# Button bucks vs. Yearling bucks



## Tracker83 (Jun 21, 2005)

I have been reading through several of these threads during the past few weeks, and I have been very surprised at how angry some folks here are against the protection of yearling bucks. I can understand some resentment over MAPRs (I am still on the fence about that one myself), but I don't quite understand how some can actually think that the protection of SOME yearling bucks actually has a net negative effect on the herd. I have also been amazed at some of those who are vocally againsts ARs are the first to call a hunter who harvests a couple of button bucks per year a "slob hunter", even though this practice is perfectly legal under the current Michigan regulations.

So my question for discussion is this:

Are there any valid arguments for the protection of button bucks that CAN'T also be made for the protection of yearling bucks?

Let's keep the anger and the bitterness out of this one so that it stays open long enough for an honest, civil discussion.

Tracker


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## Munsterlndr (Oct 16, 2004)

Tracker83 said:


> I have been reading through several of these threads during the past few weeks, and I have been very surprised at how angry some folks here are against the protection of yearling bucks. I can understand some resentment over MAPRs (I am still on the fence about that one myself), but I don't quite understand how some can actually think that the protection of SOME yearling bucks actually has a net negative effect on the herd. I have also been amazed at some of those *who are vocally againsts ARs are the first to call a hunter who harvests a couple of button bucks per year a "slob hunter", even though this practice is perfectly legal under the current Michigan regulations*.


Can't agree with this characterization. I've found that more AR advocates want to protect BB's than do AR opponents. 


Tracker83 said:


> So my question for discussion is this:
> 
> Are there any valid arguments for the protection of button bucks that CAN'T also be made for the protection of yearling bucks?
> 
> ...


Tracker -
BBs are male deer. I can think of no reason to protect BBs but not protect 1.5 year old bucks, although the reverse may be true. If you are facing the potential for high winterkill, then it may make more sense to cull BBs who will likely not make it through the winter instead of harvesting 1.5 year old bucks who will have a much higher survival rate. I personally think that since BB's & 1.5 year old bucks are legal that if a hunter chooses to harvest one, they should not be subject to derision.

As far as people being angry. it's not that some people are against the protection of 1.5 year old bucks. The debate surrounds the fact that mandatory antler restrictions are not a zero sum game. Choosing to protect 1.5 year old bucks by using ARs has a number of consequences. Depending on your opinion, you might see some of these consequences as good or some as bad. It tends to be the consequences of AR's that have some people upset.

Here are some of the potential consequences:

Increased antlerless harvest. If one of the management goals is to keep the herd in balance with the habitat, you are going to have to increase the harvest of another segment of the herd if you want to protect 1.5 year old bucks and you dont want the herd size to increase. Typically, this takes the form of increased harvest of antlerless deer. Increased antlerless harvests tend to result in declining herd numbers since it is the does that provide the fawns to replace the deer that are harvested in previous years. If you are in an area that is perceived to have too many deer than you will probably see this as a positive. If you are in an area where the herd is at or below capacity you might see this as a negative.

Some studies suggest that if you base your selective harvest on Antler Restrictions, that over some period of time you will see a net decrease in the average antler size in that area. This is due to the fact that you are protecting the 1.5 year old deer with smaller racks and harvesting the 1.5 year old deer with antlers that exceed the minimum restrictions. This topic, known as "high-grading", is highly controversial.

In states that have implemented mandatory ARs statewide, there has been an overall reduction in the annual buck harvest. While a greater number of larger racks are harvested, fewer hunters have the opportunity to harvest a buck. In Pennsylvania, it was something like 60,000 fewer hunters were able to harvest a buck so that 9,500 hunters could harvest a larger antlered buck. If you were one of the few that harvested a trophy you might see this as a good thing. If you went without a buck that year you might not agree.

Reduced hunter opportunity. One faction of hunters care more about meat and feel that the deer herd should be managed for maximum recreational opportunity. Another faction feels that larger antlers are more desirable and feel that the herd should be managed to maximize antler production. Protecting 1.5 year old bucks with ARs is going to limit the recreational opportunity for those hunters who care more about harvesting a deer for meat. If you fall into that faction you will probably be opposed to mandatory ARs.



