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Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. #6911806 10/07/17 03:03 AM
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bowbuilder1971 Offline OP
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Hi all. I moved down to Texas where my wife is from 5 years ago and just started hunting down here 3 years ago. I had to get back surgery so I wasn't able to hunt for a couple of years. So now I have been hunting on my buddies property for 3 years and it's awesome! Where I grew up, they don't allow you to bait for deer and there isn't a limit on how many people can hunt on public land. So it's a mess up there and you take your life in your hands if you dare to hunt on the weekends. The bucks also don't have enough time to mature like they used to when I was younger. People will shoot any deer that walk in front of their tree stand. So I started posting on the farm and garden section on craigslist for places to deer hunt and scored some great places to bow hunt up there. It was safer to hunt that way and you didn't have to worry about some moron trying to put a climbing tree stand 20 yards away from you an hour after legal shooting time. I have hunted in a lot of states in my life and now that I have a permanent hunting area, my buddy wants to get in to managing the herd, putting out protein feeders and making food plots. I already have all the stuff for the food plots now and have a pretty good hunting set up going. So recently we were going over some of the trail camera pics and he was talking about culling certain deer. So I really didn't get in to talking with him too much that day because I had to get back to the wife. So I was starting to wonder about culling deer. With antler restrictions in the state, who can legally cull a buck with a not so good rack. Do you have to apply for a permit and is there a restriction to where only the land owner can cull certain deer on their property? Does a deer have to be past a certain age to be taken out of the herd and does it have to have the legal 13" spread? How much does it help to take out certain deer. I know a lot of this probably sounds stupid but I have never had land to hunt on where I could put a food plot on or set up cameras on in the past. I have read some articles on culling certain bucks but nothing that was connected to Texas and if there were certain laws about it. So I thought I would ask here. Any info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks everybody!

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6911863 10/07/17 04:12 AM
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QuitShootinYoungBucks Offline
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Any animal taken, be it trophy or cull, will need to meet the restrictions in place for that county, regardless who the hunter is. I do not know if that is true under the MLD program- that would be the only case where you might get relief from standard antler/ harvest restrictions.


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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: QuitShootinYoungBucks] #6911880 10/07/17 04:40 AM
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bowbuilder1971 Offline OP
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Thank you QuitShootinYoungBucks. It's in Leon County so I will give the local game warden's office a call Monday. Then I will pick my buddies brain to learn about culling. Why he picked certain deer and what he is trying to accomplish in the long run. Thanks again for your help. Much appreciated!

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: QuitShootinYoungBucks] #6911883 10/07/17 04:44 AM
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dkershen Offline
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Originally Posted By: QuitShootinYoungBucks
Any animal taken, be it trophy or cull, will need to meet the restrictions in place for that county, regardless who the hunter is.
This makes culling difficult across much of the state.

You might try posting up some pics. Easier to advise that way. But take the advice with a grain of salt because one mans cull is often another mans trophy...


To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target.

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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6911888 10/07/17 04:53 AM
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dkershen Offline
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And BTW... the first rule of culling deer is that you MUST be able to accurately age them. Watch as many videos as you can on this topic.


To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target.

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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6911909 10/07/17 06:51 AM
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How many acres are you hunting? You normally need a good chunk and population surveys for culling to make a difference. Normally it is 1,000s of acres and a lot of shooting on MLD permits. If not big acreage, nothing will be achieved. It's like high fencing 500 acres but not removing inferior deer and putting giant genetics out there. It will all average out in the end as you can't have a bottom line to mix in. Low fence, small acreage it will happen no matter what.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: Txduckman] #6912190 10/07/17 05:12 PM
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Thank you Txduckman. It's not a big area but all the adjoining properties are huge chunks of land that people do not hunt on. He is going to talk to the local game warden about it but I just really wanted to learn about culling and if there are certain laws for doing it on private property. I would rather deal with the food plot and getting the watering hole pond together on the property than deal with having to take out certain deer. Plus I drive 1hr and 45min to get there and wouldn't want to spend my time taking out a deer that I haven't been studying. Right now I am going after a nice size 10 pointer on the property. He has a pretty good size body to him and we want to get in to feeding them all year round to get them all to their full potential. My buddy lives right on the property so he can get out and get the buck he wants to cull at any time. Plus with having to go back in for another back surgery at some point during the season, I want to get the most out of the time while I can still get out.

Culling just got my attention and I started wondering if that is how the deer get so big down here. Up north where I was from, the mature Doe's were what my friends and I went after because a lot of the bucks were just small since hunters would shoot any buck on site. Plus you couldn't bait them and there are no antler restrictions. You can buy an extra Doe tag every day through the season and collect 20 plus Doe tags and they will still never hit their quota. Zone 10 has way too many Doe's and now all these towns that are over ran with them are having big problems with Lyme disease. I wasn't too excited about moving back to MA after getting out of the Marine Corps since I haven't lived there in a long time, but my dad wanted me to move in with him so I went back. I have lived in other states now longer than in MA and I am never ever going back. Too many ridiculous laws, high taxes and the weather stinks up there.

