in the middle. An adult dough,
• 38:25
  Speaker 3: the distance from her forehead to her eye are shorter
• 38:28
  Speaker 3: than the distance from her eye to her nose. You
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: can see that long and I have identified so many
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: antlests here as a dough or a fawn based solely
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: on looking at that heads from the side. If we
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: see them from the front, a fawn's ears appear larger
• 38:43
  Speaker 3: relative to its whole head than a doze, so we
• 38:46
  Speaker 3: can use that as well. So ears, face, and body.
• 38:50
  Speaker 3: There's three things from a physical standpoint that we can
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: help differentiate between those two even before we get to
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: any of the behavioral stuff. So those are all great
• 39:00
  Speaker 3: indicators from a physical or a behavioral standpoint. Then we
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: can watch how they interact. Fawns are less wary than adults,
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: so they're almost always the first deer that shows up
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: at a food source, particularly a food plot or some
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: other area that doesn't have much cover. Maybe you're in
• 39:17
  Speaker 3: a you know, helping some oak woods and there's a
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: big open oak flat. You know, hey, they're often the
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: first one's in there as well. So seeing the first
• 39:26
  Speaker 3: deer come in, waiting the harvest on that one, you know,
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: until another one is present, can help you pick an
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: adult dough or Hey, if you want to shoot a fawn,
• 39:36
  Speaker 3: you know you can bet that you know what the
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: first one in there is a good chance it is
• 39:39
  Speaker 3: a fun if you have multiple deer there. Now you
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: can watch not only the size, but behaviorally as well,
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: who appears to be in charge. Oftentimes adult doughs will
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: go over, you know, and it can either smack a
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: fond to remove them from an area, or the faun
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: will follow the dough and it's very clear kind of
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: who's in charge. So we can watch some of that
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: behavior as well and do a really good job identifying that.
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: And from that, the last thing that we can look
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: at is if we see the head shape. Even without antlers,
• 40:11
  Speaker 3: bucks have a very flat head, So whether a buck
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: that has shed its antlers or a buck fawnd, it's
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: very flat between the ears. Dose have rounded heads, so
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: it's really really easy to tell that when they're in
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: summer coat. It becomes a little more difficult in winter coat.
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: But if we study and we can still see that.
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: So that's a great way to differentiate buck fawns from
• 40:35
  Speaker 3: dough faunds, buck fawns from adult does, or even bucks
• 40:39
  Speaker 3: that have shed their antlers from adult does. So with
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: a little bit of study, and I will say this,
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: it makes that way easier if we have some good optics.
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: So you know, don't go hunting without your binoculars. You know,
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: I never leave home without my vortex binoculars, and I
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: spend more time in them than I do my scope,
• 40:57
  Speaker 3: and I confirm what's going on there before I go
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: to my scope. So good optics really help. Not shooting
• 41:04
  Speaker 3: in real low light situations can help, or waiting until
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: there's better light can certainly help that as well. So,
• 41:11
  Speaker 3: you know, there's things that we can look at on
• 41:13
  Speaker 3: the deer, there's things we can observe from deer, and
• 41:15
  Speaker 3: there's some things we can do from a hunting end
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: as well to all, you know, improve the chances that
• 41:20
  Speaker 3: we're shooting adult dose and not buck faonnds or any
• 41:23
  Speaker 3: fond or even shed bucks.
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So on that shed buck topic, that's another one
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: that people are worried about. So the obvious thing, as
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: you described there, was to make sure to check out
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: that head with your buy no's and carefully study the forehead,
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: but from the body perspective or anything else when it
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: comes to determining or differentiating a mature dough from a
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: shed buck, are there any other things you would recommend
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: looking for?
• 41:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and that is a legitimate concern as well. And
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: I'm very cognizant when I'm hunting in late December or
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: January of watching an antlyst deer to make sure it's
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: not a shed buck. So one, I am making sure
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: that I use my optics like we just discussed. Two,
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: I am watching structurally on that deer bucks at that
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: time of the year. For most of the white tails range.
