TP&W thinks it's okay to. Don't they base the hunting tag limits on what they think is best? Like antler width, fish length, bag limits, etc? The game warden that comes to our lease says we need to use up all our doe tags each season, that's why they are there. You know last I checked, he works for the TP&W.

They are right, we are wrong.
They aren't trophy hunters, they are management minded.
We are trigger happy poachers because we don't agree with antler restrictions.....key word "antler". Good night my friend.

AR's are great. The eliminate that nasty spike, keep that trigger happy neighbor from killing that 5.5 year old that is 12" wide and sock it to the kids. Meat hunters that don't care about antlers can shoot two doe, so they are happy. Antler hunters can shoot a deer with 13"+ horns and they are happy. Everyone else just uses AR's as a scapegoat to burden the blame for folks not seeing deer...when they didn't see deer before AR's were implemented!!!!


Thread and argument resurrected

Kerr just teaches you how to line breed animals with known pedrigrees. If the ratio isn't right, no clue on CC and have a mgmt plan showing 3.5 to be mature (like the majority of etx mld) you really don't have much business shooting for cosmetics. My experience is its a way to offer max return on lease pmts by offering 1 trophy deer, 1 cull, X doe. I looked over one lease's records that touts itself as a well managed trophy lease, the buck break down was 1 6yo, 4 5yo, 5 4yo, 15 3yo, 4 2yo, 13 1yo..... 68 does... struck me as odd.

Exactly............they have ruined it for the kids. I don't care what the intentions are. I was in the stand doing the same stupid thing having to ruin the moment of deciding if the antler was passed the ear by a 1/2 inch or not at a 100 yards. Some genious with their higher education thought of this crap regulation.

Thanks for sending us to West Texas with our kids

Appearing at The Comedy Improve this weekend!

Same way they ruined it for my 79 year old dad too....dam them.

We're arguing two different ideals here. Trophy management and deer management. Trophy management is what the hunting community is turning towards. By managing for trophy class animals the overall herd has to be maintained at proper deer numbers, buck/doe ratios and overall range conditions. It sounds like you guys are saying your overall herd is healthy as is. You guys win! Your herd is healthy and you should be able to harvest whatever you please!

In many minds the health of the herd should be secondary to the ability to pull the trigger on a little branch-antlered buck.

Never mind that without a healthy herd those little branch-antlered bucks:1)are hard to come by and 2)when someone does come by one he is a dead duck,which leads to 3)almost no big bucks-whom many must have enjoyed hearing Grandpa speak about rather than actually seeing one for themselves.....

He's saying you're funny looking

No he's not

Fixed for ya.

No you didn't

Yes we did

Nope

I think it's more of pulling the trigger to justify paying lease dues.

Try again I hunt on private property!

Corn, feeder, 4wheeler, fuel, seed/fertilizer, stand, time factor & license costs then.

Tyler County must not have had a herd problem before AR's because we were a 2 buck/2 doe County!!! I suppose we didn't produce enough trophy bucks so instead of a simple changing of bag limits to 1 buck/1 doe, they implemented AR's under the guise of "saving the young bucks"!!! IMHO, I think all this may cause an imbalance in the deer herd by more does being killed off than bucks!!! What does that do to the health of the deer herd?

Seadog it sure has screwed up the numbers in hopkins co. We USED to have lots of does and small bucks and a few big bucks and deer seen at every sit at the stand. Now under AR and new bag limits we see few if any deer on stand. TPW really screwed us up when they raised the limit to 4 deer instead of 1.I hunt every week pretty much during season all they have done is make it boring for my kid and unbearable for my dad. And my big question is where are the big bucks after 6 yrs of AR? They dont exist because TPW allows 2 does to be shot [and they dont make any more when dead] and the young spikes [and they dont grow any bigger after there shot either] and 13in and bigger bucks get shot too! Dont leave much else does it! I know they dont need to fill all there tags just because they have em but alot of people will and TPW gives them the tags to do it. With all the small parcels of land in e. tx thats alot of deer shot! Remove some of the tags and problem is solved. If i can figure it out TPW should be able to.

Seadog y'all keep saying that but do you have actual numbers to back up that claim?

A quick look statewide shows total harvest numbers DOWN about 18% since the 2006-2007 season highs-with a steady ratio of about 55% bucks and 45% does during that period. In other words, if there is the phenomenon you say is caused by ARs it is certainly not statewide.

Again,any Tyler county figures?

who thinks Obama sucks?

Our herd is healthy just like every other herd in the state is healthy. That's Mother Nature's job and she does it well. The sick and unhealthy don't last long out there. Ever seen a deer in a wheelchair? Nope, if they get where they can't walk something eats them. When God created the whitetail herd I have a hard time believing that he needed help keeping it healthy. Once again, it's not about health, it's about vanity. How is that so hard for you to understand? Nothing wrong with wanting bigger bucks but don't hide behind the "health of the herd" BS.