Ilegal 9 point

[bossbowman]

except we've also grown wiser since back then. Biology and science has been proven thanks to the hard work done by A&M and the king ranch that you practice QDM because it's the right thing to do for a healthy herd. Even the antler restrictions have worked and deer populations are soaring.

The old way was wrong.. don't let your kids grow up learning the wrong way.

As time goes on more and more people are learning the correct way and if you go by the "it's brown it's down" mentality you will be the outcast.

Like it or not that's the way it is now.

[Leemo]

Bean dip

[OldRiverRat]

except we've also grown wiser since back then. Biology and science has been proven thanks to the hard work done by A&M and the king ranch that you practice QDM because it's the right thing to do for a healthy herd. Even the antler restrictions have worked and deer populations are soaring.

The old way was wrong.. don't let your kids grow up learning the wrong way.

As time goes on more and more people are learning the correct way and if you go by the "it's brown it's down" mentality you will be the outcast.

no one is saying "if its brown it's down" but you. we have laws and we stay within those laws but i will say if it makes me an "outcast" that I let my kid shoot a legal 2 year old buck then put me in the corner.

my kids are perfectly happy getting to go HUNTING and getting to KILL something without the stress of thinking about "managing" the herd.
ITS A FREAKING DEER and god will make more of them, i know because i see it every year. As they get older they will develop more patients and their desires to shoot bigger animals and pass on the smaller ones will also develop. For now they are kids and they get excited when they shoot a buck or a doe and that's the way it should be.

by the way I am in favor of the AR restrictions but all this "Deer Management" is over the top. If i can drop my 14 year old daughter off a the deer blind and pick her up later and she has a legal deer on the ground, and she did it all on her own, then that makes me more proud as a dad then having to sit there and dictate to her what she can and can't shoot not to mention the self confidence it builds for her to continue hunting and maybe, hopefully, one day lead her to teach her kids (my grandkids) to hunt.

[Low Fence]

no one is saying "if its brown it's down" but you. we have laws and we stay within those laws but i will say if it makes me an "outcast" that I let my kid shoot a legal 2 year old buck then put me in the corner.

my kids are perfectly happy getting to go HUNTING and getting to KILL something without the stress of thinking about "managing" the herd.
ITS A FREAKING DEER and god will make more of them, i know because i see it every year. As they get older they will develop more patients and their desires to shoot bigger animals and pass on the smaller ones will also develop. For now they are kids and they get excited when they shoot a buck or a doe and that's the way it should be.

by the way I am in favor of the AR restrictions but all this "Deer Management" is over the top. If i can drop my 14 year old daughter off a the deer blind and pick her up later and she has a legal deer on the ground, and she did it all on her own, then that makes me more proud as a dad then having to sit there and dictate to her what she can and can't shoot not to mention the self confidence it builds for her to continue hunting and maybe, hopefully, one day lead her to teach her kids (my grandkids) to hunt.

Well said on all 3 paragraphs!

[Javelin]

can you show me one? i like seeing all the mature <13" bucks, along with the 4yo spikes





you guys make it sound like MLD is just something you can sign up for. explain the "too small" comment, as an owner of 50 acres that wouldnt qualify for MLD, i am interested to see what you mean, that my place is too small.



i am in favor of AR, i have 2 sons and we have sat and watched <13" bucks a few times this year, i had to explain to them why we cant shoot them and a squirrel ended feeling the wrath of the 7-08 (a barnes vor-tx will literally gut a squirrel at 20y) because of it.

that I know of there is no minimum acreage to sign up on. now you may only be allowed 1deer on that 50 acres, but in reality that's probably all that should be shot. shooting more than that is just taking deer from neighboring properties.

[Greenheadless]

you guys make it sound like MLD is just something you can sign up for. explain the "too small" comment, as an owner of 50 acres that wouldnt qualify for MLD, i am interested to see what you mean, that my place is too small.