• 42:14
  Speaker 3: You know, my buddy's down in Alabama and Louisiana and
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: the place is at rut really late. This is a
• 42:19
  Speaker 3: little different for them, but for most of the ear
• 42:22
  Speaker 3: else of the country. You know where our buck's rout
• 42:25
  Speaker 3: in early to mid November, late season, once they have shed. Structurally,
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: looking at them, they are off and just thin looking.
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: They are rectangular between the front legs and back legs
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: like the dose we talked about. But they tend to
• 42:39
  Speaker 3: be slim because you know, they just don't eat much
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: during the rut, and there's a lot of data the
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: shows you know, they'll lose twenty to twenty five percent
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: of their body weight during the rut, so they can
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: get pretty slim. That's why a food sources. You know,
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: they're trying to eat all they can to put on
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: anything possible, you know, before we get into the full winter.
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: So looking at them, if you're looking at a deer
• 42:59
  Speaker 3: late seas I clearly see it's an adult. Can't really
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: see the head good, but just looking at the body,
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: if that body looks pretty round or pretty fit, it's
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: probably a dough. It's probably not a buck that's gone
• 43:13
  Speaker 3: through the riggers of the rut. Conversely, if you look
• 43:15
  Speaker 3: at it and go, now, that looks a little slim,
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: there's a better and an average chance show that that
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: can be a buck or it's a dough that's just
• 43:23
  Speaker 3: really nutritionally deprived. But that's something that I use Behaviorally.
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: Those bucks still act a little different from the does.
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: You know, once they lose their ramtlers, they know they
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: don't have them anymore, so they're not as apt to
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: you know, fight another buck. But they still often act
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: to be a little bit in charge, you know, over
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: the does. So if you see a bunch of deer,
• 43:42
  Speaker 3: particularly in you know, say a food plot or maybe
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: you have corn and you watch a deer come in,
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: that just seems to look like attitude is a little
• 43:51
  Speaker 3: more in charge or just kind of in many cases
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: that is a buck that shed their antlers. You know,
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: they don't often lose that whole attitude, you know, when
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: the antlers are going on, So just behaviorally there some
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: you can as well, But if I'm hunting in I
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: am just really really studying is that head flat or not,
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: and trying to pick up on those other cues, because
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: you know, man, a buck that makes it through, you know,
• 44:15
  Speaker 3: into late season, if he has shed his antlers from whatever,
• 44:17
  Speaker 3: you know what, I don't want to be shooting him either.
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: I want to make sure I'm putting my tag on
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: a dough, so I take extra care and I'm extra
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: cautious that time of the year.
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: Is tarsal gland stain something that can reliably help you
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: differentiate it all at that point in the year.
• 44:44
  Speaker 3: That's a great point. Sometimes. Yes, bucks and doze will
• 44:49
  Speaker 3: rub urine eight year round. They will do that. They
• 44:52
  Speaker 3: just tend to do it a lot more during the
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: rut and bucks tend to do it more during the
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: rut than dose. So once they're they're testosteron levels start
• 45:00
  Speaker 3: drop in and they're out of the ruck, they're not
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: rub urinating as much, but you still will see that
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: dark tarsal staining on bucks, and particularly older bucks that
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: have rub urinated a lot. It hangs around there a
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: lot longer than it does and does. So it's not
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: an absolute telltale sign every single time, but that's a
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: great suggestion mark and one thing that you can use,
• 45:22
  Speaker 3: you know, as one more clue to Hey, is that
• 45:25
  Speaker 3: likely a buck or is that more likely a dough?
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: So yeah, that's a really good tip.
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay. So another question, and this one isn't whether
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: this isn't so much a should you hunt dose or not?
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: This is a Okay, I've decided I'm going to start hunting.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: Does one of the other questions that you get is Okay,
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: which dough is the best to shoot? Because a whole
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: pile of them just came out into the cornfield er
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: just came out in front of me in the clearing,
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: and I've got a whole bunch of different ones. I
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: see some big ones, I see some little ones. I
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: see one with two fawns, I see one all by itself.
