Eight Weeks, No Deer

[FishDFly]

In October I put up 2 cameras, quickly had pictures of a very large "a-typical" buck which was still in velvet.

There was no patterning him, he would show up and then disappear for 10 days or so. This went on for most of November. I finally saw him for the first time during Thanksgiving, but it was very late in the evening and if I had to trail him I had no one to help. He received a pass.

I am extremely color blind and trailing in the dark is tough for me looking for blood. He was too good of a deer to possibly lose.

Xmas, I was looking for a missing cow in the deep woods where I found a very large scrape. I set up 2 cameras and when I returned to check them, he was on them.

He initially started as a 13, went to a 12 and now he is a 6 point, still in velvet. His buddies have worked him over really hard.

He has found a safe place to live and I will leave him alone.

I have read that some deer are not killable and now I believe that is true. I varied my routines to get to him and there was no way.

Cameras do serve a purpose in monitoring deer. They learn quickly that the cameras are there.

I have gone to the no flash cameras and the deer are still acute to the camera going off. They are hearing it.

I have pictures of deer staring at the cameras from with in 6" in the dark.

 

[sb 54 cal.]

Deer do know the cameras are there. Sometimes I think they even pose for it. Yes I also believe that some deer are unhuntable. Next to my place their is a large buck that some people have seen but never in daylight hours. Sometimes you feel good knowing that a large cagey buck is out there to help the next generation of deer come along.
Pappy

 

[Captjoel]

Sounds like the "Great Stag" from Bambi! I once had my sights on a very well antlered buck. He was what I would call majestic to say the least. I was using a very dependable cap lock rifle. One I had shot for several years with no negative issues. It was my most accurate rifle as well. Back on that buck, I had a good full silhouette and plenty of time to draw down on him. Gently squeezed the trigger and "pop"! The cap detonated without firing the main charge. The deer was feeding on an acorn pile and just raised his head looking in my direction. I actually had time to recap the rifle and took another well aimed shot....."pop"! The buck gave me the white flag off into the woods. I went home to the back yard and put a cap on the nipple.....boom! All I could do is scratch my head. Talking to some old timer about this incident a few years later, he just laughed and said "It just wasn't that old bucks day to die." He was sure right about that!

 

[Spikebuck]

I have read that some deer are not killable and now I believe that is true.

Cameras do serve a purpose in monitoring deer. They learn quickly that the cameras are there.

I have gone to the no flash cameras and the deer are still acute to the camera going off. They are hearing it.

I have pictures of deer staring at the cameras from with in 6" in the dark.

I think every deer is killable, but sometimes individuals (including me) don't have the time or perhaps not even the ability to pull it off. There's a chink in the deer's armor somewhere, we just don't find it for whatever reason, but someone else with a different experience background or aggressive hunting nature might. I know a few people that hunt aggressively and do stuff that the "experts" would never recommend, and that I do not do because I'm too darned timid and afraid of spooking something, yet they have great success on large mature bucks because of their "style."

Regarding cameras, it's not just the visible aspects of a camera but also the scent left on them when set. I know guys that always spray down their cameras before setting them and always wear rubber gloves when handling them. I do not follow that extreme, but I do have closeups of deer smelling my cameras, though they never seem too alarmed.

I also believe they see "low-glow" and "no-glow" LED camera flashes regardless of what the manufacturers try to tell us. Their vision is much different than ours in spectrum.

Interesting the buck never went out of velvet. I wonder what is causing that. He must have never gotten a testosterone boost...but then it sounds like he was working scrapes?

I once hit a huge "doe" with my car. It was laying in the ditch suffering so I had my Dad come out and finish it off. Upon examination we found the deer to be a very large buck with no testicles...and therefore no pedicles and a slick head like a doe! He must have been born without testicles as he had never formed them. No wonder he jumped in front of me...I bet the others bucks were really razzing him!!! :wink: :grin:

 

[FishDFly]

"Regarding cameras, it's not just the visible aspects of a camera but also the scent left on them when set. I know guys that always spray down their cameras before setting them and always wear rubber gloves when handling them. I do not follow that extreme, but I do have closeups of deer smelling my cameras, though they never seem too alarmed."