I know the place I have in lavaca county is part of a cooperative that is under the MLD program. We get a few doe tags and only one buck tag every other year, but it is only 30 acres, so is fair.

[UrbanBuck]

Sounds good to me..... less people : )

[JeffK]

OP..good for the boy to make a unselfish decision and also have the opportunity to watch an older buck. Hopefully, it pays off for him next year with that same ol' buck.

To others, I don't think AR was created for trophy hunters but for management. The original counties have areas where most of the properties are 50 to 100 acres and keep getting smaller. With each of the properties having multiple hunters, there is not enough recruitment to allow everyone to kill a buck. When I was young, you could see 20 does per sit but maybe see a yearling or 2 year old buck every once in awhile. Only relying on yearling bucks to take care of the breeding while being shot at isn't good for the deer herd. Now, you can see 5 or more bucks per sit. IMO, this should be more entertaining to kids than the old days.

The TPWD provided a early youth season. Hopefully, the people complaining about AR are taking the time to take their kids during this weekend, because it can be very successful. Now if you are still not able to find a 13" deer or a spike, it is very likely you wouldn't see a buck at all if AR was removed. That big buck experience that didn't quite meet 13" would never had happened.

AR is also a tool the control the harvest per property. Would it be fair to surrounding properties, if a small property day leased and took 10 bucks?

[jshouse]

that I know of there is no minimum acreage to sign up on. now you may only be allowed 1deer on that 50 acres, but in reality that's probably all that should be shot. shooting more than that is just taking deer from neighboring properties.

I had the biologist out in 2012 to help me with a management plan and he told me I could not get on MLD unless I was able to get a co-op going with my neighbors. Even then the private land around us is less than 200 acres so the number of tags would be minimal.

We will disagree on the "taking from the neighbors" part, there are plenty to go around out there and they get theirs

[DeadEyeB]

no one is saying "if its brown it's down" but you. we have laws and we stay within those laws but i will say if it makes me an "outcast" that I let my kid shoot a legal 2 year old buck then put me in the corner.

my kids are perfectly happy getting to go HUNTING and getting to KILL something without the stress of thinking about "managing" the herd.
ITS A FREAKING DEER and god will make more of them, i know because i see it every year. As they get older they will develop more patients and their desires to shoot bigger animals and pass on the smaller ones will also develop. For now they are kids and they get excited when they shoot a buck or a doe and that's the way it should be.

by the way I am in favor of the AR restrictions but all this "Deer Management" is over the top. If i can drop my 14 year old daughter off a the deer blind and pick her up later and she has a legal deer on the ground, and she did it all on her own, then that makes me more proud as a dad then having to sit there and dictate to her what she can and can't shoot not to mention the self confidence it builds for her to continue hunting and maybe, hopefully, one day lead her to teach her kids (my grandkids) to hunt.

it's not over the top.. QDM literally says let them get to 3.5 years old..

After a few short seasons of management you'd have tons of 3 yr old bucks. meanwhile you are probably overrun by doe.. another indication that your herd is way out of whack.

Bucks literally die trying to breed them. Late fawns are not good.. suddenly you have tons of doe and no bucks so you kill all thats left and talk bad about management.. It's literally you that is doing it.. The reason your kids don't have older bucks to kill on the regular.

God isn't doing that loll... back when your grandpappy told you just shoot whatever, the deer population was a small fraction of what it is today..

It's because of management that we are here. Not in spite of it. It's sad that the government had to intervene..

[OldRiverRat]

it's not over the top.. QDM literally says let them get to 3.5 years old..

After a few short seasons of management you'd have tons of 3 yr old bucks. meanwhile you are probably overrun by doe.. another indication that your herd is way out of whack.

Bucks literally die trying to breed them. Late fawns are not good.. suddenly you have tons of doe and no bucks so you kill all thats left and talk bad about management.. It's literally you that is doing it.. The reason your kids don't have older bucks to kill on the regular.