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: What is the best dough to shoot? If I want
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: to try to make an impact on the herd as
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: we are discussing, if I want to help manage the
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: dough herd to bring down that population or at least
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: stabilize it, what dough should I be shooting?
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: The older does tend to be better mothers. So if
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: you're they tend to recruit more fonds. So if you're
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: looking at reducing the deer herd, shooting an older dough
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: can help the most. However, we can't estimate age of
• 46:24
  Speaker 3: dose on the hoof like we can bucks, so that's
• 46:26
  Speaker 3: a very very difficult thing to do. So what I
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: tell people to do is and this is exactly the
• 46:31
  Speaker 3: advice that I follow. If I am looking at a
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: group of deer and I've identified, you know they're all does,
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: or there's doze and fawns, or you know, all the
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: deer at least all the adults there are dose, I
• 46:42
  Speaker 3: am picking the biggest one out. I am shooting the
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: biggest dough in the group. That is more likely to
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: be a dough as opposed to a fawn. It's going
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: to harvest deer from across the wide range of ages.
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: The biggest deer there is not necessarily the oldest. I
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: have seen two year old dough win big dough contest.
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: I'll see in three year old dough, four year old dough,
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: five year old dough. Kind Of like humans, some of
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: us tend to get a lot bigger than others. Some
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: just don't grow as big, so by harvest and the
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: biggest dough in the group, you're going to get the
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: most meat for the freezer, which is good, minimize the
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: chance of harvesting a fawn, and then you're going to
• 47:22
  Speaker 3: then also help harvest deer from across the whole range
• 47:25
  Speaker 3: of age classes, which is really good for the deer hurt.
• 47:28
  Speaker 3: Maybe as an individual landowner that's not important, but overall
• 47:31
  Speaker 3: that's very good. So that's my advice. And if the
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: biggest deer there was guaranteed to be the oldest, that's great.
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: But since we can't figure out which is the oldest,
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: sometimes behaviorally you can watch interactions in the more dominant
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: one tends to be the older one. But a very
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: easy piece of advice that I think across the board
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: works really well is pick the biggest one out so
• 47:55
  Speaker 3: that you can put the most meat in your freezer.
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've read recently about study came out somewhat recently
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: about the possibility of there being super does being does
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: that are disproportionately impacting the population? Is that something you
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: can elaborate on at all? Have you have you seen that?
• 48:14
  Speaker 3: I haven't seen that. I'm guessing they're probably talking about
• 48:17
  Speaker 3: ones that are recruiting more fonds maybe or just tend
• 48:20
  Speaker 3: to be better mothers, you know, because they would have
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: larger impacts, you know, on the on the deer herd.
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: So there's no doubt some do a better job recruiting fonds.
• 48:30
  Speaker 3: All of them, ninety nine percent of them are going
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: to be bred. Most of them will then be able
• 48:34
  Speaker 3: to deliver fonds. Some just are do a better job
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: recruiting them, and recruiting means they keep that phone alive
• 48:41
  Speaker 3: till they're six months of age and they get into
• 48:43
  Speaker 3: the fall deer herd. The most dominant does get the
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: best fawning areas. Oftentimes, the best fawning areas are the
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: ones that they are able to recruit the most fonds
• 48:54
  Speaker 3: from because it's where they can hide best from predators.
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: It's where you have the best food available to the
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: mother to feed that fond. So some of that mark
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: is that they just have qualities that make them better
• 49:06
  Speaker 3: at protecting fonds. Some of it is they're just the
• 49:08
  Speaker 3: dominant dough in an area, solid they have all of
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: the things stacked in their favor to be able to
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: actually recruit those fonds, you know, and nutrition is a
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: big thing there. If you take a phone, I mean
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: a dough on an area, the dominant dough, big healthy dough.
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: Take the quality of the milk that she's feeding her fon.
