Buck vs Doe

[flatcreek]

In NJ they suspended deer hunting a couple times for several years. Once around 1860 and again around 1900. They imported deer in the early 1900s to build back the herd. Think this may have from war or hide hunting.

 

[waksupi]

We're up to a tall squaw's butt with deer here, and antlerless tags are plentiful. One year you could get 28 tags down in the Bitterroot. I shot a doe opening day, just because the weather was nice, and she was close to the meat pole. I have a wall full of antlers from the past 55+ years I haven't ate yet, so I could see no reason to save any more.

 

[Terrier]

I'm fortunate enough to live in Middle TN. Deer season starts the last Saturday in September and runs through to the 1st Sunday in January. The limit in Middle TN is 2 Bucks per year, but you can take up to three does PER DAY for the entire season. Of course, there are Archery, Archery/Muzzleloader and Archery/Muzzleloader/Gun seasons, so you have to abide by the method of take as the season wears on, but we have way too many deerses. TWRA doesn't issue "tags" anymore, so all you have to do is check in your harvest with their on-line app and you get a "check-in number." No inspection stations or log books anymore.

Out of 98 days, you can take 294 does per year, if you're so inclined, really lucky, and have the energy. If you qualify for the young hunter weekends, you could bag an additional 12.

I've only taken 3 does in a day once. Once was enough! I thought I was gonna die by the time I had the last one field dressed and in the truck.

 

[OldMaineWoodsman]

I have never taken a doe, even as a kid. Growing up in CNY it was bucks only unless you had the old "doe permit." Back then that meant one between I think four or five of you.

Later while stationed and living in Maine it was bucks only, one deer per season.

Living in Virginia I still try to get my head around the fact that I can take up to four deer a season. I am only interested in a buck, with a self-imposed antler restriction of six-point or better. But I'm 64, only hunt them with a muzzleloader, and have reached the point where I just enjoy being able to hunt and be outside. I actually enjoy watching the does and spikes walk past. I still get the same feeling I did as a 16-year-old just learning, maybe more so.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

I'm 76 this month and when I grew up in NJ we could only shoot bucks. As I got older there were option like a doe day to shoot does. I was taught that when you shot a doe you killed 2 deer for next year, witch there is probably some truth to. Wonder what other think about this and in colonial time what did they think or do. Imagine when hungry they did what they needed. To be clear I have shot doe, not many.

When I was a boy there was no doe season in Maryland. Now doe are fair game. What changed was not just numbers of doe, but ability to reproduce. Fifty years ago it was uncommon for doe to have twins, and very rare for them to have triplets. Now it's uncommon for them to have triplets, which means the herd is getting very large. This is due to safe areas and abundant fodder.

With such numbers, and with them crowding into "non hunt" areas they are becoming quite destructive, not just to the manicured gardens of the wealthy, but also to the parklands where they are expected to reside. Further, they are running their own food supply low, so that instead of having healthy, robust immune systems, they are compromised because they are on "short rations". Thin the herd, and this is self corrected, and the best way for that is by hunting.

As far as the colonials or the natives, meat is meat. Deer were quite elusive even before European contact with North America because, humans were one of several apex predators after deer. In fact the Can-Tuc-Kee area of the Ohio Valley was actually a massive game preserve that numerous Native American Nations had agreed not to settle within, but allow all the nations to conduct hunting parties, but not make war, to facilitate all having some venison and leather every year.

LD

 

[kipcarter]

You're exactly right. What I was referencing was strictly for eating purposes, but still you're exactly right about the taking of so many deer and the reason for doing so. I don't know if that was why Virginia had a conservation law that far back or not, but possibly so. Virginia was settled much earlier than SC. The English settlers who came to stay didn't arrive in the current Charleston area til 1670. I've read about the "hide trade" in SC during the early 1700s, may have stated as late as the late 1600s, where wagons full of deer hides made their way from the current upstate to Charles Towne to be shipped to England. BTW, I see you're in Heath Springs. Did you graduate from Andrew Jackson? I did in 1976 and my wife in 1980. We're both originally from Kershaw, but she passed away in January 2021 and is buried in Kershaw. I still live in Mt. Pleasant across the river from Charleston, where we moved in 1987 after I resigned from the Army. Most of her remaining family and mine are still in the Camden-Kershaw-Heath Springs and Lancaster area.

I did not go to AJ but some of my children and grandchildren go there. I live up on Flat Rock Road in Congressman Richards old home.