Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters John Wootters

I always like John Wooter's work. He wrote well. I enjoyed his style. I've got nothing against him, and I write this more as a question than a condemnation.

John wrote a book, Hunting Trophy Deer , published in 1977. I've got a copy here in front of me. John used his vast knowledge of hunting whitetails in Texas to its utmost. This and several articles he wrote got hunters thinking about culling inferior bucks. This is a story of unintended consequences.

The next thing you know, the whole world was burning their deer tags on every misshapen rack they could find. When I started my stint over at Deer & Deer Hunting, there was a large mass of hunters who were determined to rid the world of inferior bucks. I was appalled. I had read Wooter's book at the dawn of my hunting career-- picked it up used at the bookstore over on the next block. The part folks seemed to be missing was the part where all this culling was taking place behind a high fence. I've got nothing against high fences either. It's just that you cannot do effective culling on anything but a captive population. I was surrounded by men determined to rid their farms, national forests, and WMA's-- the entirety of our fruited plains, from sea to shining sea of inferior bucks.

Thankfully, that nonsense has died down in the past decade or so. I am proud of whatever small part I had in its demise.

As I dug back as to a reason for this madness, I came back to Wooters. It is a tribute to Mister Wooters that his idea of culling spread so far and so fully. However, I was not really paying attention to all this when it happened. I did not start deer hunting until the early 80's, and I read outdoor magazines mostly things other than hunting. On my first pass, deer hunting content got just a cursory glance. By the time I started paying attention, Hunting Trophy Whitetails had been out for some time , and there were articles everywhere about how to cull your herd and what to look out for in a cull buck.

I think one of the saddest things in all this was all the poor wretches that posted their cull buck pics on the burgeoning new medium of internet forums. Rather than proudly proclaiming their success at hunting, guys tried to make it sound like they'd done the world a favor. Truth is, that "cull buck" probably could have grown into something awesome given a few more years. It took until about the 2010's for the culling fashion to die out.

I have questions for you all. First off, am I correct in saying Wooters popularized this whole culling thing? I never read anything by anyone about this subject prior to him. Second, why didn't anyone do anything? What I mean is that it is pretty obvious that culling a wild herd is spitting in the ocean. Someone besides me must have seen the madness for what it was.

To what extent did Wooter's change high fence hunting? What I remember from early the '80s was that "cull hunts" were a big thing. Guys readily signed up for a chance to hunt deer with 8 points or less at a discount. Did Wooters influence or popularize this, or did he just document the fad?

Wooters started the whole "trophy management" QDM, raise your very own trophy buck bullshyt that has ruined deer hunting and been responsible for millions of posted signs going up and lease fees being charged all over the Country.

I tried to lease a farm where we had permission, but they seemed afraid to “lose control” of the ability to control access when they wanted. Most farms here are smaller now, and surrounded by residential properties, so safety becomes a big issue. A lot of them show up on On-X as family trusts too.

I have about 1400 acres of public 20 minutes away and tens of thousands more within a hour or two. A little driving beats dealing with cranky farmers, and I like the woods, deer or no deer. Just bought a satellite locator so my wife will know where to send the cadaver dogs if I don’t come home.