How many hunters to have per acre?
 

HI, my name is Luke and I'am try to figure out our hunting situation. We have about 9 land owners consisting of 1700 acres, approximately 12 hunters during the bow season and 5 of them are QDM. but we are starting to see a large doe population and the ruts have been real lazy non aggressive over the past couple years. obviously we need to shoot does but my question is once we get the does down will we be over hunting the neighborhood ? and we alway seem to see and get pics of the 2 1/2 , 3 1/2 deer no mature bucks {Crawford county Wisconsin}

that kind of acreage could sustain over 30 hunters (1 hunter per 50acres), you are seeing deer overpopulation imo. like a pond that is never fished the bass will all be young and small. I would get some more responsible hunters who can follow a good deer management system

My opinion is that you are about right. I have hunted in "clubs" that have ranged from about 1/40 acres ..... to the group I hunt with now which is about 1/200 acres.

I am not sure what your bag limits are, but sounds like your group needs to drop as many does as you legally can. We started a serious doe reduction program 13 years ago and it is clear to me to have resulted in a more optimum deer/acre ratio. Still plenty of deer roaming the acreage and they are definitely heavier bodied.

I like to have a minimum of 250 acres per hunter if possible

You guys should all come up with some sort of a management plan for the next few years. I would suggest eliminating a good amount of does this year. Even if you don't keep all the meat, you could always donate it.

you need a small number of hunter's who #1 hunt, #2 harvest deer and not just trophy hunt. 12 hunters looking for 150'' bucks are not good land management practices

Been where you are. Had a lease for many year much like you describe. We too wanted to keep hunter number at a minimum and improve quality. Made some mistakes early on but here's what worked. Yes if you have high number of does remove the older ones. Trust me, the old advise of hitting does hard will back fire if you over do it. Have a bad winter, followed by a weak mass crop and your buck factory goes to out the window. Depending on where you are mother nature can quickly wipe out your efforts.. here in VA the yotes are doing a darn good job of reducing numbers. Couple that with bad crop/hard winter and the woods can quickly become rather empty.

So, to answer your question,
1. 100 acres per hunter is min. For most areas out this way.
2. Sure reduce does but only if you are seeing large numbers per bucks. A clue is deer w "over bite". Yes top teeth over bite.
3. Everyone on lease has to agree to qdm with a min size rule. Depending on your region set the min as high as you can reasonably accept. We wanted 20+ in bucks so it was set at 18.
4. If the habitat can handle the numbers get your ratio right by increasing bucks not reducing does!
5. It doesn't happen over night. However for us after 5-7 yrs of letting them walk the buck numbers caught up to the does numbers and the woods were full of 18-20 bucks

Thanks for the info, the over population get all the food they want its very plentiful with crops here in crawford county wisconsin lots of corn and soy bean fields every were and with in that 1700 acres there's deer food plots left up all year like you said get ratio right, so get the buck population up? I all ready took two does this year. and seen 15 does and fawn in one week of hunting (don't know if that's a lot ) over the past 8 years we were trying to get the herd up. so no one shot to many does and no one shot nothing younger then a 3 1/2 year old are general rule is on are farm book deer and on some others is 140 to 150 class deer. but I guess are problem is we only own a 100 acres out of the 1700 and the big deer only come through once and a while.

That's what were thinking thanks !

This year we can shoot 2 doe and a buck here in crawford county wisconsin and I got two does down with in a week of hunting. seen 15 doe and fawn in that week.

the big land owners probable cause for over population of does.
 

Thanks every one for the tips and info about my thread,I herd word that some land owners think that if you have a lot of does they just live on there farm and do the minor doe looking during the rut, witch I guess makes sense but kind of greedy, but I will still getting on them to get the right ratio down pat. so I guess well do are part on our 100 acres and hope for the best. Thanks guys

I wouldn't base a habitat's carrying capacity of deer based on amount of agriculture. Agriculture is seasonal and deer need to eat all year round. The more fields you have, the less woods, too. So, the mast and the browse is less. A barren field doesn't do much for a deer in February.

To give you an idea of the population issue we are faced with, were I hunt it is legal to take over 200 deer/season .... of which only 3 can be bucks, at least one of which must be an 8 point. The daily limit is 2 of which one can be a buck. We try our best to pass on all bucks under 4 years of age and take at least 75 does off the property. We have done this since aobut 1995.

About 3-4 seasons ago we started seeing a more like a 4/5-1 doe to buck ratio rather than the 12/15-1 when we first started knocking off the does.(It was not unusual to see 20-30-40 does in any give food plot any given afternoon). We still have a lot of does. And now we are seeing a lot more bucks. It is my personal opinion that the total population is about the same but there are far less does and more bucks.

We have no tough winters down this far south. Mast crop can vary, but there is usually plenty of browse to go around.