Culling doesn’t work

[jshouse]

That is a reason, not an advantage.

Ok say your lease biologist is sitting in the stand with you on the last day of the season and after calculating all the harvest data for the season, looks up and tells you to kill 1 more buck. And the 2 Chance described are standing at the feeder. Which one would you shoot?

Simple enough?

[JRL]

it apparently doesn't matter what buck you kill as:

antler size was not correlated to breeding value.

[Hoss163]

Kill em all especially the good looking 3 year olds 👍😜

[trophy8]

it apparently doesn't matter what buck you kill as:

Deer breeders must be doing it all wrong. They should just let any ole buck breed with any ole doe and bam. 700” whitetail! Cuz culling doesn’t work. Ever.

[Dale Moser]

Culling is just getting rid of animals for the sake of being rid of them, it never had anything to do with trophies until someone (likely in a Cotulla coffee shop) started using the term for that purpose. They were culling elephants in Africa for population control long before anyone decided they had to many 5 points in Maverick county.

I don't believe you'll change the genetic make up of the herd a bit, but if there are 2 deer out there of similar age, and you need to cull one....only makes sense to shoot the small one.


Also, we're gonna try to get "skimming" off the ground...I like that. "We just out here skimmin 7 points! Whachalldoin?"

[Puncher51]

Does “culling” work to change the genetics of a property? No. But When you are at your desired sex ratio, you have to shoot both sexes to make sure your deer density is where it needs to be.
Therefore, I’ll continue to recommend shooting a few mature bucks each year that don’t have the antlers I like. Am I altering genetics on my ranch? Nope.

2018 vs 2019. I wanted to shoot him last year, but decided to see what another year would do. Is he a top end trophy? No, but he’s a lot better scoring deer. He went from an old 8 to an old 10.

[Muskles]

We need to cull neighbors, so we can have deer to cull.

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[SabreKiller]

We are low fence and feed only corn year round. We've got soe good dear, but I think it would be better if we fed protein and could talk the landowners into managing the herd in a different manner. Currently, the landowner ( who doesn't live anywhere near the ranch) sets the bag limit. There's 6 of us on this 3500 acre lease and we can't kill off nearly what we need to based on the landowners limits.

[Ground Checkin' Heavies]

The QDMA article definitely has more stats and facts than the video. The video is very unsubstantiated, with little information and factual evidence to back up the claim. That's the only issue I had with the video. There are 4-5 threads on TBH regarding this study that seem to be very misleading; "Culling Doesn't Work" seems to be the lead with each thread.

The article and video clearly state in their opening comments that culling doesn't alter genetics. I think we can all agree on that. Culling will never change the genetic makeup of thousands of years of breeding and hereditary traits, especially when you can't see the female doe's DNA.

I would like to see more information released regarding the buck DNA research in terms of their assigned "Breeding Value" mentioned in the study. Show some statistics of big horned bucks that have small horned offspring, and small horned bucks who have big horned offspring. This may better educate and help hunters understand the study a little better, other than, well, we're scientists and we told you so...

It has been said several times throughout this particular thread, that removing the mouth of both sexes will increase nutritional opportunities for other deer whether you believe they have more desirable traits or not; thus allowing them to have a better opportunity to fully express said desirable traits. Therefore, "culling doesn't work" is very misleading and misinformed.

[breederbuck33]

Say you hunt a 5000 acre MLD property. The biologist gives you 20 buck and 20 doe tags. You have to fill the tags, so you have to figure out a guideline on what bucks you are going to shoot. I think the correct term is "management buck", but its the same thing as "cull". I've hunted where you get the MLD permits, and those places tend to have bigger deer. Not because you're improving the genetics, but because you're keeping the numbers in check. While keeping your numbers in check, you're leaving your bigger deer to get older and bigger, and taking the mature deer who had their chance out.

Culling is a RIGHT NOW fix, not a long term fix. You can get rid of that 6 year old 6 point right now, but that gene is still out there. It doesn't matter how good the ranch is, they always sell management hunts! The genes are there, and will always be there. Good news for hunters is that its a never ending cycle of targets! I love shooting stuff, so I'm glad its never ending.

[CEO]

So this means in 100 years East Texas will still have bucks wider than 13"? Even with AR?

[adam_p]

Deer breeders must be doing it all wrong. They should just let any ole buck breed with any ole doe and bam. 700” whitetail! Cuz culling doesn’t work. Ever.

Look at it backwards, maybe the doe is the problem and since there is no way to "cull" does that throw crap genetics that is what causes all these studies to come to the result that culling does not work.

[Mexico]

Deer breeders must be doing it all wrong. They should just let any ole buck breed with any ole doe and bam. 700” whitetail! Cuz culling doesn’t work. Ever.

Huge difference between free range deer and manipulating genetics in enclosures over an extended period of time with no outside influence.

[adam_p]

Huge difference between free range deer and manipulating genetics in enclosures over an extended period of time with no outside influence.

I don't disagree. The two should not even be compared. They might as well be 2 different species of deer.

[No-Tox]

Deer breeders must be doing it all wrong. They should just let any ole buck breed with any ole doe and bam. 700” whitetail! Cuz culling doesn’t work. Ever.

The article was saying that in a low fence area, it doesn't matter. Culling within high fence is a totally different affect.