I hunt in Bracketville in Kinney County.

I am the only real motivated hunter and we dont feed protein, and most dont feed corn year round. I feed corn year round in my 2 feeders only.

We have a brow tine problem every year about 50% of deer dont have them.

but this year especially there are no brow tines at all. have seen 1 buck will them and they were tiny.


I have seen so many big deer that normall would be a nice 8 or so, but its a slick 6 this year. soooo many 5 and 6 point 3/4 year deer.


is this directly attributed to the drought?

A lot of this. this is by far the best deer I have seen this year out of probably 25 bucks I have seen.

most mass and height for sure. but no brows.

Following as I have heard of similar issues up in drought affected King & Dickens county

Another

Another…that's a big ass deer for us. No rack

With the exception of one or two bucks, all of our racks are down this year due to the drought and we feed protein.

I am curious about the brow tines though… I watched a 5.5 year old 13" wide marginal 8pt for a minute or two the other weekend and he's been on camera. His rack looks like crap…

No eye guards is a genetic trait not a drought/nutrient reduction trait.

cledus6150 said:

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No eye guards is a genetic trait not a drought/nutrient reduction trait.

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yeah I know its genetic but the % without them is up a LOT this year. same year as the drought. Surely its connected in some way. maybe not though...thats why I am here!

Talked about no eye guards this weekend with a couple phd's that run some big time ranches. We had seen 2 2-year olds with no eye guards and they are now the ranch hands and managers target mgmt deer. They had explained that the drought doesn't really/typically have a major affect on the main frame 6,8,10 but will effect stickers and mass. That is to say unless your deer are in poor shape, which your deer do not look to be in poor shape.

I don't know what the age structure is like on your place…but of the photos you posted, two of those bucks are 1.5. First set of horns. Not uncommon for no brows.

Is it possible that anytime a deer reached 2 or even 3, they get shot? That you literally have no mature bucks in the pool? Just wondering what the hunting pressure is like, neighbors, etc.

It wouldn't be impossible. It's happened a lot. And it's why antler restrictions work.

nah...not a lot of bucks get taken at all. we have like 2,000 acres and maybe 6 bucks killed a year. and all mature deer

TikkaShooter said:

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I don't know what the age structure is like on your place…but of the photos you posted, two of those bucks are 1.5. First set of horns. Not uncommon for no brows.

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those first two deer are not 1.5 though. both at least 3. our deer are not that big on our lease

Gotcha.

I'd likely vote down year plus a somewhat common trait in that area making it look worse.

Even the mature bucks have no brows? Got any photos of a mature deer?

He looks like our deer in Jackson county before we took over. You have to work with the biologists for your county to get your doe to buck ratio close. We started feeding protein especially during the months AprilMay, June& July for antler growth and for does and fawns going into the autumn months. We also started mixing in with the protein about 100# of medicated goat feed with Ivermectin, it knocks out the worms and the deers coats really shine. I understand, I think purine is now producing medicated deer protein.

Purina and Lyssy and Eckel both make a medicated protein feed with Ivermectin. We used the Purina one once before.

ttha_aggie_09 said:

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Purina and Lyssy and Eckel both make a medicated protein feed with Ivermectin. We used the Purina one once before.

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I'm pretty sure you meant to say SafeGuard (fenbendazole) instead of ivermectin.

Yes, you're correct. I just assumed it was Ivermectin

No worries, just wanted to clarify in case people did not know that safeguard is the only approved dewormer for deer without a vfd. Rumatel is an excellent deer dewormer if you can get a vet to give you a prescription. A&M and East Ranch have done some research on using ivermectin treated corn with deer as have other places.

Not just you. We don't have a buck worth shooting in San saba county. First year in 31 years we have no plans of harvesting a deer on 3000 acres.

Howdy Dammit said:

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Not just you. We don't have a buck worth shooting in San saba county. First year in 31 years we have no plans of harvesting a deer on 3000 acres.

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was hoping to get some replies like this. Im sorry for you but glad its not just us

Great thread here with lots of folks chiming in with their current season experiences.