• 49:26
  Speaker 3: The quality of that is exactly the same as the
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: most nutritionally deprived dough on that area. One is not
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: better than the other. The difference is that dough that
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: has a bunch of food produces way more milk for
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: her fond So that fon will grow much faster because
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: they have a lot more resources, They grow faster, they
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: grow quicker than others. They are faster at an earlier
• 49:50
  Speaker 3: age than others, so they're better able to avoid predators,
• 49:53
  Speaker 3: and they tend to be bigger in the fall. So
• 49:56
  Speaker 3: that's why it's important for us to make sure that
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: we don't have too many miles on the landscape, because
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: then dose can actually raise more fawns. Every other fawn
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: on average is a buck fawn because they're born at
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: about a fifty to fifty ratio. So for people to
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: say I want the most bucks, I say, you know,
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: God bless you, I do too. I like to see
• 50:15
  Speaker 3: bucks and that keeps people hunting. Do that by shooting
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: enough does so the dos are as healthy as popular.
• 50:21
  Speaker 3: That's when they can recruit the most fawnds. That's how
• 50:25
  Speaker 3: you recruit the most bucks on the landscape. So, man,
• 50:28
  Speaker 3: when we do things right, it all works out good
• 50:30
  Speaker 3: to benefit us. And I believe the hunters want to
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: do things right, So sharing information like that with them
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: can help convince them of the need and the benefit
• 50:40
  Speaker 3: of shooting a dough.
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: Now, speaking of fauns, a lot of people have worries
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: or questions about shooting a dough with fauns. So we're
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: sitting there in the tree stand and a mature looking
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: dough and two fawns step out into the open in
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: front of you. What are your thoughts for someone who
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: is faced with the shoot or don't shoot question at
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: that point, because some people have worries about.
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: That, Absolutely, no great question. Most of our fauns in
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: the northern half of the US anyway, where where deer
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: are writing in November. Most of the phones are born
• 51:17
  Speaker 3: in May and June. That means they are wienable by
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: mid to late August. By ten weeks of age, they're wienable.
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: They could live on their own. Now, we don't have
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: deer seasons in August, partly because of that, by the
• 51:29
  Speaker 3: time our deer seasons start, those fawns are totally fine
• 51:33
  Speaker 3: to make it on their own if they have been orphaned.
• 51:36
  Speaker 3: So what I tell people is there is no biological
• 51:39
  Speaker 3: concern of harvesting that dough. Those fawns will survive, or
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: at least there's a good chance that they're going to survive.
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: The only time I would be hesitant is if those
• 51:50
  Speaker 3: fawns still have spots. If it's a spotted fawn, man,
• 51:54
  Speaker 3: there's a lot of benefit to leaving that mother with
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: him for a longer period of time. Now, obviously that
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: dough will continue to help them avoid predators in that,
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: you know, but we don't need to worry about most
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: of that for the most part. If the fawn is spotted,
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: don't shoot that dough. Give it fawn more time with it.
• 52:10
  Speaker 3: But if you're into deer season, that fawn, you know,
• 52:13
  Speaker 3: is not spotted, It is eating vegetation, it is going
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: to group up with other deer anyway, there is no
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: biological concern with shooting the mother. Now, if it just
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: makes you queezing and say I just don't want to
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: do that, I understand that, go ahead and shoot a
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: different do but understand, there is nothing wrong with you
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: or somebody else shooting that dough that has fawns with her.
• 52:34
  Speaker 3: It's not even guaranteed they're both her fawns because fawns
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: grouped together. And there's some research out of Pennsylvania where
• 52:39
  Speaker 3: they trapped deer and did DNA work and in many
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: cases the fawn or fawns that walk in with that dough,
• 52:47
  Speaker 3: they weren't hers. They weren't even related to her, you know,
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: maybe they lost their mother so they just grouped up
• 52:52
  Speaker 3: with her. So it's not a guarantee that you're shooting,
• 52:54
  Speaker 3: you know, their mother. It's just a dough in that area.
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: So nothing wrong at all with with with harvesting that
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: adult dough.
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: All right, So I'm convinced I need to do more
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: to manage the antler list deer population in my area.