I dont see anyone criticizing QDM advocates for voluntarily adopting personal antler restrictions or for practicing QDM on their private land. The debate occurs when it is proposed that QDM be made mandatory for all hunters on both public & private land.
_____________________________
Munsterlndr
Curmudgeon in Training


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## Sib (Jan 8, 2003)

I've never heard of anyone intentionally harvesting BBs, but plenty do get harvested every year. I think the majority of their harvest are mistakes made when trying to collect a doe, last figure I saw was about 20% of the antlerless harvest was comprised of button bucks. I'd only give a friend, or a campmate guff for killing a BB, it's legal so I'd not comment to a stranger on something like this. But a friend or a campmate, you're gonna get some ribbing. :lol:


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## Guest (Jul 25, 2005)

There is nothing wrong with protecting button bucks and the more the merrier. There is little wrong harvesting BB's and this practice is not the result of mistakes as often as one might think. It is usually the result of shoot first and ask questions later. In other words, "I got my deer and wow it is a buck". It is natural for undisiplined humans to be selfish and not care about our resource.

We all need to ask ourselves this question, Would the deer herd be better off health wise by taking or protecting BB's? The theory oft quoted is that in the harsher areas there are times, (usually following several mild winters) that fawns should be taken. No doubt that this is good deer management, and yet the real deer experts would advise to target the doe fawns not BB's during this periord of excess young deer. So, I trust the experts such as John Ozoga not the wanna be's. 

In summary it is not a tragedy to take BB's but one should make a serious effort to protect them.

It is often quoted here by Wanna be's and naysayers that the QDMA pushes for the mandatory protection of 1 1/2 year old bucks. This is not only false but I believe purposely a negative shot at the QDM world wide movement. I'm on the National Board of Directors QDMA and for the last five years and I have never voted for or seen such a policy letter. We advocate voluntary antler restrictions on private or public land to better balance (more natural) the herd in the buck age structure, We advocate that the sex ratio be more natural (a buck to doe sex ratio of 1:1.5 to !:2 with a ratio as high as 1:3 for the harsher areas. We advocate very strongly that the deer density to be no more than 60% of the maximum carrying capacity of the habitat for each area to create a sustained deer herd and habitat. In other words a deer herd in balance with its world and as natural as we can create. 

We do get involved and are asked endlessly by state agencies for help in designing their deer management policy. Lately the requests are growing and we have actually had QDM seminars for the entire state wldlife agency. Example, the state of Delaware early this year made that exact request and six noted deer research biologists, Brian Murphy, Joe Hamilton, Dr. Karl Miller, Dr. Larry Marchington, Dr Grant Woods along with Michigan's Dr. Harry Jacobson gave a three day advanced deer management seminr to the entire Delaware Wildlife Division personnel. Alabama recently asked us to advise on their recent mandatory antler restriction potential rule. We declind due to the proposal not being sound enough to achieve acceptable results. Nevertheless, the proposal passed and should be in the Alabama rules this year. 

Our increasing involvement for advice for private or state agencies is due to having over 800 professional as members of our organization. Professionals such as our own noted deer researcher John Ozoga who is a life member of the QDMA. It has been discussed here and especially within the professional ranks that no more deer biologists are being trained in our Univerities. In the near future there will be only one source to obtain factual advice for sound and scientific deer management and you all know which source that will be.

There are many ways to advance the yearling bucks into an older age class, not just a single mandatory antler restriction program. You may choose a slot system where spike bucks are legal but one cannot take anything less than a 15 inch minimum spread for all other bucks. Texas now has that rule in a large demonstrtion area and is accepted by more than 75% of all deer hunters in that area. Not bad support for only the second year. It is expected to grow into a much larger area after this year and some are saying statewide with area modifications in a short few years.

The QDMA does have an unofficial policy advocatiog manadatory antler rules only as a fast learning curve and hopefully remove this rule and let the educated hunters make good deer harvest decisions. I personally believe that this will work and get much support from landowners and hunters.

By the way, before we get too much misinformation, there are QDM type coop's (some quite large in size) that actually have increased their harvest of bucks from two to fivefold, while taking more does and protecting a minimum of 50% of all the bucks. 

Our own DMU 118 five year demonstrion in Clare County is an example of this phenomenon, which is not rare but a result of poor previous deer management. The deer harvest data from the DNR showed an increase of buck harvests by 24%, while protecting 50% of the yearling does and taking 84% more does thn historical data. There was also a drop in the BB harvest from a historical average of 19% of the antlerless deer to an average of 12% for the five year period. This increase took place as the rest of the state was dropping deer harvest numbers. THis is fact not fiction and it happened in our state. Is this the result of SOUND AND SCIENTUIFIC DEER MANAGEMENT? 

