Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Wildlife Management Deer Season '24/'25 Thread

We don't have the trophy deer around here that you folks have in the plains states. We pretty much have neighborhood deer and many of them pretty destructive to the landscape. I'm happy my 11th grade son has kept his interest in hunting. He has watched his game camera pictures and can often recognize the bucks he saw last season on this year's cameras, with a little growth in body and in the antlers. It is cool that he gets to recognize various deer as they move through and then can see some new bucks that also travel mostly at night.

He had his hopes set on what looked to be a very nice 8 point but the deer was cautious and only seen on cameras at night. He has spent a lot of hours in various blinds and stands and watched a lot of smaller does and a few spike antler bucks chasing them around. He would prefer to get one with a bow as he has only been successful last year with a gun. He didn't take a shot with his bow prior to gun season. He uses a Stevens 301 20 gauge with single shot break barrel. (sorry if I get the lingo wrong as I'm still new to all of this)

This week he watched a new buck not seen on camera before come into a clearing after a doe and decided to use part of his combo tag to harvest it. The body seemed lean but the rack was pretty symmetrical. We get to put some more venison sticks in the freezer and he was happy to have his first set of authentic antlers to use for rattling in other bucks.

The first 2 pictures attached are my son's deer.




I'll also attach a game camera picture of the desired larger 8 point.





Sadly he got word today that another hunter we BELIEVE got the larger 8 point in a protected apple orchard just beyond the rear of our property. When seeing the desired deer in real life one can see the antlers seem to have some real unusual bends in them. I expected with the larger antlers the body would be more solid but this deer also looks skinny. Can someone take a guess if the deer in the night time game cam pick is the same one in the last picture?

Yep, same buck. Congrats to your son, CC! Good stuff!

Agree with Dr. Luke, that is the same buck as on the camera.

His most forward tine on his left antler is broken (squared off) in the game camera pic. You can also see that in the harvest pic. Also, the racks appear to match perfectly to my eye.


P.S. Congrats to your son. That is a nice buck that he took. I would be VERY happy on my property if I was able to harvest the second largest buck every year!

Thanks! yes, it is so good to see a young man be willing to learn what he can about hunting, learn about his bow and learn to sight it in and then the same for his gun. He spent a lot of time this summer preparing a food plot and trying to get things to grow. We had of course no rain for about 4 weeks so it really didn't come up like it could have. But the deer still came to check out the area since it was sheltered and a nice cleared spot to play in.

Last year when hunting he didn't have his scope quite sighted in right and he also had what golfers call 'the Yips' or nerves that probably had him taking too quick of a shot. Both deer he shot before were moving and ended up being rear leg shot or partial gut shot. This time he didn't want that to happen again if possible and I'm proud of him for doing a really accurate double lung shot!

I can see now how important it is to get more young hunters in the woods as the deer population in our county is out of control. The county and university are working on it and even created a 'heat map' of where the epicenter of car deer crashes are. The guy tasked with picking them up said they had like 4500 carcasses this year already and in late November it is 20-30 a day. The estimated deer herd in MI I read was like 2 million and 2 yrs ago hunters took about 300,000 and last year less than 250,000 if I recall. We are losing a big percentage of hunters year over year. One solution may be to take down the cost of hunting license and deer tags but that has not happened yet. They do extend the season in certain areas and do also allow firearms in some areas in the dates past the traditional 2 week gun season.

Car Deer Crash heat map

Congrats on the kid's deer! That's great!!!

Stuck one. Time to make pastrami!

Nice!

Congrats! Nice buck.

Can you send us some venison Reuben sandwiches using the Private Message function on Pond Boss?

Damn! If I'd known about that, I'd have distributed some Tilapia filets.

Wish I could PM you guys some of it. I love me some deer reubens and grilled pastrami sandwiches!

Hope everyone is having a good season so far. I've gotten several decent bucks on camera this year, but this one's the best.

Nice rack on that buck!

Is the fence so raccoons, hogs, and other varmints cannot eat the corn, but the deer can hop right over for food?

Have you seen any deer on camera not go over the fence?

I've heard if you have the fence too small deer will not enter because it's like being caged. Not saying your fence is too small just curious.

We don't have a hog problem in my area (yet) so we don't have to fence our feeders.

Don’t know about trap size. Some years back I caught a whopper buck in a small hog trap. He broke his neck somehow. I guess thrashing around.

Yep. A lot of hogs in my area. They can't get in, but still cleanup around the edges of the fence.



My hog shootin' feeder without a fence.

The babies usually take a month or so before they'll jump in. But adults go right over.

I was worried about the size when I first built it. It's only 30' and read 40' is really the minimum, but it hasn't seemed to matter. I've filmed 6 in there at once and 3 more on the outside waiting their turn. Ha.

(It also looks smaller in that picture than it is. Here's a turkey and a deer in there together.)



And here's a shot you rarely see. Deer and hogs eating together (sort of)...