Jeg3455:
Go to your local feed store, they might have some there. Another spot would be your local farm Co-op store. Anywhere that farmers go to by there seed for the year. But buy a "low grade" of cotton seed, the stuff the farmers use is very expensive because its treated and coated with all kinds of stuff.
BrutalAttack:
I know alot of you guys dislike what biologists say, but they don't say it for no reason. The majority of them want hunters and the herd to succeed or they wouldn't be in the field.
I have my degree in range and wildlife management, part of what I do for a living is manage large private landholdings in south Texas.
One example I can think of is a water hole in Africa
I've sat by many ponds, rivers, and lakes in south Texas and you know, I've yet to ever see a lion, cheetah, leopard, alligator, hyena, or jackal stop by. Our deer are quite safe compared to plains game in Africa.......
Quail and deer are two very different species
Yes they are, but quail have far more enemies then the whitetail deer does. If a quail lives past 2 years then he has really beat the odds. So if quail numbers dont experience much if any rise in predation rates because of baiting, then its very clear that deer wont either. But either way, like I stated in my previous post, there have been studies done down here about baiting, whitetail deer, and predation, and those studies have shown theres not much/if any negative affect.
It's seems pretty obvious to me that when more animals are in contact with each other the risk is higher.
It might seem that way, but its not always the case. Baiting and using corn has been huge down here for atleast 50 years, yet our deer herd is one of the largest and healthiest in the country. And most places down here have many feeders set up around the ranch. The deer numbers are pretty evenly dispersed between one feeder and the other. Just because you set out 200 pounds worth of feed, does not mean every deer in the county is going to come running to eat it. Some areas in wis. where you have CWD cases, and 100 deer feeding on the same pile of corn during a harsh winter, you might run the risk of spreading some kinda disease. But like I said earlier, thats an extreme case, and besides where talking about Texas here.