I will agree this will not happen throughout our state but I firmly believe that with a sound deer management program in place we should expect no less than present buck harvests numbers and being of an older class versus presently and also taking more does than presently. I believe that this can happen whille having a statewide deer herd approaching 1,5 million. That means having less deer than present but harvesting more and better deer in spite of what the wanna be's or naysayers tell you. It's called sound and scientific deer management that many of you voted for back in 1996 (proposal "G").


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## Tracker83 (Jun 21, 2005)

I simply thought it would be interesting to hear from somebody who doesn't believe in the protection of yearling bucks and find out the reasons why they think button bucks, on the other hand, SHOULD be protected.


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## boehr (Jan 31, 2000)

Ed Spin04 said:


> ...Before to many wanna be biologists on this site....


Yep, there are a lot of them


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## Guest (Jul 25, 2005)

Correction, second sentence 12th paragraph should read, "while protecting 50% of the yearling bucks", (not does). Sorry.


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## Munsterlndr (Oct 16, 2004)

Ed Spin04 said:


> It is often quoted here by Wanna be's and naysayers that the QDMA pushes for the mandatory protection of 1 1/2 year old bucks. This is not only false but I believe purposely a negative shot at the QDM world wide movement. I'm on the National Board of Directors QDMA and for the last five years and I have never voted for or seen such a policy letter.


The following is taken from the minutes of the Dec. 3-5, 2003, meeting of the Natural Resources Commission.

*Ed Spinnazzola,Mid Michigan Branch QDMA,* Requested that the DNR review and evaluate the existing harvest data for DMU 118 and also requested that the "three points on one side rule" remain in effect for two more years."

In other NRC meetings there were requests by *Perry Russo of QDMA* and by John Ozaga to keep mandatory AR's in place and to increase the restriction to 4 points on a side.

So when representitives of QDMA make public requests of the NRC to implement Mandatory Antler Restrictions, how can this be seen as anything other than _"pushing for mandatory protection of 1 1/2 year old bucks?"_

If all the members of the QDMA wanted was voluntary implementation of AR's we would not even be having this discussion.
____________________________
Munsterlndr
Curmudgeon in Training


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## Ranger Ray (Mar 2, 2003)

Tracker83 said:


> Are there any valid arguments for the protection of button bucks that CAN'T also be made for the protection of yearling bucks?


I think we will need to ask God when we get to heaven what is the right balance of age structure for the deer herd because everyone besides him falls in the category of wanna be. Not positive but I think he will start off by saying everything would have worked out just fine if I hadn't introduced man.


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## GVDocHoliday (Sep 5, 2003)

> So when representitives of QDMA make public requests of the NRC to implement Mandatory Antler Restrictions, how can this be seen as anything other than "pushing for mandatory protection of 1 1/2 year old bucks?"


I see it as pushing for mandatory antler restrictions to collect more data as to either enforce the hypothesis or prove it wrong beyond a reasonable doubt. There are many areas in Michigan where many deer will not achieve more than 3 or 4 points to a side until they are 3.5 years old. Now this is quite common...I'm sure you've read somewhere that once a spike not always a spike? Oh yeah you know, the hunting mag articles where they say a deer that starts off as a spike in it's second year will more than likely be larger than a buck that starts off as a 4 or 6?


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## Guest (Jul 26, 2005)

Thanks Doc, you got it right. That doesn't mean that truth will be accepted by others.


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## Ferg (Dec 17, 2002)

There is no need to keep up this name calling - sticks and stones and all that - this is NOT the sand box.

Thanks

ferg....


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## Jeff Sturgis (Mar 28, 2002)

Just for clarification...who want's to be a biologist? Just speaking personally, but I'd rather be a deer manager with hands on experience and knowledge pertainining to deer and deer habitat...I'll take experience over a degree anyday


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## beer and nuts (Jan 2, 2001)

NJ-""""I'll take experience over a degree anyday """"

aaahhhhh :yikes: I know alot of 30 experienced plus year deer hunters/sportsman.......Not everybody can say they have a college degree but alot can say they have 20 plus years experience deer hunting!!! _Will the real biologists please stand up.......... _


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## Adam Waszak (Apr 12, 2004)

Rather there are times to or to not shot a button buck the question I ask is simply WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO? If you desire a fawn then take a doe fawn but why cut into the posibility of next years buck or the year after thats buck just to "tag a deer". I have shot BB's and I felt stupid afterwards for it but it was unintentional and I think we all should be a little more careful to avaoid such killing. Too many times we on this board confuse "legal" with "what we should do". I would much rather have a guy shoot a 4 pointer with a nice basket rack then shoot a BB. You never know what the BB will turn out like. The intentional culling of such deer is something 90% of us should never discuss because the winters are not harsh enough throughout the majority of the state to even try to justify this type of action. If there are too many deer then take the does and the population will drop but why shoot BB's because there are too many deer?  