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna go out there and shoot doze. But I've
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: listened to seventy two podcasts from Wired to Hunt about
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: how to kill big mature bucks. Nobody ever tells me
• 53:17
  Speaker 2: how to kill big old doe. Can I get Kip
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: Adam's top three tips for killing a dough in the
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: late season, since that's what we're talking.
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: Sure, I'm hopeing a bunch of folks have shot them early.
• 53:30
  Speaker 3: If you haven't, it's not too late. We still have
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: season so one. Once this run is over, you know,
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: doze now are looking also to get as much food
• 53:40
  Speaker 3: as they can getting into winter, so food sources are
• 53:44
  Speaker 3: an awesome time in the rut, those doughs are often
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: and heavy cover just trying to stop from being harassed
• 53:50
  Speaker 3: by bucks. So you know, hunting really heavy cover is
• 53:53
  Speaker 3: often advantageous. That's where we want to be in many
• 53:56
  Speaker 3: cases to catch those cruising bucks as well. But the
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: rud is pretty much over, winter is getting you know,
• 54:03
  Speaker 3: setting in dose. Need to feed as much as possible,
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: so food sources are perfect. If you have anything left
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: in food plots, if you have opportunity to hunt agricultural fields,
• 54:13
  Speaker 3: if you have an opportunity to hunt mask crops, if
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: you're in an all wooded area, find the mast, you know,
• 54:18
  Speaker 3: if there's any acorns left, any beech nuts left, they
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: want that. If not, find areas in wooded areas where
• 54:26
  Speaker 3: or wooded situations do you know that have a bunch
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: of young seedlings. They need those buds, so they're going
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: to do as much as possible to maximize calories that
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: they can take in. So I'm hunting food sources like
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: crazy late season. That is where we stand the best
• 54:42
  Speaker 3: chance to cross paths with a dough beautiful.
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: Have you ever tried any outside the box tactics to
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: fill a dough tag? Do you ever call? Do you
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: ever decoy? Do you ever I don't know, slip around,
• 54:55
  Speaker 2: spot and stock, anything that's a little outside of the norm.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: Is there anything like that worth considering?
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: I No, I don't know that I've ever called in
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: a dough in late season. I often continue to call
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: while I'm hunting. I was running this past Friday night
• 55:08
  Speaker 3: when I was sitting with my nephew in Pennsylvania. Our
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: run is mostly over, but hey, there's still some dose
• 55:13
  Speaker 3: or some bucks that are interested in that. So I
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: think it's fine to call anytime. Deer communicated a much
• 55:20
  Speaker 3: higher level through you know, sounds than many hunters realize.
• 55:25
  Speaker 3: So I have never called in a dough late season.
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: I don't know that that's one of, you know, the
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: most likely things to call in, but I wouldn't be
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: afraid to try it, you know, just because of the
• 55:37
  Speaker 3: amount of time that they do communicate. I think spot
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: and stock is totally fine. So I would be very
• 55:44
  Speaker 3: careful because this time of the year in much of
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: the white tails range, it gets loud to try to
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: sneak around. It's either you know, krusty snow or we
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: have ice or whatever. So I would be very careful
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: along those lines. But I wouldn't rule that out. I'm
• 55:58
  Speaker 3: thinking food first, and whatever I can do to get
• 56:01
  Speaker 3: myself in a position to catch one on food or
• 56:04
  Speaker 3: you know, or move into food as what I would do.
• 56:06
  Speaker 3: I would not be afraid at all. And actually I
• 56:08
  Speaker 3: would encourage people to set up outside that are different
• 56:11
  Speaker 3: stands that you have hunted most of the season in.
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: You've probably spooked some deer from those stands though, are
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: aware of where they had been, you know, chased, So
• 56:20
  Speaker 3: get into other areas. Maybe try take a saddle, you know,
• 56:23
  Speaker 3: and hunt out of a saddle in a place you
• 56:25
  Speaker 3: haven't hunted from this year. Maybe even just get out
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: and stand by a tree or sit in an area.
