Deer hunters hipothetical situation.

[kc]

Its the last day of Deer season, temps are in the teens, lots of blowing snow and about 2 foot of powder. you are looking at three Deer at about 100 yards and you are tucked inside a bunch of pines . it don't matter if you are in cammo or not you have a clear shot no problems.
One of the Deer is a healthy, doe but the others are small and just loosing there spots.
What deer should I shoot? I have land owner permits if its a doe its ok, no law broke.


What is my decision? and why.

 

[cfvickers]

Let em' walk. If it is the last day and you have permission to shoot a doe, you should have already shot one and picked either an old mare or one that otherwise didn't have little ones with it. If you shoot a little one, you run the risk of killing a button buck, because sometimes you really can't tell even at that range. Where I hunt we have a terrible doe to buck ration and it sucks when that happens, but it does from time to time. The little ones have not yet lived through a winter and may not yet know how to survive. true, they would likely fall in with a group and be fine, but why wait till the last day of the season to then make a questionable kill. If it wasn't that important to you before to get a deer, no need in doing it in this situation. I am not criticizing anyone else's opinion but this is how I look at it. If you feel like for some reason you absolutely must kill one, pick one, it makes no difference. In my experience though, if there are two babies, one is a buck at least half the time.

 

[bigngreen]

I would need more input, like general deer population and health of the area. With the info I would eat my tag or if I could pick the doe fawn I would take it to give the others the best chance of getting through winter good.

I actually at two doe tags last year in a similar situation, but there was only two does in 13 deer, not good for the little guys so I held of.

 

[winmag]

I agree with both Cfvickers, and Bigngreen,
One says dont shoot the young one for fear it could be a buck
One says shoot a young one to give the others the best chance of survival
Both say dont shoot depending on the situation.
Completely depends on you and your judgement for your particular situation.
Maybe youve only had a chance to hunt for one day due to work, and family obligations, and you need meat. Maybe your a trophy hunter only. Maybe the buck to doe ratio is XXX so you do X..... It all depends. There is no right answer, nor wrong answer IMO.

 

[kc]

All great points. As for me, I love to see Deer live but where I Hunt there are so many dead Deer in the swamps, it makes me wont to shake my head and ask why is Mother Nature such a bitch?




If I were to fill land owner permits, I would take the late fawn, the chances of it living is slim.
we get around 3ft of snow by Dec 25. as they get weak they can spread desiese and it can pass to the healthy.

 

[Coyboy]

Shoot all three, if theres that much snow in November in the UP then they will likly find a crueler fate. Death by wolves or starvation.

 

[ICANHITHIMMAN]

Shoot all three, if theres that much snow in November in the UP then they will likly find a crueler fate. Death by wolves or starvation.

I was going to say that as well bang bang last day its brown its down.

 

[Chas1]

+1 w/cfvickers.