Why would someone high fence their piddly 15 acres? Oh, I see now. Its so wildlife can't cross on one side of our property. Now I understand. Idiots.

incoming

High-fence in most of the state is mostly a matter of self defense. When the large ranches around us sold off in 100 to 200 acre tracts, the age structure in our herd suffered mightily. I wish every "rancher" with less than a section would put up a high fence too keep my deer from being killed at 2 1/2 years of age.

I agree with 89fordag. We had ranches on both sides of us that sold day hunts to anybody that had $100. It was killin' our age structure as well. But now people see our high fence and say that hunting is not "fair chase" behind it. No matter that the ranch is well over 4,000 acres. It does not get much more fair than you trying to kill one specific mature buck that loves to hide in the cedar thickets and never comes near a feeder.

FSGuide = winner

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my deer

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State resource.

have to agree with pedro here

Vote for Pedro!



[This message has been edited by markandles (edited 12/18/2006 7:11p).]

Don't get me started. I think most of the vets here already know how I feel. We had a heated thread going about a month ago.

If it's a state resource (which it is, don't get me wrong here) shouldn't the state be feeding them?

The state does... "Your" plants are assumed to be available for consumption by the law. Ask someone about what happens in the burbs when a deer gets in their veggie garden.

I don't like high fences. It will start to damage genetics and cause increases in incidence of genetic disorders if it gets too prevalent. Then you have fools starting to capture and move around bucks to improve genetics, etc..and before you know it you have livestock instead of game. To me, it's already on the border of livestock when you feed year round from a feeder to draw them into a kill zone. To add genetics and breeding and closed populations as if whitetail were exotic, you might as well reclassify whitetail as livestock at that point...whats the sport?

every deer lease in texas has feeders. What's the difference.

good post BQ98

However, I dont believe the use of a feeder classifies deer as "livestock".

I believe the pressure from development and more hunters has driven deer to cover and formed more prevalent nocturnal habits. Feeders are almost necessary in many parts of Texas if you want to lure a deer from cover.

In parts of East Texas it is tough to get a mature buck out in the open (there are few open areas)with a feeder, and a food plot.

you got highfencepw3ned

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Feeders are almost necessary in many parts of Texas if you want to lure a deer from cover.

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Ok, I have to take issue with this. Try hunting in the east. Yous guys have no idea what hunting pressure is.

Did I put out feeders when I moved out here? No, I became a better hunter.

If you want to shoot deer over feeders, go right ahead. But don't try and sell it to me as a necessity, because it's not. Just admit that you are too lazy to scout, do scent control, and get out in the ****.

Apples... meet Oranges... Oranges... this is Apples... Play nice.

Deer management is big business in Texas. Will it become like the cattle biz? Who knows....I know of one ranch that is, though. Called Hooves and Horns in Zephyr. It is a deer ranch. You don't go there to hunt deer, but to purchase them, or some of their stud buck's semen. The prevalence of high fence operations that charge big $$$ for trophy hunts make an operation like this viable...

Check out the "Big Bucks" article in Texas Coop Power magazine.

http://www.texas-ec.org/publications/documents/tcp1106_001.pdf

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If you want to shoot deer over feeders, go right ahead. But don't try and sell it to me as a necessity, because it's not. Just admit that you are too lazy to scout, do scent control, and get out in the ****.

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Having feeders does not = shooting deer over feeders. I get so damn sick of this argument. We have corn feeders and protein feeders on our place. Out of the 3 of us that hunt there over the last 12 years there have been ZERO deer shot at a feeder. Does it work that way for everyone? No, but not all of us "lure deer in" and shoot them while they are eating corn. The feeders are there to serve a purpose and that is to provide nourishment.

To say that you're a better hunter because of the way you hunt is crap too. You became a different kind of hunter using a different skill set. I can do the same things you do, maybe even better but that does not make me a "worse" hunter since I too have adapted to the hunting situation I am in. There's not one right way to do it and not all ways are right but your way is no more pure or better than mine.

We by the way are low fenced.

[This message has been edited by MasterAggie (edited 12/19/2006 9:16a).]

A lot of what is being discussed is why I am primarily a bird hunter now, i.e. deer conditioned to visit feeders. I won't knock any deer hunters, cause I still enjoy it and we all know that you have to work for the good ones unless you get lucky, but I just love the sport and the action of quail and duck hunting more so than deer hunting. I've never thought of how high fencing may be determental to the deer herds in Texas. I doubt there will be enough high fence ranches in Texas to effect the over all herd in Texas for quite some time, but it is something to think about.

Should there be a minimum acreage a ranch must meet in order to install high fencing? This might reduce the effects of the deer population state wide and reduce the amount of scrutinty on fair game hunting. Although this would take some liberties away from land owners. Food for thaught though.

Master, there is a difference between supplementing feed for the health of your herd and

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Feeders are almost necessary in many parts of Texas if you want to lure a deer from cover.

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which is what I was referring to. The contention was that you just couln't kill Texas deer unless you shot 'em over a feeder because they are just so gosh darn skittish. I called BS.

If it don't apply to you, don't apply it to yourself. KnowwhatImean Vern?

[This message has been edited by AggieChemist (edited 12/19/2006 9:13a).]

I see where both of you guys (AC & MA) are coming from. The ranch where I guide uses feeders of course. Most of our clients don't want to do anything but hunt out of the stands. When you ask most of them if they want to get out and walk the draws or do some rattling, they all say no.

And at my lease, most of my fellow hunters want to just sit in the stands with their little portable heaters and hunt over the feeders. There are a few of us that walk the canyons and draws, rattle horns in the mesquite flats and stuff like that. The other hunters call us crazy. But it is always the "crazy" ones that kill the better deer each year. Hunting in Texas is going along the same trend as everything else in America. Lazy, lazy, lazy......and IMHO, feeders are the main reason for the stand/sloth epidemic.

