I have a feeder 40 yards behind my cabin at my hunting ranch , mainly just for wildlife viewing . I hunt elsewhere . It is popular with the local does . I have not shot any does on my place for about 8 years , just bucks . My does draw the bucks in during the season . Now they are getting too tame . I have had them stay and eat at the feeder as I work outside , they just watch . I went down a few days ago , the feeder had been empty for about 7 days and the does had quit coming . In the morning I shot a big rattlesnake from my porch . In less than a minute 3 does showed up at the feeder . With the shot they knew I was there and came to see if I had put corn out . Now I have deer coming to gunfire .

Same way at our place. We spread corn in the front yard to draw them in to watch. Bucks come too.

They get in my yard all the time. They're eating mesquite beans. I have a protein and corn feeder 150 yards out my back door.

Dang Stompy. Great buck!!

I don’t really like “tame” “wild”life.

I have some very gentle does. I don’t have a house feeder but when I drive up to a blind most come out to the noise of the can am. Not gonna lie, I do talk to them and will toss them feed.


I’ve accepted the fact that the gentle doe I’m talking to today, I might be dragging out in October. I’m just really nice to them in the meantime.

My cousin has deer like that. They still taste good though!

I carry a gallon bag 1/2 full of corn to my ladder stand to throw out every hunt. Every season I have deer that will show up when I throw it out and then watch me climb up my ladder and get situated. Last season I even had a small 8 point follow me 300 yards then cut thru the mesquites to where I was going. Here`s a video from 2020 of a small buck that acted as a decoy most of the season. He even showed up behind me while I was checking a camera at another location with another small buck. I think they see me with the corn in the plastic bag and know where I`m headed. FYI...... these deer aren`t fed year round either. We usually don`t start feeders until first of September or late August.

VVVVVVV
[video:youtube]https://www.youtube.com/shorts/lEWNwJXtoxw?feature=share[/video]

A red rider BB gun will get them back to being spooky again.

Cool picture

I put a wildlife feeder out about 100 yards from the house. It's a no shoot feeder, just for viewing. It's nice to look out the window and see deer & hogs feeding. Although my horses think it's their own personal pre-popped popcorn machine. Two years ago we had three 30ish pounds hogs on it multiple times a day. You could drive within yards of them and they would feed. If you stopped they dart off into the woods until you left. I stopped seeing them around Thanksgiving. More than likely my one of my neighbors got them.

Sounds about like the deer at my friend's place where we have a shooting range. I hung a feeder out there several years ago and keep it running year round. We'll have deer eating corn while we bang away from a shooting bench that's about 80 yards away from them. We've got a berm out at 600 yards and a couple of gongs hanging in front of it. More than once we've had to quit shooting and let deer walk across right in front of the gongs.

More to my story . There was a big boar at the feeder after dark with 5 does circling the feeder but not going in . I had to wait for a clear shot with no does in the way . The pig dropped and the does just looked at me when I stepped out . I got the truck and drug the pig off as the does just stood there and watched . Then they went right to the feeder , without even a thank you .

Our property was pretty overhunted when we got it. We didn’t shoot anything for 3 years by that time the deer had gotten just like you describe very relaxed around people. On several occasions I shot hogs standing amongst deer and the hog would fall over deer would look a bit and go right back to eating. After a season of shooting deer that all went back to normal.

Shoot some does problem fixed.

I do not shoot does and I realize that is the problem . But my does live at my place all year round and they bring in a bunch of transient bucks during the rut for hunting season . All new bucks that I only see for a month or so . So I do not need to fix the problem .

Paintball gun should solve the problem

Maybe maybe not. We shoot the heck out of the does and still see the same thing you describe new bucks all over. If you never shoot does almost guaranteed you have too many deer and the body and rack size is suffering from too many mouths.

My experience related to how spooky whitetail deer are is directly tied to how many natural predators they have.

Have a lot of coyotes and such, the deer are more skittish. Zero coyotes, the deer are much calmer.

I shoot does on my place and they are still gentle.

You can have one hot doe or twenty, still gonna bring the same amount of bucks in.

We have more coyotes and bobcats than you can shake a stick at.

Gentle of not, does will die on my place. Around Wichita Falls "you see it, you kill it" is pretty much the only way to put deer in the freezer. Opening weekend of bow season is creeping up on us and my crossbow is ready to go to work.

My land is just South of Bowie and we have been in a 4 year drought that hasn’t helped wildlife and kept me from planting food plots. We have recently had some pretty good rain but it’s too late in the year to generate forage or allow me to plant wheat. I’ve scratched the surface and the moisture just hasn’t been retained.

We’ve kept 6 corn feeders going since last year and deer are coming to them according to cams. So are birds, coons, squirrels and pigs. The deer generally get there too late. Recently got a picture of a porcupine. I haven’t seen but one in my life and that was hunting in Montana. I showed it to the local Game Mgt guy. He said he figured the last one had gone 20 years before. It dang sure won’t be able to breed.