God isn't doing that loll... back when your grandpappy told you just shoot whatever, the deer population was a small fraction of what it is today..

It's because of management that we are here. Not in spite of it. It's sad that the government had to intervene..

dude back off, we have mature bucks on our place and my grandpappy didn't deer hunt. Who ever said we didn't have any mature bucks? it wasn't me, but probably another assumption. I completely understand the whole deer management theory, what you don't get is i don't care when it comes to a 6 year old that loves to hunt and wants to shoot a legal deer. I put the child first and the deer second in that situation. if, like someone or multiple people on this forum have said, a doe is as good as a young buck then we will just shoot does if we run out of bucks but i don't see that happening since it's never happened. its funny how some say "your heard" but then say "the deer don't belong to you" guess someone needs to figure out which it is.

[bossbowman]

dude back off, we have mature bucks on our place and my grandpappy didn't deer hunt. Who ever said we didn't have any mature bucks? it wasn't me, but probably another assumption. I completely understand the whole deer management theory, what you don't get is i don't care when it comes to a 6 year old that loves to hunt and wants to shoot a legal deer. I put the child first and the deer second in that situation. if, like someone or multiple people on this forum have said, a doe is as good as a young buck then we will just shoot does if we run out of bucks but i don't see that happening since it's never happened. its funny how some say "your heard" but then say "the deer don't belong to you" guess someone needs to figure out which it is.

I hunt navarro co. and it a world of difference from 10 years ago when they changed the antler rules. But there's still a lot of outlaws there.

[OldRiverRat]

I hunt navarro co. and it a world of difference from 10 years ago when they changed the antler rules. But there's still a lot of outlaws there.

i've hunted there for over 20 years now and you are correct. in the beginning i may have seen one or two bucks a year and they were small. Over the last 5 years things have improved dramatically, the AR regs have been a good thing. I was actually upset that it took them so long to put Navarro and Freestone under the AR restrictions. This being said it doesn't change my position on how i feel about kids shooting deer that are legal but may not meet someone's definition of a "quality" deer.

[DeadEyeB]

dude back off, we have mature bucks on our place and my grandpappy didn't deer hunt. Who ever said we didn't have any mature bucks? it wasn't me, but probably another assumption. I completely understand the whole deer management theory, what you don't get is i don't care when it comes to a 6 year old that loves to hunt and wants to shoot a legal deer. I put the child first and the deer second in that situation. if, like someone or multiple people on this forum have said, a doe is as good as a young buck then we will just shoot does if we run out of bucks but i don't see that happening since it's never happened. its funny how some say "your heard" but then say "the deer don't belong to you" guess someone needs to figure out which it is.

yeah it's your and your neighbors herd. what if all your neighbors thought like this?

multiple kids killing a 1 yr old buck every year will have major negative effects to the herd in a short period of time.. You have mature bucks that means luckily for you your neighbors probably care.

Or hopefully you have so much land it doesn't affect them.

Either way it's basic principals of conservation. It's not over the top it's studied biology to make sure we don't destroy the deer population. It works and should be part of every kid's hunter education.

[OldRiverRat]

yeah it's your and your neighbors herd. what if all your neighbors thought like this?

multiple kids killing a 1 yr old buck every year will have major negative effects to the herd in a short period of time.. You have mature bucks that means luckily for you your neighbors probably care.

Or hopefully you have so much land it doesn't affect them.

Either way it's basic principals of conservation. It's not over the top it's studied biology to make sure we don't destroy the deer population. It works and should be part of every kid's hunter education.

well i've never seen a 1 year old buck that would make the legal AR restrictions, at least not around our place so another stupid assumption there. I don't know if my neighbors hunt, i don't get into their business. I hope they do and i hope their kids hunt too.
was our deer population destroyed before the implementation of the AR rules or was the deer population just not producing the number of "Quality" deer that someone thought it should.