Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Texan hired to study Wisconsin deer management practices

Don't flame me for asking this question, but if what the WIDNR did in relation to CWD was so wrong, why was MNDNR's reaction to finding CWD there last fall almost a carbon copy of WI's plan?

Notice that this was also in an area of MN that has allowed up to 5 antlerless deer plus a buck per hunter per year? There has to be a correlation with to high a deer density whether perceived by hunters/landowners or not, right?

Another question that I have, and this is a general question, not pointed at anyone in particular. In the past 10 to 15 years, there has been this huge propensity to QDM or "Let'em go, Let'em grow". When the DNR comes in and tries giving hunters exactly what they've been asking for, they go nuts, because they don't see deer.

People don't do deer drives anymore. Can't the neighbor will come unglued that I'm pushing his buck away.

It is very apparent to me that hunting media and/or DNR's have pushed very bad information or have presented it's information in a way that the majority of the hunter population doesn't comprehend.

I am not aware of the MN CWD plan. I have been too busy to follow it. If it a nearly a copy, then it is junk as far as I'm concerned.

I'm not a fan of QDM either. At least not the way it's practiced on most places I know of. The way I've seen it used, it would be better named as quality buck management. But it's not

I don't disagree with you. Most people are using the acronym of QDM to impose Trophy Management.

Really, when you sit down and look at what the WIDNR did with EAB, was really the first step in a QDM process. The next step would be protecting 1 1/2 year old bucks to make the age classes of bucks more diverse. There were talks of point restrictions... With Kroll coming in, do we really think that we're not going to hear the same things that no one likes? His background is, more or less, QDM. Maybe the state needs to hire a Psychologist instead of a Deer Expert. Again just asking a question, not to anyone in particular.

The DNR was doing what people told them they wanted without ever really looking into what it actually took to do what they requested. It's easy to say you want something, it's quite another to sacrifice to make that something work. Why is the divorce rate what it is in America?

Did it go wrong in some areas? Sure, but they did change in areas too, No doe quota areas, buck stickers that carried over a year, etc. It was and still is an on going evolving management plan.

But like Nathan says, they're probably managing the wrong population. They are worrying about the deer when they should be managing the hunters.

interesting thread.....

I think if you can get the average hunter on board with Kroll's management practices, they will be happy in a few years down the road. Maybe not this year, maybe not next year... 5 years down the road, if he is allowed to do as he pleases, the deer herd will improve. Isn't that what this is all about?

I think I'm misunderstood. He's not even a big antler restriction guy. He's a big proponent of determing the age of the deer on the hoof - something which is very difficult to get deer hunters to do in the field overall.

His "management practices" are to manage to whatever goals the landowners have. Our biggest project in our deer management class where we traveled to a variety of landowners who had different goals was to write a management plan to suit the goals of the landowner. Some wanted more deer for any opportunity, some wanted just bigger deer, some wanted trophy deer. Your job as a wildlife biolgoist and manager is to provide a management plan to accomplish those goals.

If the DNR doesn't have a clear cut goal maybe that's part of the problem.

Down here we have more freaking deer than we know what to do with (we have so many deer that some WMA managers now are taking Coyotes off the list of species you can take incidental to a deer hunt to keep the coyote numbers high - coyotes gotta eat too and they keep downward pressure on the deer herd especially in fawning season - how's that for an eye opener and an off the wall management method?). So management plans for producing more deer and more opportunity aren't really in that much demand. However it doesn't mean he can't still do one.

Exactly! That's why I will be interested to see what he has to say about managing a complex of deer populations in a variety of habitats for a diverse population of stakeholders.

if a landowner in texas asks Kroll to help them out.... what do you think on average their goal is?

to raise a ranch full of 3 year old 110 inch deer, or perhaps shoot for the stars a little bit? part of the antler restriction program in texas allows for shooting spikes... most of which are 1.5 year old deer at harvest, so I can understand why he's not fully behind the program. on a year like this, which is one of the worst drought years texas has seen in a long time, there are spikes everywhere. I have at least 3 at each camera location on my place... typical years we might only see 2 spikes on the entire ranch.

I've met him at a couple TDA conventions, he's confident but friendly... One of his studies I enjoy passing on to other people is to stop shooting young spikes, or young deer as a "cull". you don't know a deer's full potential in south texas until they are at least 4. people that go around shooting 1.5 year old spikes (or any 1-2 year old deer) to "cull" the herd drives me nuts. If you want the meat, fine... shoot them, but to make the excuse of culling is just wrong.

