Johnny...Evidently your uncle doesn't raise cattle....Put 20 cattle in a 20 acre pen to fend for themselves and they won't be healthy...Put 5 in there and there is enough to go around and then some...
Now..Real world...We own 3 farms in eastern NC, heavily populated with deer, we raise corn, soybeans, peanuts, wheat...Plenty to eat, so food isn't a problem during the growing season, but come February...It is a problem...
30 years ago, I wouldn't kill a doe...One evening I watched as 48 deer moved into one of our cut corn fields...None of these deer had antlers!!! It was November, I was in college and I thought, this is crazy, I like deer meat...Two of the deer didn't leave the field (Well they did....I took them for a ride in the back of my pickup)...
At any rate...I started killing does, for several years it made no difference...And I killed a ton, even got permits and my brother's help....Frankly some years I killed 15 or so, got tired of skinning them and giving them away...About 15 years ago my nieces, nephews etc got old enough to hunt, so I had more help...We kill 40-50 deer a year...Mainly does...We now see 8-12 deer in a field, but for the past 4-5 years we are seeing more bucks, bigger bucks and bucks actually chasing does...We still have plenty of deer, but they have more and better food to choose from because there is less competition....Plus, with a better buck/doe ratio, the dominant bucks are the ones doing the breeding, so the better genes are naturally passed on...Before "any buck" could breed, because the big boys were doing all they were physically able to do...
Shoot what you want to, but I'm thinking about starting a new organization.....DoeBusters...Each week I'll show you how to kill does and at the end of each show have a great new recipe showing how to eat does!!!
