_Dan

I tried not to get involved in these threads, but I can't hold my breath any longer. I hope to shed a little light on the QDM bashers with my own real world experience. I gurantee if you have seen what I have, you would change your tune.

Also, let me point out that QDM is being mixed up with QAM (Quality Antler Management)around here a little too much. Bigger bucks are in fact a SIDE BENEFIT of the QDM movement, but are not the objective.

Now to my real world experience, how we as game managers have messed up and why QDM is the right choice.

I am EXTREMELY fortunate to be able to hunt an area that has almost zero hunting pressure and one area within this area that, in fact, has zero hunting pressure, except from my family. This is an area that has no human traffic and most of the deer have never seen ahuman before. The buck to doe ratio is almost 1:1. There are natural predators, wolves.

We as "game managers" have failed miserably. Our first mistake was to eliminate thenatural predators because theywerekilling "our" animals. The natural predators, wolves,are not selective hunters. They do not care if it is adoe, fawn,sick, weak, or a healthyand mature buck.In early game management wethought that more deer was better. In that old school of thought, (which many still posess)only bucks should be killed. These two factors have solely caused the huge boom and problem in the population.

In anotherpost someone mentioned the days when he saw very few deer and hunting was a challenge. Over the years this same person, like many others, killed only bucks and left the does to breed.How many of these does actually died from year to year? Very few. Why? There was no longer a predator to take them out of theherd, the wolves were in fact gone. Now we have the problem of the buck to doe ratio getting out of whack. In the natural world, and healthy herd, the buck to doe ratio would be nearly 1:1. You could argue that we have "farmed" our population to be as large as it is today. (I've heard that term thrown around recklessly as well)

If we are to be used as a tool for game management and want to keep our hunting traditions alive, we need to change. Drastically. The idea of kill what you want, as long as its legal, is a very naive way of thinking and needs to fall by the wayside. Along with the idea of the more deer I see while hunting, the better.

Theidea of QDM, (not QAM!)is a very powerful tool and very simple. Shoot more does and only mature bucks. By doing this you bring the buck to doe ratio closer and it begins to resemble the natural world, before we showed up andbotched it.Its as plain and simple as that.Though most people don't like it, because they then won't see as many deer.

I'm not the best at transfering my thoughts from my brain to the screen. I probably left some holes in my thinking and will be back to fill them in.

It all seems pretty black and white to me. Then again, I have been to the promised land of deer hunting and have seen what99.9% of people will never see in their lives.A truely undisturbed and natural deer herdlivingand thriving next to the greatest quality deer managers out there, the wolf.

GMMAT

I agree with everything you said/say.....but you'd probably be taken more seriously if your signature said

"NANNY OR NOTHING"

Jeff

_Dan

LOL I figured someone would bring that up. The reason I say "Boonie or Bust!"is because I have a personal challenge to shoot at least one "Booner" in my life. Though I will probably never enter it in the books, but it would look great on my wall.

Madjac20

Good post, Dan.

wis_bow_huntr

I agree with you as well, but in some areas its just not possible to post as a QDM area. Why? Well in Wisconsin if you post your land as QDM, you have to let so many hunters (public) hunt that property per year. And if we havent had a hard enough time with tresspassers already in the last few years on our property. Everyone and their dead ancestors wants a piece of our property. Not just because of recreational value but because of the value of whats in the ground. We have had granit companies from all over the state want a piece of our land. Also have had housing developers offer us very very large substantial amounts per acre for our land, always being declined. Therefore why make a situation worse than it already is. We do not post our land as QDM because of the hi risk factor it would place among our family, friends, neighbors and relatives. Yet we did start our own private QDM with in our family. Forbow season only though. Between the days of Sept 18th-Nov17th bucks must have no less than 8 points and be older than 2 1/2 years of age and if the law permits, we can shoot any doe as long as its no younger that 11/2 years of age.We just starteddoing this, this year as our buck to do ratio is very low in hopes to harvest larger bucks off our property with in the next 2-4 years. The largest antlered rack taken off the farm was a 9 pointer back in 1995. The largest bodied deer was a 240lb 8 pointer (dressed out and weighed offically). See pic(s). We have never taken anything larger off our farm than the 9 pointer. Were not after large rack deers as we can not eat the antlers anway but what were trying to accomplish is raising larger bodied, more mature deer, but that boone and crocket buck or pope and young buck sure would be nice. If anyone thinks that we could do something different throw your ideas my way id like to hear some. QDM can be anything that the owner or the hunters desire or concider a QDM deer. This buck was concidered management buck.

wis_bow_huntr

and another pic of the buck hanging next to a 140lb doe.

Germ

That right there is it, in a nut shell

GMMAT

But why wouldn't you shoot the younger does (younger than 1-1/2.....if it were for management puposes), then? I'm curious.

Jeff

Germ

Jeff you would want to shoot the olde doe's. This way the younger ones get bread with the healther deer. The old genetics "die out". If your area was really bad I would target the mature deer.

GMMAT

Germ....

This goes against everything I've ever heard about QDM. What "I" have heard....is the youger does are likely the smaller ones (stand to reason)...and that they're likely going to come into estrous and be bred if not taken from the herd. Her offspring will be not as healthy as those bred from a mature doe.

I've seen MANY QDM types on TV state this theory....including uncle Ted. He's a BIG proponent of taking doe fawns out of the herd in lieu of mature does (IF GIVEN THE CHOICE).

I'd like to hear nore about this...in hopes of learning something before I enter the woods on Saturday for THIS PURPOSE, alone.

Also.....if you've got a mature, healthy doe....WHY would you want her out of the gene pool?

Jeff