In northern WI, MN, and probably MI A LOT of 1.5 y.o. bucks are spikes, or 3 pts. In the areas I hunt in MN a 6pt can be a 2.5 y.o. buck, if it's not a tiny littly rack. I'm not sure buck managemnt would work in areas like that, maybe...but I'm not sure.

If you want to be a game manager as well as a hunter and not shoot immature deer, do this test:

1-Look at his antlers.
2-From the tip of his ears, draw an imaginary line through his antlers.

If all of the rack is between the two imaginary lines, there is a good chance, that the buck is immature ( 2 1/yrs old or younger.)

Mature deer (>3.5yrs) antlers wil spread outside the tip of the ears.

Not always. There are more reliable ways to age a buck than antler spread.

Yep. Lotta truth in that statement.

Right, right.....

Spread isn't an accurate way to age a deer, but it's one of those 90/10 things. The majority of the time, a mature deer will have a spread at it's ears or greater. Everyone has a "one time at bandcamp" photo of a narrow mature rack, but it doesn't fit the vast majority of whitetail. Problem is, people have a hard time judging a 13" spread...how can anyone expect the average hunter to shoot at a specific age? Most people can't tell the difference between a 2 year old and a 4 year old. It's not always easy.

Here's my weekend at band camp



3.5 year old, 14.5" spread. Typical northern MN, WI pine needle and maple leaf crunching bucks. This one dressed at 184#

Under the new antler restrictions in TX the allowing of shooting a spike is not a cull program. It was a political comprimise that had nothing to do with the biology or the management plan, a large portion of the political deal centered around opportunity for a first time or youth hunter to harvest a deer. Without the comprimise it never would have been implimented. IT was put in to allow the harvest of multiple bucks instead of one. The number of bucks that have been taken that fall under that part of the program so far have been pretty insignificant.

Sure there are...now come up with one that works in the field with hunters who spend on average 3 days a year in the field.

I think a lot of people on this board would be shocked at how little time the average person who buys a hunting license for deer actually spends hunting. Past the opening weekend the numbers in the field drop like a rock. Every biologist knows those numbers and can draw those graphs from memory.

The way they came up with a spread or number of points is this....

1. They take years of data from good harvest records. In East TX where the program was put into effect they had at least 20 years of records coming from the various clubs etc...This has to be specific to the area. If you took this to South Texas it wouldn't work for squat because maybe 50% of the bucks would beat that at age 1.5 - I mean I work with a ranch right next to the chaparel WMA where the landowners wife shot a 3.5 year old 173" typical - he was pretty damn pissed off, no way the managemnet plan there works pretty much anywhere else. A management plan that works here isn't going to be the plan that works elsewhere - ever. That's why I've pointed out multiple times the first step is going to have to be getting good records that are accurate. I'm sure at some point TPW is going to start looking at the data coming in after the new program to see what needs adjustment there as well.

2. After that it's nothing but pure statistics. You look at the various external physical properties such as spread, number of points, main beam length and you get as many as you can "under the curve". So let's say you pick 13.5" spread and you get 90% of the deer are not 1.5 years of age. Let's say you pick 8 points and 80% of the deer are not 1.5 years of age.

Remember you are coming up with an external physical property on the deer that can be easily identified by a hunter that might hunt 3 days a year, and easily to ID at a distance. You are also doing this for a region, not a small property, not an individual deer.

Let's not forget the program in TX was put into place because it was asked for, asked for by an overwhelming majority of hunters in the area. Not only that it was rolled out earlier into neighboring counties years ahead of schedule at the request of hunters who saw what was going on in the counties next to them. This wasn't something that was shoved down the throats of hunters from TPWD. Very little resistance came from hunters and hunting groups. The biggest resistance actually came from within TPWD and that was game wardens who refused to enforce the new rules in the field, even tho hunters were asking for it and wanted it enforced.

I gaurantee if a state DNR made actual age from looking at the whole deer and a deer must be 2.5 years of age two things would happen. 80% of the hunters wouldn't shoot a deer for fear of being wrong...or 80% of the hunters would shoot anyway and ingore it.