I have a feeling you are correct. For some reason deer this year seem more focused on scent than in years past. In a previous life I did smoke and the smell never bothered them.


"I also believe they see "low-glow" and "no-glow" LED camera flashes regardless of what the manufacturers try to tell us. Their vision is much different than ours in spectrum."

Agree.


"Interesting the buck never went out of velvet. I wonder what is causing that. He must have never gotten a testosterone boost...but then it sounds like he was working scrapes?"

I traded notes with Dr. James Kroll about the deer, his response was that he felt the deer had a hormone problem. He said that he had more reports of bucks in velvet in November this year than ever.

I studied the pictures of him and the rear hocks were black during the rut, does are normally white.

I talked with a Texas Parks and Wildlife Biologist and his thoughts were it was a doe in with horns.

Years ago I read somewhere if a buck is castrated, it will stay in velvet.

I do have pictures of him working 2 different scrapes and feel it is a buck. Both scrapes showed him with black hocks.

I did check my cameras from February 2014 and found a buck in velvet from a night picture. Do not think it is the same deer, deer was to close to the camera to make a good call.

Since I am retired I can vary my hunting times. Most folks hunt morning and evening Saturday and Sunday morning.

I hunted this deer during the week, varied my routes to the blind, varied if I drove or walked a considerable distance to get there. I hunted during mid-day and was never consistent when I hunted.

I talked with some select neighbors and no one has ever seen the deer.

I never focus on just one deer except for a couple of times and never did take the deer after the initial sighting.

Dr. Kroll feels that some deer cannot be taken and after over 50 years of deer hunting I believe he is correct.

What I really like abut the cameras is you know what is around. I use to wonder if I hunted one blind, what was at another that I was not in. Now I know what is going on.

I have a blind that is an evening blind. I had a large hog who patterned me and would come each evening 30 minutes after dark after I left. Took me 6 weeks but the weather turned on him, rained all night long and that was his mistake.

We are now using cameras on hog traps to monitor what the hogs are doing, before it was a guess on what they were doing.

 

[Patocazador]

"No wonder he jumped in front of me...I bet the others bucks were really razzing him!!!"

He probably committed suicide because he couldn't afford a sex change operation. :youcrazy:
.
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I started hunting deer long before game cameras were around and think it makes it less of a sport. I used to use all the new gimmicks available to try to get that monster buck. However, I gave all that up and went back to just playing the wind, physically scouting and quit using "no-scent", doe pee, etc. It's more fun now and using a bow or muzzy just makes it that much better.

 

[FishDFly]

I started hunting deer long before game cameras were around and think it makes it less of a sport. I used to use all the new gimmicks available to try to get that monster buck. However, I gave all that up and went back to just playing the wind, physically scouting and quit using "no-scent", doe pee, etc. It's more fun now and using a bow or muzzy just makes it that much better.

I started deer hunting in 1957 and have seen most of the fads come and go, such as the thing that rolled around on the ground which was supposed to imitate the sound of a buck breeding a doe.

I use cameras to monitor what deer are there, how many are in an area and to monitor my blinds for trespassers.

I do not focus on "monster" bucks, responsible ranch owners do not carry their best bull to the market to make hamburger meat.

We all get to do as we wish on our own ranches.

 

[FishDFly]

"I use cameras to monitor what deer are there, how many are in an area and to monitor my blinds for trespassers."

Also use them to monitor gates, houses and fence lines of those folks who are not to be there, Sherriff and Game Warden find them entertaining and quick prosecution if needed.

 

[Curt]

Richard This is a very interestin topic because the more we learn about the whitetail deer the better our success should be .Before we had children my wife would hunt as time permitted and one day she called me to help her get her deer out of the woods.Iwas helpin a neighbor build a house or something and by the time i got there she had them
2 bucks gutted and ready to drag out.

.One was a nice 8 pointer and the other was just as big but no rack had ever developed .He had all the other parts tho to make him a buck.
And he was not a yearling. We have seen some unusuall stuff when in the woods. Patacozador I think your right about leavin all the stuff (JUNK) at the stores and just learn to hunt. Curt

 

[Spikebuck]

I started hunting deer long before game cameras were around and think it makes it less of a sport.

