Gettin Worried

[BJohnson]

I know there has already been a lot of discussion about dropping deer numbers but this past week has elevated my concerns even more. Over the past couple weeks I spoke with every shotgun group I interacted with about their recent season observations (I have not hunted the slug seasons now for a number of years but regularly check in with people I know who do participate). Almost every person I spoke with confirmed their group saw less deer than in most previous seasons, some significantly less.

Since last Monday, I have also spent a decent amount of time driving in an attempt to observe if any deer were coming out to feed in any of the fields adjacent to the timber tracts that I hunt, some private and some public. Over that week, I have seen very few deer at all. I realize that this is just after the gun seasons but also realize that this was during some challenging weather systems also that I thought would prompt some feeding activity.

Last night I sat over a 120 by 200 yard standing corn plot on some public land. This plot was immediately adjacent to about 250 acres of public/private timber but close (within a mile) of over 1,000 acres of timber. I got skunked. The "skunked" part was not all together that surprising but the absence of any significant amount of deer tracks coming to this plot was astounding to me. I was shocked by the minimal tracks that I observed surrounding this corn plot during my 1/2 mile walk into and out of this area.

I hope I was merely unfortunate enough to have picked the wrong place to hunt last night. Otherwise, I am getting very worried about the true level of deer numbers in my area. Anybody else been surprised by their late season sightings, or lack thereof, so far ??

 

[Jerrod]

I hunt in ILL Brown county - 8 acres of standing beans - secluded from any roads - in past years this is a spot that is not uncommon to see 30-60 deer with the right conditions. last night was 18 degrees with 5" of snow on the ground. I did not see a deer. The deer numbers are extremely low in our area as well.

 

[River1]

Anybody else been surprised by their late season sightings, or lack thereof, so far ??

I have a good late season spot and the sign there is telling me I was wrong about my earlier concerns. It is actually even WORSE than I thought!

 

[Daver]

I also did not get a shotgun tag this year, but like you, I touch base with various people and groups that still do. I do not think there is any question about it...there are fewer deer this year and in some areas WAY FEWER. The people I talked to would have been hunting in north and central Washington County and also all over southern Davis County.

Driving to and from my farm in northern Davis County, traveling through Washington, Jefferson and a little bit of Van Buren counties too, this year revealed MANY FEWER deer sightings than in years past.

However, even with all of that, there still are areas where things are out of balance the other way, too many deer. But the common denominator here is always a tract or two that is essentially a sanctuary of sorts. This is a hard problem for the DNR to solve, some are still calling for more deer killed and many of us realize now that there are far fewer deer in a lot of the normal areas. It's a feast or famine thing.

 

[BJohnson]

My point to this post is not to bash the DNR. What I am trying to do locally in my area is encourage hunters to think about what they are observing and react to it. What really confuses me is the hunters who recognize that there are less deer but still go out and shoot the does ????????? I ask some of these people why and I have yet to hear an answer that makes any sense to me. My only complaint with the DNR is that the doe tags issued over the years have created a habit now that is going to take some time to modify.

 

[scottonbuck]

Went to a spot that is always good to see 25 to 30 deer a night and when was all said and done I saw 2 deer a tiny doe and a year and half six point. Four nights out and total deer spotted is at a whopping 6. The next few nights are going to be spent out driving and scouting looking for the deer. It does me no good to sit where the deer are not at.
Its going to be a tough season for sure but Im due for one.

 

[JNRBRONC]

Yeah, deer numbers are down in my area, but what surprised me was the lack of shotgun hunters. In the past I'd see three or four pickups loaded with orange clad hunters go by, headed for their next drive. Sometimes they had hunters in the back of the truck as well. I NEVER saw any of these groups this past shotgun seasons. I saw a few solo shot gunners head out. A time or two I saw a small group of two or three hunters working a patch. Not sure if the large groups have headed to southern Iowa where there are more deer or what.

