Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting WV buck kill way down

No surprise at all.

http://www.wsaz.com/content/news/Bu...un-season-down-25-percent-405045086.html

We have a camp in Randolph County and we saw the fewest number of bucks in the last 10-12 years . I got a small 8 pt and a spike and only saw several others . Lot of does saw 30 does on several different days.

Of course it is; I'm hunting in VA this year!

Wonder if the total kill is down as well, or if hunters are just shooting does?

I hunted a small piece of public land the last four years and saw some bucks before the season, but only a couple of small ones during, except for a nice 8-point that was scooting to private land in the dark on the opening day of ML season. The private VA land I'm hunting this year is only a few miles away from that WV WMA I hunted before, and I've seen a number of bucks there, including a pretty decent one.

Be interesting to see what the official reason will be after it's all over.

Okay, I followed the link and they say it was the wind. Possibly, I just stayed home when it was real windy since the VA season runs until Jan. 7. I might take my ML on Friday just for the heck of it.

I know our area in Randolph County was really windy the first several days . Sustained winds of 20 mph and gusts 30-35+

Not sure how much stock I put in the wind theory. All of my preseason scouting; looking at numbers, buck sign and bucks indicated this was going to be a dismal year. (I hunt Central WV)

Once season opened, I did manage to see good numbers, but only small bucks that I wouldn't shoulder the rifle for. One thing that was glaringly obvious was the lack of hunters. Places that are usually overrun with people were vacant. Not sure what contributed to this, but there just weren't many people hunting this year like there has been in previous years.....maybe it was the wind.

Hunted two weeks in Hampshire County. We did drives both weeks, yes the wind was rough. Our club usually takes 25-35 deer opening week. This year, first week, yielded only 11. I call BS on blaming wind. There were VERY few mature deer seen period. I normally see more mature deer on ONE deer drive than what I saw in ONE whole week. There was mention of "Blue Tongue" having wiped out a large amount of the herd.

A gnat-borne disease hit my area some years ago. Found a dozen dead deer on the local 150-acre park alone. If it was that, though, you'd find carcasses all over, i'd think, for quite some time. The ones I found were in heavy cover, so possibly you just didn't see them.

Hampshire used to be the number one county. Has the CWD made a big impact?

DNR has been taking lymph nodes, IIRC, for last several years when the animal was checked in. Now we just use their online check in. Never saw any meaningful drop off in numbers since CWD was a "thing".

All the dead deer found this year were in the river bottoms. The assumption, they were boiling with fever from "Blue Tongue". One member saw a deer "knee walking" in a river bottom around the end of summer/beginning of fall. Said he could smell death before he even saw that poor SOB. I'm sure there were more than a few down there stinking it up.

IMHO? Too many bucks taken last year due to the bumper mast crop in '14. Other reasons to but this can't be dismissed.

What hit us was EHD, a disease related to Bluetongue. The DNR site says they are indistinguishable in the field and spread the same way. As I recall, both kill quickly.

I would imagine we are gonna face a few lean seasons before the numbers rebound. On a positive note we had a hell of acorn crop this year.

Overall white oak acorn production was only 20% state wide. If there wasn't mast in the woods the deer were near fields. I hunted Jackson Co. at Staats Mills the first two days. I saw 4 deer (all doe) in two full days of hunting. Two from our camp got bucks, an 8 point and a 10 point. They were hunting areas between the fields and bedding areas. There was some rut activity observed on that end of the property. The oak tree in our yard dropped acorns a bit early. The deer and squirrels cleaned them up as fast as they dropped. Deer are grazing in our yard nightly. IMO the sighting problem is a food source problem.

I'm in Hardy Co our #s are way down. EDH hit our area pretty hard it seems. IMO far too many young bucks are harvested in WV. I really wish the WVADNR would adopt point restrictions on bucks. Just look at the results coning out of PA.

^^^ Yep. I'm in Mineral Co. Way too many bucks taken last yr. I know people who took 3 or more. I hunt the GWNF in Va. In Va. your first buck can be whatever(maybe 3" or better?). After that 4pts to one side or more. No does in the GWNF except the last day of antlered season and the last day of late season. Also no ATV/UTV's and behind locked gates it's walk in only. SO MUCH land.

This is my opinion as well, the seasons are too liberal allowing too many bucks to be harvested.

As for the disease some of you guys were seeing; I seen no signs of it in the center of the state nor did others mention it this year. It's been a few years since we've seen anything like that.

Didn't see any signs of disease in out area but I'll agree with others on the need to let small bucks go . I saw 30 does on several occasions and no bucks . Pretty screwed up buck to doe ratio . Makes a big difference during the rut also . Most bucks don't have to go far to find does.

IIRC the rut was in the first week last year and there were more bucks taken the first week than usual.

I was sorry I didn't get W.Va license this year. Maybe didn't miss much.

That restriction in VA only applies to certain Western counties. VA regs are convoluted, with often different rules for public and private land, as well as Eastern and Western counties.