I have several questions about hunting (both arrows and guns) Do hunters more likely go after the males or females? I ask this because I used to go crabbing with my Grandfather and he would never let us keep any females we caught. We did this because the males can breed with multiple females, but the females can only have x amount of young in it's life.
My other question is what happens if you kill a doe that has young fawns? Hopefully you would have seen the fawns before hand but I am pretty sure that these situations have happened in the past (accidently I hope)
I have gone target shooting before, I have a .22 caliber rifle, but i have never hunted (my ex has) and my father was always very much against it(especially bear hunts where they use dogs to tree the bears) I have nothing against hunters who hunt in season and use the meat and animal, I am just trying to educate myself from someone who hunts, and does not have a biased opinion against hunting.

Deer season is in the fall, and fawns are born in the spring. By the time hunting season opens, the young are fending for themselves. Orphan fawns aren't a danger from licensed, in-season hunting.

I know that around here, both does and buck are hunted. In areas with low populations, only bucks are hunted, but if populations are too high, both bucks and does are hunted. All the hunters I know eat the meat and have the hides tanned.

I don't hunt myself, but friends of mine do.

Like supertwist said, by the time the fall season comes in the fawns can take care of themselves. They do still spend time with mother in many cases, but they are fully capable of survival in her absence.

There are five different "types" of hunters, or better yet "stages" of hunters. Shooter, limit, trophy, method, sportsman.

http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~powlesla/perso...text/stages.txt

excerpt from Stephen Kellert in 1978: http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~powlesla/perso...ext/kellert.txt

Also try James Swan's "In defence of Hunting.

So not all hunters specifically target males. In other cases it's illegal to kill females except on certian days. Where I hunt in Western Virginia [NOT West Virginia] there are only 3 days of the 12 day long rifle season in which one can kill a doe. There are much longer periods to kill a doe, however, during muzzleloader and bow season but the rifle season attracts more hunters by far.

I'll try to find a better link that has more on all the stages. I've progressed through most of the stages in my 15 years of hunting. I like to think of myself as part method hunter (muzzleloader), part true sportsman. I do kill a nice buck if I get a good shot though.

lilpea,,,,,,,, " My other question is what happens if you kill a doe that has young fawns?"


here (Al.) it would be possible to kill a doe with a "too" young fawn , it would be a rare event though .


to answer your qusetion it would be either caught by a predator or it would starve .


i go after both bucks and does , i kill a lot more does than i do bucks . though as things are going on the land "I" hunt the number of does killed will go down where the numbers of bucks might go up .

i should say the numbers of "trophy" bucks killed might go up . i know the numbers are growing but we have to see them to kill them .

Lilpea,

In Wisconsin the hunting season starts in the fall , starting with bowhunting, the fawns are basically weaned off. I mainly bowhunt but will take a day during the gun season and gun hunt. All my friends consider me a trophy hunter because I will not shoot a buck smaller than my biggest buck I have mounted. In the last 10 years I bet I have let 70 to 90 bucks walk right by me. 2 years ago I shot a huge buck, so it may be 10 years before I see anything bigger , maybe I'll never see one bigger , but I dought that. But I will shoot does also, at least one or two a year because i also believe in managing our deer herd , remember X amount of habitat will only support X amount of wildlife!

Hope I made sense for you ........

Kevin

Out here there are many more doe and cow elk tags than buck and bull tags. I prefer the younger members of both species. A friend got a 9-12 year old cow last year, the hide was almost impossible to work and after 24 hours in a crock pot the roasts were still "Chewy". Had to quit eating, not because you were full, but cause your jaws were sore. The thought of trying to turn it into jerky was scary. So I didn't.

Yes you all made sense to me. Though another question is, what do trophy hunters use with the rest of the body? I am asuming they only use the head. I do know that many hunters are great spokesmen and protecters of the outdoors, and you and I all know that our wild spaces need all the help they can get. And like it has been in other posts, it is a shame that a few bad apples ruin it for the rest.

"what do trophy hunters use with the rest of the body? "

Lilpea,

I tan the hide and eat the meat.

Kevin

i could be labled as a trophy hunter . i hunt bucks for the antlers not the meat and i will shot them from any angle . by angle i mean shooting through the deer to get to the heart/lung area. IOW i don't worry about wasting meat if all i have is a rump shot . i also try to kill the oldest bucks in the area .

though i do use what i can of the buck .

i really can't say a trophy hunter is a bad apple . if all he uses is the head the meat is not really wasted , i'm sure some animal will put it to good use . course leaving a deer in the woods is illegal here .

To answer your first question.

" Do hunters more likely go after the males or females? "

There are too many complex variables that can affect my ability to give a direct answer.

Each state's fisheries and wildlife department manages its wildlife population in a slightly different manner than the next and most states are often divided into several different wildlife management areas. Within each management area, the type ( male or female ) and the number of deer that may be harvested can vary depending on the population and condition of the deer in that area. For example in the state of Maine, in order to harvest an antlerless deer, a hunter need to have a special permit. Usually such permits are chosen in a random drawing from those hunters seeking such a permit. ( Hunters select which specific wildlife management district they wish to apply for a permit in. ) Additionally, the number of available permits in each of Maine's 30 wildlife management districts can vary depending on the population and distribution of deer in a particular district. For example, appx. 50 miles west of Bangor, Maine there are 25,000 permits available, but 50 miles east of Bangor there are only 200 permits available. So where a person hunts can have a significant impact on whether he or she is allowed to harvest a male or a female.