One of these days Chronic Wasting Disease will make its way here and the way we hunt in TX will have to change because one of the first things the TPW will do is ban the feeding of deer like they have done in other states.

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which is what I was referring to. The contention was that you just couln't kill Texas deer unless you shot 'em over a feeder because they are just so gosh darn skittish. I called BS.

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Apparently the only post I skipped was the one you're referencing. Well perhaps they are too skittish in places but I've never hunted one of those places. I do think though that most people who hold a negative opinion about feeders think everyone who has them shoots deer with a moth full of corn. The feeders are pretty vital to the well being of our deer. Deer in this neck of the woods don't have too much to eat without us other than acorns.

Now hold on,

I said "feeders are ALMOST necessary for MANY places in Texas"

no where did I say that you must have a feeder in Texas to bag a deer.

Deer in East Texas can survive all winter long on less than 1/4 of an acre given adequate food and water supply. They can feed at night and bed down all day in some of the thickest woods and brush in the state. On leases, you dont always have the option to just "scout" out anywhere you want to hunt. The deer have a lot more advantage over the hunters. You take what is available and you use whatever tools that are available to make a hunt work and bring food home.



[This message has been edited by Neches21 (edited 12/19/2006 9:33a).]

Nothing you just said invalidates any of my arguments.

I'll leave it at that.

Many years deer in East Texas don't even go to feeders until late in the season. That said the mature bucks want be coming out of the woods to feeders unless they are chasing some tail.

I have used feeders but feel my chances of seeing a mature buck are much better on a deer trail in a thicket.

P.S.

food is used to get that big son-of-a-bi--- and his herd of does out of the other guys place, over the fence, and into your pasture eat up Johnny.

further... who the hell high fences 15 acres?


[This message has been edited by Zone416 (edited 12/19/2006 10:28a).]

Thanks Old Town, that is exactly what this thread needed!

Pedro: You mean I don't own the deer? Damn, I better open my gates and run 'em out before the real owner misses them. Thanks for the legal advice, you're tougher and smarter than Jim Adler.

If I had a dollar for every time I pulled into the locker plant and saw a Cadillac Escalade towing a Polaris loaded with a pencil horned 2 1/2 year old buck killed within 100 ft of a fenceline, then I'd be as rich as the idiot Dallas doctor that shot the deer.

I know that not all doctors and urban dwellers are idiots when it comes to hunting, that is just who I seem to run into in my neck of the woods.

Deer are a State resource. In my opinion, you high fencing a piddly 15 acres is an infringement on my rights. Mostly because of the fact that one side of our place backs up to a river, and the other side a highway. Any animals want on our property now, they have to either cross a river or a highway. This fence eliminated a large amount of wildlife from our little place....not only deer, but also raccoons, armadillos, fox, rocksquirrels, etc.. The guy that did this was of course a wealthy doctor from Houston, who had no idea how he was disrupting things. Proof in that is the 3 million dollar house he built as well as the (2) 5 acre sections he bought adjacent to his place for his kids, which are also high fenced now. What a jackass.

The main reason we use feeders is to attract and keep does in a certain area. As far as I know, we have never shot a buck anywhere near a feeder.

Our hunting lease is in an old river bottom that is about 1.5 miles wide by 5 miles long. It is surrounded by smaller tracts layed out in a similar way. If we did not keep the does (and bucks) in our place, they would get mowed down by every little 20 acre lease hunter from Houston.

Maybe he didn't want a gut shot deer running on to his place...so he high fenced them out.

I hear ya' RoperJoe. That scenario is rediculous. On the bright side, at least Houston Doc and his family and friends won't be busting any baby bucks roaming outside his fence. I suspect that it would be incredibly difficult to manage a healthy herd in the petting zoo that he has created. As far as increasing traffic on your place, I'd go with a free choice protein feeder and a couple of corn feeders. Stop feeding free-choice protein during hunting season (nocturnal deer problem) and keep them coming to your timed corn slingers.

Any man who high-fences 15 acres is most certainly trying to keep animals OUT.

I believe you need several hundred acres of land and a commitment to a game management program to make the case for high-fences, or even more depending upon the terrain/environment. For example, 300 or more acres in the piney woods can hold and support a large deer herd that can be managed, whereas 300 acres in most western areas of the state will hold and support very few animals.

My family has a place, high-fenced, in East Texas that is about 500 acres. When they first bought it almost 10 years ago, the whitetail were extremely poor both in quality and quantity. Now, we have a healthy herd that has a good doe/buck ratio and 130+ class trophy animals thanks to a management program, and they are only getting better. Had we not high-fenced the place and made a commitment to a game management program, those deer wouldn't exist today. Yes, some deer would still be walking the woods, but not like we have accomplished.

By the way, we are virtually surrounded by 10-30 acre plots. Our high-fence does nothing to diminish those land owner's opportunity to harvest the same crappy animals that we started with 10 years ago.

I am neutral on high fences. But it is my opinion that in most cases, those b*i*t*c*h*ing about high fences are in reality jealous that they lack the resources to have a high fenced ranch themselves.......but they cloak their jealousy in the "poor genetics, captive hunt, state resource" arguments.

[This message has been edited by VetSurg (edited 12/19/2006 3:17p).]

Yeah, I am griping because I do not have the resourced to high fence 15 ACRES?!?!? Come on man. I am griping because, though it can be productive on hundreds and thousands of acres...it is NOT productive in this scenario. It is stupid, and detrimental to the animals that follow the river.