I haven't found any advantage to game cameras other than seeing what's around and getting excited about it.

While bucks may be patternable in the summer, I have found no pattern after they go hard antlered. In fact, most of the ones I'm after go nocturnal as soon as they shed velvet. If a guy has a truly mature buck (minimum 4.5 yrs of age) coming along the same trail at x o'clock every day in daylight after going hard antlered he's a lucky guy, I guess. :grin:

What makes it far less of a "sport" than game cameras is TREE STANDS. :stir: To me, the ultimate sport is getting right on the ground eye-to-eye with them and adding traditional equipment...bows for sure, but also our traditional muzzleloaders... which are almost non-sport compared to a stick bow! :grin: Now, I still sit in tree stands, especially bow hunting, but the real action is on the ground.

 

[FishDFly]

When I see deer, I normally stop and let them go on the way they wish. I hate pushing them when they are close to a fence, they have a choice, up and over or under.

I had a buck run across the county road in front of me last week and before I could get fully stopped, he made a lunge to go up an incline and go over the fence. He landed on the fence, luckily he did not flip and get caught between the top 2 wires.

He landed short and I have a feeling he injured himself and is in a lot of pain.

I normally find a couple of deer each year who attempted to jump a fence and were caught when they flipped.

There is not a shortage of stuff sold to deer hunters to separate them from their money. I was in the feed store when a couple of guys came in to buy some deer corn. The owner asked them if they were hunting does or bucks as he needed to know which corn to sell them. They said "bucks", he said good, did not want to sell you doe corn.

They did not have a clue.

 

[FishDFly]

Texas has different rules depending on which county you hunt in.

In the county where I own land there is a minimum 13" rule for a buck to be legal. A buck with 12 7/8" on the ground will get you fined. Ground shrinkage is a major problem.

The cameras let a person study the bucks and decide if they are legal or not. In the county where I hunt you are allowed essentially one buck unless you want a spike, thus you have to be picky.

What the state has done for us is a generation of deer that are less than 13". If a deer gets to be 13" he is going on the ground, folks who are leasing land to hunt on want something for their money.

The cameras let us monitor hogs and coyotes. I have some interesting pictures of coyotes attempting to get to mature hogs at night.

Most deer hunters, at least in Texas, are leasing land. They arrive on Friday night, hunt morning and evening on Saturday, hunt Sunday morning and are on the way home about lunch time. Cameras let them monitor what is happening when they are not there.

They are a tool for the landowner, folks can use them or not.

 

[Spikebuck]

In the county where I own land there is a minimum 13" rule for a buck to be legal. A buck with 12 7/8" on the ground will get you fined.

What the state has done for us is a generation of deer that are less than 13".

Four years ago Minnesota put a "4-point on one side" rule into effect in the Southeastern zone. If the state is going to try to manage for some level of quality/maturity, I think the point count is better than an inch spread...people should be able to count to four! Hard to tell a 13" from a 12 1/2". In conjunction with this change, they made cross-tagging of bucks illegal. Net, groups can party-hunt and tag does for one another, but a person cannot legally shoot a buck and have another person tag it.

The 4-pt on one side rule is supposed to protect yearling class bucks. And I believe it does...at least the genetically inferior ones! A seven or eight point yearling is not that uncommon here...and being the least experienced bucks in the woods, will still get shot. That leaves the spikes, forks, and sixes as yearlings...in theory not as genetically robust in the antler department.

The one good thing is that large groups doing drives cannot count fast enough, so yearling 7's and 8's are escaping because the shooters are not sure.

I'm not a proponent or opponent of trying to force QDM on the general hunting population. I'm not convinced it's the right thing to do even though I personally hunt for mature bucks (or does). Not sure "I" have the right to "tell" some other guy what kind of deer he can shoot just to give myself a better opportunity at a mature buck. :idunno: Many of my friends are staunch supporters of the rule, but when I remind them they are right wing "freedom" advocates and against government intervention in our lives and then ask them how they can support government telling people what size of buck they can shoot, it's pure silence. :grin: