A Deer Perspective
Larry Weishuhn
“Son, stay awake. If you get a shot, shoot him immediately behind the shoulder. If you get a second shot, shoot him again. Then holler as loud as you can and I’ll come back. If you don’t shoot I’ll be back to get you in about three hours!” With that I settled in, my back against an ancient, gnarly oak tree, then tightly gripped the single-shot .22 rifle I had been given by my grandfather on my fifth birthday, which back then was a legal and accepted deer caliber.
There was no moonlight, only millions of stars up above. They became even brighter as my eyes adjusted to the darkness after my dad disappeared with his flashlight. I was excited, and maybe even a little bit scared. I had hunted deer with my dad in the past, but always sitting with him in his deer stand, a couple of cedar limbs tied in the fork on an oak tree, some twenty or so feet above the ground. This was my first time he decided I was “old enough” to hunt on my own.
The chill of the November 16 pre-dawn Texas deer season opener started creeping in. It would be at least an hour before the sun would make an appearance. I shivered, tried to nap, but was simply too excited. After all there is only one first time of hunting whitetails on your own.
To me, it was a six-year olds dream come true, to be hunting deer on my own even though my dad was only three hundred yards away. Grudgingly darkness started turning to shades of gray. Bears, moose and elk in near darkness morphed into bushes, shrubs and clumps of “yankee weed” as daylight approached.
Legal shooting time started a half hour before official sun-up. But, I did not own a watch, so, I had to depend upon shots in the distance or essentially full sun up.
Off in the distance I heard a shot. Someone would soon be a hero in our rural area just north of the Gulf Coast Plains of Texas. Deer populations at the time were sparse to say the least. If anyone shot a deer, he or she was indeed a local hero. Even if you saw a deer while hunting it was a big deal. Back then, as today, many of the daughters, wives, grandmothers in our area of Texas hunted deer. Hunting deer was family affair!
Just as sunlight first appeared, I heard shuffling off to my left. I turned, fully expecting the sound to be made by a squirrel. To my surprise there stood a deer. I could see only the back part of it. The head was behind the trunk of a huge oak. Was it a buck or doe? My heart was beating so rapidly I feared the deer might hear. Thousands of thoughts raced through my mind. Then I remembered I had a rifle in my hands. I raised it to my shoulder and pointed it in the direction of deer, and waited for it to move. It seemed Earth when through several seasons, civilizations rose and fell before finally the deer stepped out from behind the tree, exposing the head. Doe! My heart sank. I had so dearly hoped and prayed it would be a buck with three or more points, making it legal. But it was only a doe. But then hope was renewed when I saw movement in the bushes behind the doe. Could it be a buck? My dad had told me bucks had followed does! Just then out stepped a full grown fawn. A buck fawn with obvious “nubbins”. My first buck seen while hunting on my own! I was thrilled. I had not only had I been hunting, sitting by myself, I could brag about seeing a buck!
Wish I could tell you a legal buck followed the doe and fawn, but that did not happen. Matter of fact it would be many more hunts before I finally saw a buck that was legal and I actually got a chance to shoot one!
Even though it has been many years since I saw that first doe and “buck” hunting on my own as a six-year old, I have never lost the excitement of hunting deer, or for that matter, other big game species. As a youngster growing up, I read every thing I could about guns and hunting. Those early years had a great influence on my becoming a wildlife biologist, outdoor journalist and many most enjoyable years hunting I have spent not only whitetail deer but other big game animals throughout the world on six continents. For much of my life I have been living a dream, but not simply, just a dream, “my dream” as well!
Over the years as a professional wildlife biologist, hunter/conservationist, and writer/television show host I have learned much, and, I still have much to learn. Hunting, whether it is deer in the backyard or being on the track of dangerous game in Africa, is indeed a learning process. Every time I head into the hunting fields I learn something new; about the animals, about the habitat, about the hunting culture and even about myself. I love it!
I’ll bet you love hunting, too!
With this first of what will be a regular visit, which I hope you will accept as time spent around a welcoming campfire with old friends who have just experienced a highly successful and fun-filled day hunting, we will visit about many things with emphasis on deer and sometimes on the topic of guns, ammunition, essential equipment, management ideas, and the like, but also occasionally spinning a yarn about hunting “off shore” in such far off places as Europe, Africa, New Zealand and destinations in between.
With the inaugral of what will be an ongoing “series”, like my “DSC’s Trailing the Hunter’s Moon” television series which airs year around that I own and host with my co-host Blake Barnett, I would like to initially discuss a few things about whitetail deer fawns, often the over-looked segment of the deer population.
With May and June and a bit later in some areas we are into the peak fawning season. Whitetail fawns are “planned by Nature” to be born during the best of nutritional times of the year. This is another way of saying the fall deer breeding season or rut in your area occurs so fawns are born seven and a half months later during the best nutritional time when deer have the access to highest quality forage so does can produce a lot of milk and there is soft browse for the fawns as they switch from an all milk diet to a forage based diet. But also at time when there is a lot of ground cover so fawns can hide from predators.
We have an increasing coyote population throughout North America. Predators start taking their first great toll on fawns when they are about 3 weeks to a month old. Up until that time they lay very still and quiet. Predators often walk right past them, if there is cover to hide the young fawns. At about a month of age, fawns tend to start jumping and running when a predator approaches rather than lay really still.
There is a lesson here; actually two or more. One is for us as “deer manager” to make certain the local habitat is in great shape and there is more than sufficient food for the deer present, and, ground cover is tall enough for the newly born fawns to hide from predators.
If you have a predator problem, real or perceived, and you want to increase fawn survival, thereby increasing the number of fawns “going into the population”, now as having started back in February is an excellent time to grab your Convergent Hunting Solution’s Bullet HP predator call, your Ruger rifle and Hornady ammo and call in and remove coyotes and bobcats (where legal) to help increase the number of fawns which can then grow into adulthood. Not only is this great fun, it is also good for the deer herd, provided adult deer too, are properly managed and populations kept in check with what the habitat can support in the worst of range and weather conditions.
Why is fawn survival important? It should be obvious, the more fawns that survive the greater potential for there to be mature deer in the future!
In these days of quality management, and I admit loving to hunt mature bucks, the more buck fawns that make it into the six-month old class and as time goes by into the ensuing age classes the better the chance of taking a mature buck in the future.
When looking at potential hunting ground or perhaps a new area to hunt in another state, one of the first questions I ask is “What was the fawn survival rate in your area starting six year ago?
If there were not many surviving fawns six springs ago, there cannot be hardly any six-years old bucks in the herd, the coming hunting season. The same is true for each ensuing and decreasing years. Hardly any fawns born four years earlier there will not be many four and one-half year old bucks available for harvest this year.
I mentioned loving to hunt mature bucks. These older aged bucks have performed their biological purposes. They have survived several hunting seasons and are more challenging to hunt. And, they tend to develop larger antlers which are more interesting to me. Also I see antler developing as an indicator of the health of the habitat and the deer herd.
I love eating venison as does my family! And, while I will use all the meat from any bucks I take, when filling my freezer with prime venison I choose to take does. As a wildlife biologist I can tell you practically all the whitetail deer herds in North America, with very few exceptions, have an excess of does. Mule deer are a bit different, as the does of that deer species mature and start producing fawns later in life than do whitetails.
Hopefully as we head into late spring, you are enjoying your wild harvest and are planning to add to your larder this coming hunting season!
Next visit we will take a look at food plots. Late May, early June are ideal times to plant food plots throughout much of our North American deer range.
It is all about a deer perspective!