A 200# 8 pointer was considered a monster up there. But when I was growing up and hunting with my uncle, a 175# buck was considered an average size deer in my area of MA. We would pass them up all the time and let them grow. He moved up to NH where there were good size deer until they built everywhere and now him and his friends own miles of land up in Maine in the old logging territory and built a nice cabin up there. It's so remote up there that some deer have never even seen a human. When it snows, it's only accessible by snow mobiles. I really regret not buying a huge piece of land up there when they were practically giving it away in the 90's. They were selling 10 mile plots of land for $100.000.00 and under. But I love it down here and hunting in Texas is awesome! Free bacon running around everywhere and I can hunt from a blind instead of having to freeze to death in a tree with a climbing tree stand lol. I went all out on my hunting set up since I didn't have anything I could use down here. I bought a 4'x8' blind on a 5' tower, game cameras with modems, 2 feeders, The Remote feeder remote and a SHL Exterminator II feeder light for hunting hogs at night. Now we are going to plant Antler King food plots, put up some protein gravity feeders around the property, dig a huge hole, throw a pond liner in it and make a pond watering hole for the herd. Now that I will be moving up in the area and my back will be fixed, he will have the help he needs to get the place all set up nice like he wants it. Thanks for all your help. Much appreciated.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: dkershen] #6912210 10/07/17 05:26 PM
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Thank you dkershen. I will look up some videos on it today. I started reading a lot of articles on it yesterday. I am leaving the culling up to my buddy who owns and lives on the property. I was just really curious about how it works, if there were certain regulations for it here in Texas and how people decide which buck needs to be culled. Even the non shooters look like they have potential to me so I wouldn't know which one to take out. Thanks again.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6912599 10/08/17 02:16 AM
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Parts of Leon county have very high deer densities. Doubt you're going to really make a difference trying to cull certain deer. And as stated above you're limited to one 13" buck and one with at least one unbranched antler.


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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6912601 10/08/17 02:17 AM
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Erathkid Offline
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Shoot a 13" or better. Let your buddy shoot spikes and cull deer confused2


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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6912637 10/08/17 03:26 AM
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First you need to understand that one man's cull is another man's trophy- it all depends on what you are trying to accomplish. Cull is a term that is used by managers for bucks that do not meet their criteria for what is trying to be managed for. If it is an AR county you can's shoot any buck with an inside spread of less than 13" unless it is a spike. If it is a non-AR county then a cull is whatever you want to call it. In east Texas we have lots of bucks that have inside spreads of less than 13" that we would love to take out but can't legally. What was said earlier was correct- unless you have lots of acreage or can work out a coop situation with neighboring land owners the best you will be able to do is use protein and food plots to improve your bucks. Also, removing does is also part of a good management plan.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: Erathkid] #6912822 10/08/17 02:30 PM
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Thanks Erathkid. Yeah his area has a pretty good amount of deer. I wrote the post to learn more about culling and the effects of it. What type of place would the herd actually benefit with bigger racks from it etc. So far I am getting a lot of good info from all of you. I won't shoot any branches on his property and stick to shooting 1 or 2 deer at most in a season because I don't have enough room to store them right now. Because after deer season I like to get a couple of hogs in the freezer too. But once I move up to the area this winter, I am buying a good size freezer so I can have the room to store them. We have my in-laws living on one side of the house, 2 large refrigerators but the freezers get stuffed by them. So they know to start leaving me some room around deer season now lol. But it's not enough room to hold a lot of deer and hog meat. I give some deer meat to my elderly neighbor every year and he and his dog look forward to it lol. Thanks for the help Erathkid.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: Russ79] #6912835 10/08/17 02:47 PM
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Thank you Russ79. Centerville is an AR area. We do have a huge amount of Doe in the area which is good. I am going to work on getting the food plots ready after the season is over, build a small pond watering hole and getting up some protein feeders up around the property after muzzleloader season is over. I always thought that feeding them certain stuff would help them grow healthier and never heard of this culling technique so I had to learn about it. It wouldn't be the method I would use but then again, I am new to hunting here in Texas. I have seen some amazing looking bucks up in Centerville and some pretty big wild hogs as well. I like hunting out of a blind now. No more freezing my arse off in a climbing tree stand during bow season for me lol. Thanks again for all your help.

Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: bowbuilder1971] #6912915 10/08/17 04:34 PM
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Anytime buddy. Good luck.


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Re: Got some questions about culling deer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. [Re: Erathkid] #6919886 10/14/17 03:11 AM
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Thanks Erathkid.

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