Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Yard Buck Made It

With a recent 3-week absence, Cookie was worried our neighborhood buck had bought the farm. With a sighting a day or so back, it looks like he made it through archery, rifle, and the local muzzleloader seasons.

A 3 by 4 this year approaching Cookie's bird feeder


and resting at the edge of the neighbor's yard.


A few lesser guys around, but they only rate an honorable mention.

Great photos of a fine buck. Thanks for posting.

Those photos make me want to sit in your back yard..... with my rifle.

How old do you think this buck is? Nice pics!

Lonny:


I think the image below is same buck stealing fruit in the summer and fall of 2022. In 2022, I'd put him at maybe three as his first year as a 4 by. A four by, but with not much mass or width. While it's not too obvious in these pics, there is a very small notch about two inches down from the tip of his left ear. That aspect carries through to some of the other images Cookie snapped this year.


Given the increase in width and mass, I'd put him presently at 4 1/2, but again, he was not a balanced 4by4 this season. Be interesting to see if he makes it through this winter and is around for 2024.

Over the years, there have been a few bucks Cookie definitively tracked over time. We think the oldest probably made it to 8 1/2 yrs before buying the farm. Over that period, he bounced between being a 4 x 4 and a 5 by 4 with the pic below being his last year when he looked to be going downhill a bit. By that age, most deer in the wild are pretty much gummers, so food processing becomes an issue.

His identifying characteristics were a couple of tiny black spots immediately above his left eye. Images rendered here only depict about 12 to 15% of the data available in our original pics. That being, a lot of the detail is lost. This downsizing for web use speeds up upload/download times boosting speed and saving file space. With many of the original images, one can see individual whiskers, eye lashes, mosquitos on their noses, and small details around antler bases etc. Most computer monitors only do about 70 to 80 pixels per linear inch. Rendered full size at that scale, pics are 4 or 5 times larger than most screens. Real detail shows up in prints where one can do 300 to 600 pixels per linear inch.

Once in while something like this shows up. That antler configuration and some of the ear notches make it pretty easy to follow them over time.

She tracked this guy for 3 years.

Great pics! Thanks for sharing the info.

enjoyed the pics!

Merry Christmas!