I'm curious, is everyone in favor of a balanced deer herd that is within reasonable agreement with the carrying capacity? We just don't agree on how this is to be achieved?
I'd like to think we could all agree on that.
Where I hunt - we had way too many deer for the land. We countered by initially taking a bunch of does and by planting abundant year round, food sources. In effect - we increassed the carrying capacity of the land. We still have alot of deer - more than many areas.
Now we use the doe harvest to micro-manage our property (200 acres) - doe permits, bow & BP tags.
This past year we only took 1 doe - but took 6 bucks. The year before we did about the opposite. Most years prior - we tried to take at least one doe for every buck - some years 2 does for every buck. We set our goals in September prior to the hunting season opening.