• 56:29
  Speaker 3: Maybe you can't hunt as long as we would have earlier,
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: so you know, maximize later in the morning catching deer
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: leaving food or just before an evening, you know, but
• 56:38
  Speaker 3: try spots that you haven't spooked deer from during the
• 56:41
  Speaker 3: course of the year, and you know, hit them from
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: a new area like that can can be a great suggestion.
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, one of my favorite things to do
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: in the late season part of the year, when I'm
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: focused just on dos is I will take the anything
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: is better than nothing approach. So i might not be
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: able to get out for a full morning hunt or
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: a full evening hunt, but I've got from eight thirty
• 57:06
  Speaker 2: to nine thirty in the morning after breakfast that could
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: just slip out maybe. So we've got these late firearm
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: seasons across many states these days for analyst deer. So
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: I might say, well, I'll have breakfast of the family
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: and then I'm going to go out for just an
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: hour with the gun, and I'm gonna go walk the
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: edges of some fields. And oftentimes that's not going to
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: work when you're trying to hunt for one specific mature
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: buck or something. But if you're trying to shoot any
• 57:27
  Speaker 2: antelust deer, you might happen to catch that dough that's
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: still feeding just before stepping into the woods on the
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: edge of the bean field, or you might actually catch
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: one when you glass over the hilltop and see that
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: there's one just inside of the cover about to bed down,
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: and you can sneak within one hundred yards or whatever.
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: I found those little kind of get it in while
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: you can kind of opportunities that are outside of the
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: box end up sometimes being possible when you're targeting antlers
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: deer and are really fun and when you're trying to
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: do whatever you can to fill an antlyst tag and
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: do your management responsibility. It's a great way to make
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: it happen when you maybe don't have all the time
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: in the world, or you're trying to fit it in
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: between different things. Those types of things are possible when
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: it's this kind of hunt.
• 58:15
  Speaker 3: I agree. And you know the nice thing is is
• 58:17
  Speaker 3: once deer seasons are done and hunters have left the woods,
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: you know, after a few days or a week, you know,
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: deer often start resuming some normal movement patterns anyway, So
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: it's a great opportunity for that, you know where that
• 58:28
  Speaker 3: may not have happened at the end of your rifle season,
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: but you know, hey, it can happen now. Another benefit
• 58:34
  Speaker 3: of that is, man, you have a perfect opportunity to.
• 58:36
  Speaker 4: Do some postseason or at least Yeah, it's not postseason,
• 58:39
  Speaker 4: but late scouting to see where deer are moving, you know,
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: once all the hunters will leave, and so yeah, you know,
• 58:45
  Speaker 4: I think that you get some information to help you
• 58:48
  Speaker 4: next year, as well as provide an opportunity to shoot
• 58:51
  Speaker 4: an antlerus deer late.
• 58:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah, or maybe even a buck late if you still
• 58:54
  Speaker 3: have your buck tag. Maybe you've already shot some antlous
• 58:56
  Speaker 3: deer and you're trying to add another one or still
• 58:59
  Speaker 3: can fill your buck teck.
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a great time to try something new,
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: that's for sure. What about the situation where somebody says, well,
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: you know, I already killed a buck this year, and
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: my I only need one deer worth of meat in
• 59:13
  Speaker 2: the freezer. Or maybe they kill two deer and they
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: don't need to they don't need any more meat. So
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: this person who has a full freezer and they're saying, well, yeah,
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: I would do this, I would shoot some does, but
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: I just I don't need to. I don't need to
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: eat it. What do you say to that person.