Even trained people aren't as good at it as they think they are. There are videos of known age deer that you can use to quiz yourself, where they give you a 15 second look or 30 second look typical of hunting. I've taken them. Even the best people rarely will score above a 70%. It's one thing to look at a picture of a dead deer for a minute or two and then come up with an answer, it's another deal all together to do it on the hoof in under 15-30 seconds. I'm not saying don't try or don't do it. But don't think a population at large of hunters is going to do it - even if they wanted to, which would be a pretty big leap.

Of course deer will fall outside the curve. Of course people will always say well I shot a 150" deer with a 9" spread. On the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter. I shot an antlered doe, I'm pretty sure he/she/it fell outside the curve too

Also another factor these regulations only apply to lands that don't have another management plan in place. Unlike many states in TX you can write or get writeen your own management plan and have it endorsed by the state and get on with it. I've always done my own management plans for my property. Pretty much anyone can do it with a little help from a biologist and after you've done it once it's a cakewalk. If you don't want to shoot spikes on your property don't do it. I would say 75% of the deer leases (deer leases are very popular here) are currently enrolled in the state program for this. You can get additional doe tags, different season open and close dates etc...


I think too many people are getting hung up on what's going on in TX and that's what is going to go to WI. Let's not forget Dr. Kroll doesn't work for TPWD. Doesn't set policy in TPWD, he only does research and works with private landowners. That's it.

If you read the press release he wasn't actually hired to set new policy in WI. He was hired to review the procedures and practices that WI uses to come up with and deploy their management plans in the field. There's a big difference in that and thinking someone is going to come in write a new management plan that will save everything and everyone Think of it more like a peer review for an article. I'm sure there will be some research thrown into it with local universities as well.

Everyone thinks it's easy but just read this thread and it's been pretty civil. Now talk to those same people in a room of 200 of them and just you standing up there. The only easy management decisions I've ever had where the ones on my own property. It's like trying to juggle with 14 balls in the air at once.

It's a huge balancing act against what you know can be done and what can be done. Hell if it was easy the first thing I would do would be issue a collection permit to a lot of places and we'd go out and get rid of about 25-50% of their does at night from a high rack and then got on with it. It's sound biology and been proven to be highly effective....it's also not very popular with hunters even if the end result gives them exactly what they requested. I'm old enough to remember when you gave a talk and recommend the killing of a doe (not an increased killing) there was a good chance you might get booed off stage or easked to leave as a mama killer. Each one of those does is going to have a buck next year right? You're killing bucks. The list goes on. It's kinda like people who are against bait. I'm all for it just for the fact it helps hunters collect does here. I'm for anything that actually gets a hunter to shoot more deer here. I'd even be willing to look at an earn a buck program but I know it would be highly ignored because there's no political will for it here.

Managing wildlife is about 20% wildlife and 80% people. That's why I tell people who are interested in wildlife management they better have good people skills (I don't). Look at states that don't allow hunting on Sunday, that's not a biological reason. That's a cultural issue. Just like in TX there's cultural deals where we can bait in other states that would never fly because of the culture. So you do the best you can.

That's a legal buck under the TX regulations by a lot.

Sometimes we forget on this board that not everyone hunts and fishes as much as we do as a group on here. In MN the woods get a lot quieter after opening weekend, even more so after the Monday, which is why I like to hunt on that monday.

In WI, it slows down, but not nearly as much. Hunting is a good, strong, rich, tradition in WI. We hunters in WI are a passionate group and a large reason why there is so much anger toward the WIDNR. I thing the folks there are willing to wait a few years if they can start to see some results.

People also tend to gravitate and hang out with people who are like them. So if you hunt hard, scout and do your homework you tend to hang out with people like that and hunt with with like people. I tend to hunt with people with a wildlife background etc...it narrows your focus and you begin to think everyone is much like you. To me it's hard to imagine people having a lease and buying a license and hunting only 3 days but the numbers don't lie. It's just like you can open the season on a Monday and cut down 50% or more of your hunters if you need to....doesn't seem like it would work to me because I would be out there anway - but the numbers don't lie.

I haven't look it up but how long is the arcery season and how long is the general gun season there?

On my comment about culling spikes, I was referring to individuals and their practice of culling spikes...it's pretty well known that the spike allowance was a political agreement for the "meat" hunters...meat hunters who refuse to shoot does I guess.



I agree with the time in the woods issue...too bad we can only hunt deer in Texas from October 1 to February 28....