Good hunting spot gone bad

[WEKILLDEER]

A few years ago I went to a new "honey hole." The first three years were phenominal. I shot a 170-180 buck each year. I also saw many good 140-150 bucks that had promising futures. The last two years have I have seen lots of smaller deer but the # of deer in the 150+ class has dropped off. A guy I hunt with says that deer run on a cycle, after so many years it is natural for the #s of quality deer to shrink. He says that he has had his "honey holes" in the past go from great to poor and then never regain their #s of good deer. I really hope that this spot doesnt end up like that and that the poor horn growth is due to the dry conditions that we have had lately. Have any of you guys had a good spot gone bad? Why?

 

[sageadvice]

LAST EDITED ON Dec-01-07 AT 06:57PM (MST)[p]From the mid 70's to mid 80's i helped my mulie crazy Uncle patrol a large ranch that bordered up against the Ruby Mts. National Forest in Nv. He'd trade his gas and these patroling duties for exclusive permission, him and me when i drew a tag, to hunt this ranch and very access limited, N. Forest land above it. This 100k acre ranch was a honey hole if ever there was one. Every day we would count over a hundred deer and 25-40 nice bucks with an occational slug mixed in. The numbers and the bigger toad bucks got very scarce toward the end of this period. No reason that we could see. The amount of deer taken was minimum, habitat was getting older but still plenty of it, and the deer genetics was proved out from previous years. There just got to be fewer deer and hardly any average bucks let alone any monsters.

It actually got so bad that my uncle moved, dratts, to Wyoming around 1985, a move he later regretted, in search of big mule deer. We both never had it so good and i probably never will again.

 

[old_man_of_the_hills]

Bad horn growth? Yes. Preditors? Yes. Hunting pressure? Yes. Winter kill? Yes. All those things can hurt the bucks in a herd...but deer numbers don't "cycle" on their own and it's not "natural" either. If the good bucks go away, there's a reason.

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This is my post

I've just pissed in my pants.......and nobody can do anything about it.

 

[eelgrass]

One year I found a couple of 40 acre cut blocks that had a Forest Service gate across the only access road into them. It was a very steep climb up the mountain to them. When I first found them they were loaded with deer. I would almost always see two or three bucks a day just in those cut blocks. They were both surrounded by virgin timber. I never saw a soul in there. Then one year I hiked up in there and the deer were gone. Just up and disappeared. I found two fresh lion kills and thought that was the problem. So I gave it a rest for a year. I went back the next year and stll no deer. No sign of life at all. I've hiked in there every year since and still nothing. The young trees are getting pretty big now and will soon crowd out the good feed. All that's left are memories. Why? I have no clue! It's very common in blacktail country though.

honeyholes aren't forever, so enjoy them while you got them.

Eel

 

[old_man_of_the_hills]

Forage changes fast too, especially in years after a fire

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This is my post

I've just pissed in my pants.......and nobody can do anything about it.

 

[eelgrass]

>Forage changes fast too, especially in
>years after a fire
>
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>This is my post
>
>I've just pissed in my pants.......and
>nobody can do anything about
>it.

old-man, ain't that the truth! You have about a 3 to 5 year window in blacktail country!

Eel

 

[WEKILLDEER]

Where I hunt it is really open country. No predators, Good water, and fairly low hunting pressure. I really see no reason for deer to move. I hope this spot contiues to produce, if not, back to the drawing board i guess.

 

[thebuckstopshere]

I went up a canyon last weekend where I used to see a lot of deer, and have seen a number of decent bucks all through the 1990's. I didn't see a deer. I did see about 50 head of elk.

 

[cabinfever]

Wekilldeer & Sageadvice

The answer is genetics.Think about how rare certain genetic traits are in humans. How many humans have children that grow to be 7'6, or midgets. It's no different in mule deer. I think you could round up every yearling buck on a unit like the paunsaguant and 20 bucks may have the potential to grow racks over 200. 20 years later you could preform the same test and you might get 5 bucks with the genetics to grow a 200+ inch rack.Still you could conduct the same test and get 30 bucks that grow racks over 200. My point is, it is a roll of the dice when it comes to genetics.Than throw in the fact that only 3 of those 20 gentic studs live long enough to grow there full potential racks. Heck, just look at the world record NT Broder buck killed in 1926. There hasn't been a buck killed in the last 50 years that has even come close. Same with the Burris buck. No one has come even remotely close to breaking this record in 35 years. BIG Muley bucks are just genticly rare.

 

[old_man_of_the_hills]

But WEKILLDEER is not talking about some freak-antlered giants...he's talking about nice bucks, the size of buck that can be found nearly anywhere in the mule deer's range, if given adequate forage and time to mature.

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This is my post

I've just pissed in my pants.......and nobody can do anything about it.