Management Dilemma
I just wanted some input on my hunting situation. The land I hunt on is actually my in-laws, they got me into hunting since I grew up a city kid. It is an 80 acre piece of mixed swamp/forest and it gets a TON of hunting pressure as does most of the land in my area of northeastern WI. For example 6 people bowhunt it and 12 gun hunt it. 12 people shotgun hunting 80 acres gets a little nuts. Anyway half the group wants to start some version of QDM while the other half is dead set against it. Two 1.5 year old bucks have been taken off the property already this year just bowhunting, and 4 1.5 yearold bucks were taken altogether last year. The quality of bucks in the area has gone up the last 10 years due to some of the neighbors practicing QDM. This is why some of our group wants to try it.
Here is the dilemma. Due to 4 of the last 5 years being EAB, the overall population is down considerably, to the point where its normal not see anything half the time you sit. Because of that we dont want to harvest any does for awhile. However if we start doing QDM the odds are you wont harvest a buck for awhile. So that would mean we probably wont get anything for the next few years. TO me that takes the fun out of hunting.
As a decent compromise we are thinking of proposing is an eight point antler restriction, that way the odds of getting something are decent (I would guess that maybe 20% of our yearlings have eight points.) I realize that this would put the yearlings with the best potential and genetics in the "shooter" category but we cant think of any other way to get the "traditional" guys to let some of the yearlings go. If anyone has been in a similar situation or has any ideas I would love to hear them, thanks.