 

[sep0667]

The areas around my house in eastern and southeastern polk county where typically in late December and early January where I see fields or hillsides that typically will have 20+ deer at times are only producing usually no more than 5. Also once we ge snow I pay a lot of attention to the tracks and where deer cross the roads and I've seen huge decrease in the number of crosses and tracks.
I have a couply uncles that party hunt shotgun in Mahaska county and usually they get 10-15 deer or so, this year I e-mailed one and they only had one drive where they even saw deer and were only able to get one. Keep in mind that they farm and that makes them happy, they don't want any deer at all, and these past few years have used countless antlerless tags.

 

[blake]

Where are the deer at?

The number of hunters participating in this years first and second season shotgun seasons was also down in Page County according to my resources.

The complaint that I heard from many that did hunt was deer numbers were down. Some stated that they didn’t see many or any big mature does.

So far I have yet to talk to any Late Season Muzzleloading hunters that are seeing any mature bucks.

I realize that in past years I have rarely seen any mature bucks until the last 4-5 days of the late ML season. I hope the weather cooperates this year; I would really like to get an opportunity at a nice buck.

 

[hillrunner]

I'm kind of an outsider on this deal being from the wrong side of the state. With that said, what was everyone thinking would happen when they were shooting pickup loads of does every year? I thought that reducing the population was everyone's goal? We reap what we sew.
The problem we have now up here, is everyone on this side of the state is catching doe fever as well. Even though they don't offer any antlerless only tags up here,(we don't need them) people still seem convinced we have way to many deer. The farmers get depredation tags and hand them out to the hunters like candy on Halloween. Things are going to go from not so great, to plain depressing in a big hurry in my area.

 

[Booner]

I hear ya Brent, I'm home for the holidays and have a late muzz tag in my pocket. I have gone out the past couple days and sat from 1 to 5:20ish and have seen the same 5 deer each time I've been out in the standing corn field. It's mind boggling to me that our county got any bonus tags at all let alone 100. I have a good hunch that next year our area and the surrounding counties will not be given any, which a great thing in my eyes. I'll without a doubt be eating my muzz tag before i shoot a doe.

 

[TheMadCatter]

I hope I was merely unfortunate enough to have picked the wrong place to hunt last night. Otherwise, I am getting very worried about the true level of deer numbers in my area. Anybody else been surprised by their late season sightings, or lack thereof, so far ??

Not in the least bit where I live you used to see 10 maybe 15 deer 3 years ago and this year I saw about 80-100 on our place and or our friends place. But we do have about 300+ acres of CRP on the north side of our place. The only thing I've seen drop it deer but rabbits didn't do so well last year or this year I saw about 100-200 wild rabbits last year I've seen 1 this year and I've even gone out and hunted them. Phesants are having MAJOR drops where I live to it seems Deer and Coyote are taking over.

 

[Altiman94]

We will all talk about this until we are blue in the face. I hope the DNR is listening and will drop the # of doe tags down. Eventually they will lose hunters due to less deer. Then, NR will no longer want to come to IOWA because they won't see any animals. A lot of our problem is areas being overhunted and the lack of public ground. It's pretty rare these days to see a decent amount of deer on public land. At least, it is where I'm at.

 

[SEIowaDeerslayer]

Yeah, deer numbers are down in my area, but what surprised me was the lack of shotgun hunters. In the past I'd see three or four pickups loaded with orange clad hunters go by, headed for their next drive. Sometimes they had hunters in the back of the truck as well. I NEVER saw any of these groups this past shotgun seasons. I saw a few solo shot gunners head out. A time or two I saw a small group of two or three hunters working a patch. Not sure if the large groups have headed to southern Iowa where there are more deer or what.

