It’s just a deer.

[bpa556]

DOMINION with an emphasis on BEING A GOOD STEWARD. There are exponentially more ppl hunting than in days gone by... More pressure on smaller acreage. More and more eland where you can't hunt legally. if we arnt selective and management minded then our kids won't have ANY TROPHYS for thier kids.

There is a huge difference in those deer that has been shown over and over again...

Losing a friend or poaching sure they arent worth it... Not even close... But don't stick your head in the sand... Most ppl who make a young deer comment are working toward a good thing and would LOVE whoever is asking or shoot it to kill it later when it's bigger

Stop acting like it doesn't matter at all... That is NOT good stewardship

You have your facts backward. There are fewer hunters than decades past. In 1975, nearly 15 million Americans participated in some form of hunting. In 2016, the number was 11.5 million. That is a significant decrease in numbers. When population growth during that time period is factored in, it is an almost staggering decrease.

On the other hand, whitetail deer populations are higher than they have ever been. Ever... They were hunted to dangerously low numbers by the 1930s (300,000 estimated population). Today, there are over 30 million. Hunters kill an estimated 6.5 million of them each year.

“Managing” for trophies is a personal quest and is not necessarily good stewardship. Letting everything under 6 years old walk is not good stewardship. Not shooting doe because the bucks won’t come to the feeders is not good stewardship.

TPWD started the MLD program in response to overpopulation. It allows extended hunting seasons and the ability to actually control the target population. Biologists help develop a management plan and issue tags to help it happen. ALL of the MLD tags are meant to be filled. This is how TPWD tries to get the population back to what the land will support naturally, and get the ratios correct. Antlered and antlerless tags are supposed to be filled from every age class. Few properties follow the plans.

Whitetail deer are in zero danger of ever being over-hunted in the US. Whatever you shoot will be replaced with interest.


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