Post by GoTres on Nov 19, 2003 14:54:21 GMT -5
I pulled this from The Dallas Morning News website. Thought some might find it interesting. I had always heard that deer pretty much stayed in the same area.
...Scientists know more about whitetails than ever before. There remain, however, many popular misconceptions about deer:
• Whitetails are homebodies, never roaming farther than a mile from where they were born.
Fact: Deer are not nomadic like caribou or elk, but they move farther than most hunters think. Published reports indicate home ranges varying from 365 acres to more than 5,000 acres. A doe's range tends to expand the most during winter, when food is in short supply. Bucks may move dramatically during the rut. One mature radio-collared buck moved 27 miles during the breeding season.
• The buck with the biggest antlers is the dominant buck.
Fact: Antlers serve a vague, unexplained function in herd status, but overall dominance is determined more by a buck's body size and aggressive personality than by antler size. Older bucks generally exhibit dominance over young bucks, regardless of antler size.
• Whitetails only move early and late in the day.
Fact: Dusk and dawn are peak movement periods for most whitetails, but that may represent the fringes of nocturnal movements, when deer in heavily hunted populations are most active. Weather changes throughout the day often trigger unusual activity peaks.
• Rut timing varies year to year and is triggered by cold weather.
Fact: The whitetail breeding season varies greatly throughout traditional deer range, but the rut tends to stay consistent in a given area from one season to the next. That's because the rut is triggered by photoperiod, the amount of daylight available during a day.
The best way to determine when the rut occurs is to backdate the birth of fawns. The whitetail gestation period averages 200 days. Peak timing of the rut evolved so that fawns are born when range conditions are likely to be good. State wildlife biologists can pinpoint the primary breeding season in your area. If cold weather triggered the rut, deer in the south might never breed.
• Don't shoot does – a rancher doesn't shoot cows, does he?
Fact: Comparing cattle ranching with whitetail management is worse than comparing apples and oranges. A rancher's objective is to produce and sell as many cattle as possible. A hunter or game manager's objective is to produce as many quality bucks as possible. In most cases, that means keeping deer numbers under control. It's an unusual deer herd that does not benefit from doe harvest.
• Deer never look up for danger.
Fact: They do if they are accustomed to danger associated with high places. In woods that are heavily hunted from tree stands, deer may walk around as if looking for squirrels. There are several advantages to hunting from an elevated blind, but such a blind does not make you invisible to a deer.
• Once a spike, always a spike.
Fact: Young spike bucks may be caused by inferior genetics, but they may also be caused by poor nutrition. If nutrition improves the following year, the spike may develop much better antlers. A spike may also be the result of late birth, often to a young doe that does not produce enough milk to adequately feed her first offspring. Some yearling spikes in research herds have shed the stigma of spikedom and gone on to develop record-book-quality antlers.
...Scientists know more about whitetails than ever before. There remain, however, many popular misconceptions about deer:
• Whitetails are homebodies, never roaming farther than a mile from where they were born.
Fact: Deer are not nomadic like caribou or elk, but they move farther than most hunters think. Published reports indicate home ranges varying from 365 acres to more than 5,000 acres. A doe's range tends to expand the most during winter, when food is in short supply. Bucks may move dramatically during the rut. One mature radio-collared buck moved 27 miles during the breeding season.
• The buck with the biggest antlers is the dominant buck.
Fact: Antlers serve a vague, unexplained function in herd status, but overall dominance is determined more by a buck's body size and aggressive personality than by antler size. Older bucks generally exhibit dominance over young bucks, regardless of antler size.
• Whitetails only move early and late in the day.
Fact: Dusk and dawn are peak movement periods for most whitetails, but that may represent the fringes of nocturnal movements, when deer in heavily hunted populations are most active. Weather changes throughout the day often trigger unusual activity peaks.
• Rut timing varies year to year and is triggered by cold weather.
Fact: The whitetail breeding season varies greatly throughout traditional deer range, but the rut tends to stay consistent in a given area from one season to the next. That's because the rut is triggered by photoperiod, the amount of daylight available during a day.
The best way to determine when the rut occurs is to backdate the birth of fawns. The whitetail gestation period averages 200 days. Peak timing of the rut evolved so that fawns are born when range conditions are likely to be good. State wildlife biologists can pinpoint the primary breeding season in your area. If cold weather triggered the rut, deer in the south might never breed.
• Don't shoot does – a rancher doesn't shoot cows, does he?
Fact: Comparing cattle ranching with whitetail management is worse than comparing apples and oranges. A rancher's objective is to produce and sell as many cattle as possible. A hunter or game manager's objective is to produce as many quality bucks as possible. In most cases, that means keeping deer numbers under control. It's an unusual deer herd that does not benefit from doe harvest.
• Deer never look up for danger.
Fact: They do if they are accustomed to danger associated with high places. In woods that are heavily hunted from tree stands, deer may walk around as if looking for squirrels. There are several advantages to hunting from an elevated blind, but such a blind does not make you invisible to a deer.
• Once a spike, always a spike.
Fact: Young spike bucks may be caused by inferior genetics, but they may also be caused by poor nutrition. If nutrition improves the following year, the spike may develop much better antlers. A spike may also be the result of late birth, often to a young doe that does not produce enough milk to adequately feed her first offspring. Some yearling spikes in research herds have shed the stigma of spikedom and gone on to develop record-book-quality antlers.