There aren't more deer in S. Iowa, at least in my neck of the woods. I haven't seen one deer during late muzz, and during 1st shotgun I only saw a 120" 8 cruising and 2 does...passed on all 3. Hardly any gun fire was heard. I also noticed that there are still plenty of doe tags available. I think a lot of guys stayed home this year after blowing a lot of money on tags last year trying to fill their freezer. Let's face it, the average deer hunter in Iowa is the weekend warrior and hunts 2 days out of the year, wants to shoot their deer and go home and watch football. 10 years ago you could easily do that, but its been increasingly more difficult over the last 3 or 4 seasons. Most guys just aren't willing to put in the time.

Enough does will get shot to keep the herd balanced just with any sex tags and offering doe tags during the regular seasons. The DNR needs to screw their heads back on straight and just do away with the doe seasons and reduce the quotas. If they keep up with this stuff we're going to lose hunters, period. I think poachers and the weather are also contributing, something they need to factor in. I bet only 75% of the harvests are actually getting reported as well. I still know of groups of guys that refuse to take the time to call in their deer.

Either way I'm afraid we're screwed. When does stop being shot and less guys take to the woods, we're going to get slapped with the stupid earn a buck program like Wisconsin did. But, I guess its human nature to destroy its resources, and our deer herd is no exception.

 

[gundog870]

Driving my late season loop where I usually see 60-100 deer in a night is now at 20-30. Unbelievable.

Now this year with the majority of the fields being plowed under. I believe that the does that were going to typically going to have twins and triplets, will now have a lone fawn this year. screwing it up even more.

 

[bowtech150]

I made a post earlier about this and more I read about this the worse I feel this is getting. We have a farm 260 acres and left a cornfield untilled, I have been checking it and there are hardly any tracks. This is so strange to me because the last couple years couple years I have watched about 250 deer at one time no joke head to a field of ours. This year honestly I have seen the same 10 does thats it. I know there are other deer on the farm just not moving till way late but with the weather like it has been there should be no reason that they wouldnt come out on unpressured land to feed.

We need to have a limit of how many deer we can kill for ex. a gun party shooting everything they see its true no matter what anyone says. If you ask me its just plain dumb to go out and shoot 25 freaking deer in one day. we are hunters not SHOOTERS!! We keep it up its gonna be like turkeys that were non existent in iowa till the 60s. Will we have to put money in to replenish the deer populations again down the road just things to think about.

 

[J_Barton]

If you ask me its just plain dumb to go out and shoot 25 freaking deer in one day. we are hunters not SHOOTERS!!

The 90% of deer hunters that were brainwashed by Farm Bureau AP News releases do not read this site, nor do they understand basic deer biology in their hunting area. Just like everything else in life, they act like sheep and do as told. "Too many deer, kill them".

It took many years of education to convince most hunters to pass on young bucks. It's the same thing with over-harvesting antlerless deer in your immediate hunting area- it will take several years to figure out it's time to cut back. Unfortunately, that's too late. The sad part, if you take too many antlerless deer, the buck hunting does not necessarily improve. The breeding stock that produces young bucks is now gone.

 

[Jdubs]

I wrote this on a different thread.

Guys be careful. Don't go the way of Pennsylvania. Those who set license allocations play on if we give them a tag they will fill it premise. In PA they increased the doe tag allocation and everyone jumped in with the, " if I don't shoot it someone else will mentality". Ten years later PA deer populations are in the dumper. If you have no girls you have no little ones, and no girls for the big boys to chase. I like QDMA but I sometimes believe its an arm of the insurance companies. You shoot one adult doe you are really shooting three. Refrain from all the bonus seasons and take only what you believe is necessary for your land.

 

[G6]

I'll say it again, the hunters MANAGE the population not the DNR, you shoot all the does don't complain.:thrwrck: I'll be buying two tags next year (bow and muzzleloader) and they will be BUCK tags only even if they say any sex on them.

 

[YtailFreak]

With that said, what was everyone thinking would happen when they were shooting pickup loads of does every year? I thought that reducing the population was everyone's goal? We reap what we sew.

I'll say it again, the hunters MANAGE the population not the DNR, you shoot all the does don't complain.

Let them does walk!!