AW


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## Ferg (Dec 17, 2002)

Get back to BB's or just PM each other - thanks

ferg....


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## Adam Waszak (Apr 12, 2004)

beer and nuts said:


> NJ-""""I'll take experience over a degree anyday """"
> 
> aaahhhhh :yikes: I know alot of 30 experienced plus year deer hunters/sportsman.......Not everybody can say they have a college degree but alot can say they have 20 plus years experience deer hunting!!! _Will the real biologists please stand up.......... _



I have been hunting for 19 years now and I am no biologist. I have a hard time aging deer on the hoof because in MI you really just have to be able to identify a 1 1/2 year old and you have most of em covered. QW had a great article explaining this in the August issue by the way. We could all benefity by being able to better identifying BB's as well as older bucks. I must admit after 2 1/2 year olds it is tough for me in a lot of ways but then again I don't have to worry in MI about that in the near future :lol: But I in no way consider myself as smart as a biologist or someone like NJ who has proven their knowledge and skill year in and year out. Iam just another deer hunter trying to become a better deer hunter every year.

AW


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## QDMAMAN (Dec 8, 2004)

Adam Waszak said:


> I would much rather have a guy shoot a 4 pointer with a nice basket rack then shoot a BB. You never know what the BB will turn out like. AW


The same thing goes for the 4 pt. with a nice basket rack.

Big T


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## Adam Waszak (Apr 12, 2004)

QDMAMAN said:


> The same thing goes for the 4 pt. with a nice basket rack.
> 
> Big T



You are correct sir! Problem with alot of areas you will not see any bigger than 4 although a birdie told me of an area where there are some nice ones in Isabella Cty.

AW


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## Jeff Sturgis (Mar 28, 2002)

One angle to look at this is concerning the U.P. We lose 50% of our fawns during an average winter. Basically, this is a huge wasted resource and could be as high as 50,000 annually with an average size herd. Compare those numbers to wolves...350 wolves = 7000 dead deer a year, or 20 deer per wolf, per year. So, you have a doe tag, and you accidently shoot a BB....the BB had a 50% chance of dying anyways in an average winter, so this was not a very critical mistake. A yearling buck is a lot different. A yearling buck on the other hand has already made it through one winter as a fawn, escaped predators, cars, etc., and has a very good chance of making it through the next winter. I'm not saying to go out and shoot BB's...but there is a differance and we hear so much about all the deer the wolves are supposed to take...but seemingly no concern over the several times more fawns that are taken due to winter severity.


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## Luv2hunteup (Mar 22, 2003)

> Luv2hunteup, Is the hunting spot with too many does in the EUP?


There sure is. Last season my sightings were down (about 100) due to wolves hanging out at the begining of rifle season but in 2003 the longest I went in the first 8 days of rifle season without a deer sighting was 2 hours. That is hunting from dark to dark without leaving the blind. 50 sightings a day was not unusual. Between rifle season and muzzleloader season I had over 400 separate sightings. Alot were the same deer roaming from blind to blind location waiting for it to get dark enough to venture into the hayfields out Fibre way. Go back, so a search and look at my posts from that season. Rudyard/Fibre ag land is great hunting but the public land offers far less deer numbers and there's room for lots of improvement.

About where to you hunt? No specifics please.


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## withgrace (Apr 24, 2005)

I just bought 20 acres south of rudyard last year. Live and hunt there. Before that I hunted state land in the EUP with little success. Saw more deer last year than all teh other years combined. I am happy with the amount of deer I have been seeing in my field, but I would not say we are overpopulated in my area.


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## Luv2hunteup (Mar 22, 2003)

Very good area. Some real hawgs have been taken in south Rudyard.


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## Whit1 (Apr 27, 2001)

Off Topic = Closed


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