To add…this is just another reason why culling is so, so difficult. Judging age is one thing. Then trying to add antler growth or lack of growth to the equation. Even harder. Not saying culling is useless. It's just much lower on the "how to have better deer" list than most put it.

My bad for the sidebar.

We deworm at first green up and in late October. It makes all the difference in the world. THe pasture also looks over grazed and that can put a huge strain on the ecology and thus a reduction in nutrients for the deer, and No Im not talking about grass.

We are in a bad drought. And racks are bigger than they have been in years.

In our part of Kimble Co. We have the worst racks we've seen in 20 years. Definitely (severe) drought related. We have mature deer, but will only be a cull year this season.

Edit to add that the racks are very unusual this year. Very wavy main beams and tines with smaller and/or missing points. Definitely not a normal year and significantly drought impacted. Have almost no fawns either. Until August, we had less than 10 inches of rain the previous 12 months. Spots of our ranch are still bare dirt and we run minimal livestock.

Just giving an observation for my area in coryell/Mclennan county line. We have seen more deer this season than we have in years. It has also been one of the driest years, if not the driest on record. Surface water is few and far between. And this particular area has very few live oaks. Although you don't have to travel very many miles to get some. So you can't attribute the numbers being up to acorns. The antler growth is pretty much on par for other years, and maybe a tad better

gwellis said:

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We deworm at first green up and in late October. It makes all the difference in the world. THe pasture also looks over grazed and that can put a huge strain on the ecology and thus a reduction in nutrients for the deer, and No Im not talking about grass.

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De worm what?

Worst racks I've seen ever in our family place in Medina County. Like, nothing but pure trash bucks. That said, we've never properly managed the herd at the family place. Most bucks are down significantly on my heavy managed lease in Dimmit County too though.

gigemJTH12 said:

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TikkaShooter said:

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I don't know what the age structure is like on your place…but of the photos you posted, two of those bucks are 1.5. First set of horns. Not uncommon for no brows.

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those first two deer are not 1.5 though. both at least 3. our deer are not that big on our lease

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My guess would be 2-1/2yr min. 3-1/2yr old max

AstroAggie15 said:

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Following as I have heard of similar issues up in drought affected King & Dickens county

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I hunt in King Co. Drought was bad this year, but we started getting a lot of rain beginning in Sept, and there was a bumper crop of mesquite beans this year.

I killed this buck on Nov 19th. He weighed 200# on the hoof.

Damn let me know if you get a lease
Opening!

I've hunted 10 times this year at my lease in Hamilton county and I've yet to see a legal buck. The one for sure legal deer I had on camera was a 16" 6 pt and he showed up a couple of weeks ago with his entire right antler broken off. The neighbor who owns 1800 acres leases the grazing rights to our hunting lease and he grazed the place literally to the dirt during the drought while his 1800 acres is still lush with plenty of grass and cover so all of the wildlife has moved off to his property now. Really pisses me off and I'm having a hard time deciding if I want to renew the lease next year since I'm paying for 3 spots so me and my boys can have the place to ourselves and there's currently not any deer for 1 person to shoot much less 3.

We've hunted our place in Burleson county 6 or so times this year. We've had 0 deer come to the feeder and we're hardly getting any pictures. I threw a decoy out this morning and had an 8 point come at it but I let it walk. In probably 4 sits, I've seen that buck and a yearling spike. Not even any does.

While in the stand this morning, any time the wind blew it sounded like it was hailing the acorns were falling so thick. One thing that drought did was cause a huge acorn crop. I think one issue is we aren't seeing the mature deer because they know they don't have to the leave the woods.

Man I hunt Kinney county and we are seeing the best brows we have ever seen and amazing 3 and 4 year age class bucks. Anthrax hit us hard and we have bounced back better than I ever Expected.
Our ranch in Kinney county got amazing rain this year while everyone else was in horrible drought. The future is bright. We have more big axis than ever seen also.
This buck was killed last week. Yes low fence for those that need to know.

Shoot it. Mount it. Consider it like Michelangelo's David - sure the peenis may be small but it was still a fine specimen overall.

Meh, weak right G2, would not shoot.