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: I think there's a bunch of folks that fall in
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: that category, And I say, you know what, we have
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: a perfect opportunity to help feed others today in the
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: us about one in seven households or food insecure, you know,
• 59:39
  Speaker 3: I mean, and they don't have enough meat. This is
• 59:41
  Speaker 3: a perfect way for a hunter to shoot a dough
• 59:44
  Speaker 3: which helps that deer herd, and then donate that to
• 59:47
  Speaker 3: a needy family. Maybe it's a somebody down the street,
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: maybe it's a friend or family member, can take it
• 59:52
  Speaker 3: to a soup kitchen. There are many venison donation processors
• 59:57
  Speaker 3: across the country that can take that and get it
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: into the food bank hands, and so that that is
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 3: a great thing that makes the hunters look like a
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: champion of society.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 3: Society loves it that we're solving this antlust deer under
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 3: harvest problem at the same time feeding people. You know,
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 3: and I get it, Mark, there's a there's a bottleneck
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 3: today with fewer processors than there used to be. I
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 3: see it in my state of Pennsylvania. I know it's
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: in your state of Michigan and elsewhere. We have met
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: with a lot of state wildlife agencies about this issue
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 3: and where are trying to develop a national map of
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 3: where venison processors are located. Pennsylvania is done, so we
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: started in my home state of Pa. We have that
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 3: map now and are starting to add other states to
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 3: provide a resource for hunters. Hey, here's a place you
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 3: can take a deer to have it, you know, processed.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 3: We have on those listed on there. Hey, these ones
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 3: are involved with venison donation program, so it doesn't cost
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 3: you anything to leave that. So I think this is
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 3: going to be a tremendous resource for hunters because a
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 3: lot just don't know where to go, you know, particularly
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 3: we lose more venison processors. So we actually are working
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: on trying to get some federal funding to increase the
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 3: number of processors that are available to hunters, but then
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 3: simultaneously making the current ones that are available, put it
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 3: on a map to make at a resource for hunters
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: to see where they are. So if you, even if
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 3: you're Freezer's full, I promise you there's somebody in your
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 3: community that can use it. Get with an NDA branch
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 3: in your area. We can help find a home for
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: or your state Wildlife agency or your state venison donation program.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 3: Somebody needs that, it needs it desperately, and as a
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 3: hunter man you can you can be the winner and
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 3: provide that for Yeah.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: So whether it be to get some information as you
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: just described regarding processors, or finding that deer diagnosis, the
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: dough harvest diagnosis one sheeter you mentioned, or connecting with
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: an NDA branch, or becoming a member. All of these
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: things I know are over on the Deer the National
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: Deer Association's website. Can you tell folks where to find that,
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: how to get involved anything else you want to leave folks, let's.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 3: Say, sure, you can go to Dearassociation dot com. We
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 3: provide all kinds of information there for for hunters. You know,
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 3: research information, hunting information, recipes, you know, the dough diagnosis,
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 3: harvest and all kinds of other stuff. You know that
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 3: that's all there for the take, and we encourage folks
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 3: to grab it. Sign up to be a member. There's
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 3: there are different levels of membership. Our paid membership provides
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: all kinds of discounts to some awesome hunting industry items.
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: If you don't want to be a paid member, we
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 3: have a free membership as well, which gets you our
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 3: weekly newsletter to keep you up to date with all
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 3: kinds of good information. So there's lots of ways to
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 3: be able to get involved and uh, you know, if
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 3: if you want to do something positive for the future
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 3: of our deer herds or our hunting heritage. Man being
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 3: being a National Dear Association member is the perfect place
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 3: to start.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: Terrific Kip. As always, I really appreciate your time. Thanks
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 2: for chatting all right, good to see you.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 3: My friend's great day.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: All right, and that's gonna do it for us. Thank
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: you for joining us, Thanks for being here. Hope you
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: had a very merry Christmas. Happy holiday, is a wonderful
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: time with your friends and family. Best to luck out
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: there in the woods. Good luck filling some more dough tags.
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: Let's keep the keep that momentum moving. Let's get some
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 2: dos on the ground. Let's fill the freezers. Share it
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: with folks, make a positive difference for the environment. Keep
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: our ability to manage deer within the world of deer hunters,
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: rather than having some other entity. You have to do it.
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: We can control the situation, We can influence this situation.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: We know the solution. We just got to get out
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: there and do it. So here's to having a great
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: antalyst season and until next time, stay wired to hunt.