As for the number and type of deer harvested in general though throughout the U.S. , many people, as a result of hunting magazines and television shows which often wrongfully appear to cater towards a hunter harvesting a trophy male deer with massive antlers, often receive the wrong impression that hunting deer equates to specifically seeking out only large male deer with trophy quality antlers. However in reality the number of female and antlerless deer harvested equals and/or exceeds the number of antlered bucks harvested in many states. Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Kentucky, and New Jersey are an example of 4 such states.



As for your second question.

" My other question is what happens if you kill a doe that has young fawns? "

Nature has seen that most animals in the wild, including deer, produce offspring at such a time during the year as to have the best chance at survival. Usually seeing that offspring are old enough and strong enough to survive the most stressful part of the year. Winter. When food supplies are at their lowest. As a result female deer usually become fertile and conceive appx. around the month of November and give birth appx. the following May.

Deer hunting season usually occurs in the autumn just prior to and during the deer's breeding season, which is also called the rut. At such a time, fawns born the previous spring, while they may still accompany their mother, are usually old enough and wise enough, in spite of claims to the contrary, to survive on their own.

In fact in the winter time, which follows the hunting season, while deer often congregate in areas where food is available, it is still every deer for itself when it comes to survival on the limited food supply available at that time. In other words, at such a time, a female deer who gave birth to fawns the previous spring and may be carrying next springs fawns, will be more interested in its own survival than that of its most recent offspring.

Finally, it should be noted that mother nature is quite unpredictable. Where I live, we broke the record for most snowfall in one winter season one year and the record for the least snowfall the next. Wildlife management officials take such factors into consideration when setting quotas for the number of deer they wish to see harvested the following hunting season. In seasons following harsh winters and significant winter kill of deer, the number of deer hunters are allowed to harvest is reduced. Following a mild winter, where the survival rate of deer is high, the number of deer allowed to be harvested is increased.

Just for Frankie, I never said that a trophy hunter is a bad apple, as long as you don't take the head and waste the rest. And I know you don't buddy. Sorry for the confusion.

XXMag >>>> i was replying to to this posted by lilpea:

"Yes you all made sense to me. Though another question is, what do trophy hunters use with the rest of the body? I am asuming they only use the head. I do know that many hunters are great spokesmen and protecters of the outdoors, and you and I all know that our wild spaces need all the help they can get. And like it has been in other posts, it is a shame that a few bad apples ruin it for the rest."

Many hunters donate venison to help feed those who are hungry.


http://www.nrahq.org/hunting/hungry_nat_list.asp


http://www.h4hungry.org/press.htm

If you talk to many hunters, and I'm pretty sure that all of the hunters here will agree with me on this, killing an animal and letting it lie to rot is grounds for an ass kicking.

Around my camp we usually kill a few more than we have room for in the freezer, but we butcher it all up and give it away. I always give my grandparents a good bit. I'll probbably give some to my girlfriend's parents this year. And as T4T stated a lot gets donated to the hungry. A good hunter doesn't let it go to waste.

XXMag,,,,, "A good hunter doesn't let it go to waste."


in this case what is "waste" ?

i define it as something not used, a deer (or parts of it) left in the woods does not go unused. i see no difference in leaving a deer in the woods and giving my dog a piece of deer cube steak of my table . i also see no difference in leaving a coyote in the woods and leaving a deer in the woods .

when i kill a deer i only use parts of it . i don't eat the ribs on most of the deer i kill , i don't eat the heart , lungs, brain, kedneys or save the hide .

i'll add this ,, when i dog hunted a few years back a couple times a stander had killed a doe out of doe season . both of them would have just left the deer to avoid the risk of the $90 fine if they were caught . when i knew this had happened i would bring the doe home with me , i would take the risk .

sure i'd rather see the deer used by the hunter but i'm not ready to call him a bad hunter if he doesn't .

When I say let it go to waste I mean killing it and letting it lie. I don't use every part either. I do take as much of the meat as I can though.

XX ,,,,,,even the hunters i know that do not eat the meat do not leave the deer in the woods . we as hunters have bigger fish to fry than "trophy" hunters .

Agreed. Man, you know I'm on your side

Even Alie took a stab at you once upon a time. Cut me some slack :P :

Think about why ARFs often attack trophy hunting.

I mean...it doesn't make much sense for them to be so rabidly opposed to trophy hunters if their philosophy is about minimizing suffering. A dedicated trophy hunter might hunt several years before selectively killing an animal. So on the ARF scale of morality, a trophy hunter should come in several steps above a meat hunter. Even if a trophy hunter doesn't eat that 12 point buck when he finally kills it...what difference should that make to an ARF? Do they support meat hunters because those guys happen to eat the carcass of the deer they kill? Do they consider that they, themselves, are less moral because they don't eat the animals they are responsible for killing?

To make sense of ARF thought processes, you must toss out rationality and consider the political.

in the ARA eye's the meat should belong to the other animals any way.

Here where I live, our food banks beg hunters every year for their "left overs". We have an extremely high poverty rate. Game killed illegally that is confiscated by fish and wildlife, if possible is taken and donated to the food banks. So if we were in a position to have too much meat....which has never ever happened.....then we would likely donate it to the mission. But most of our areas are pretty heavily restricted, and many years we are lucky to get one deer. In fact your very best shot at a deer in my area would be to have a son....or daughter....that you can take on a youth hunt that is held in september. It is ANY deer. Other than that hunters are pretty limited to taking three points or better in most of GMU's.