What is the best Big Game(deer/Elk) suppelment on the market that will atract big game to your property and provide good growth on there antlers, and where can i order it? thanks Sdf7

 

We tried some of those supplements a few years ago and didn’t see much of a difference if any. Drop a block here or there or buy a bag or two of the commercial antler growth concoctions but don’t expect miracles or measurable results for that matter. (Hunting over such poducts can be considred baiting in many areas and lead to tickets and legal hassles by the way)

You are much better off with good conservation practices and planting some food plots in my humble opinion. If you want to attract game to your property the basics like water, food and cover will provide much better results than the latest bag of overpriced, overhyped buck growing pixie dust. Better for non-game wildlife too.

 

I agree with Mort. In fact I couldn't agree with Mort more. Antlers are genetically determined...and the deer/elk has to be able to survive many years of hunting for his antlers to develop.

Here are some figures on developing trophy deer:

The minimum acreage to manage a herd of deer, is a full section of land, 640 acres. The land must be fenced, have at least 6 ponds (plus creeks and draws), new and old growth timber, native prarie grasses (ordinary pasture grasses like fescue and orchardgrass are not optimum habitat) and include a hundred acres of food plots/conservation plantings. You will have a herd of 150+ deer, of which 75% wil be does and 25% bucks. The 90% of the does will have 1.3 offspring per year...so you should have 100+ new offspring per year. Each deer will require a gallon of water per day, so your ponds should supply 2,000 gallons of clean water per day, just for the deer before demands of other animals and before calculations for evaporation, pond leakage etc. Now for the next 10 years you can only take does and bucks with minimal antlers, allowing the older bucks to develop. In a decade of good weather, conservation minded supervision and minimal poaching, you will have a herd of trophy bucks. You will get 14 pointers on the first day of deer season. There are no shortcuts and it may take more than ten years.

Of course, if you don't have a spare 640 acres with ponds, native prairie grasses, etc, and don't want to wait a decade, the next best thing (assuming you have adequate food, water and cover on your property), is to overseed your pasture/grasses in the winter with white clover. You could add Korean lespedeza to the white clover. Deer like it, and quail love it and as a legume it adds nitrogen to the soil as does clover. You can expect deer to come a mile for the clover. Set up on the clover during the off season and you will see if there are trophy deer in the area.

Simply putting grain down to attract deer is baiting and is illegal in every state I am familiar with. Typically you cannot hunt over baited land for six months without risking arrest. The biggest penalty I have seen for baiting deer is arrest, confiscation of rifle, vehicle, $1,700 fine and loss of hunting privledges for 5 years. (As an aside, the biggest fine I have seen for hunting Elk out of season is $20,000)


Questions??

 

you guys are not getting it I am not talking about putting stuff out i'm talking about planting food plots. Like split peas that will provide what the deer need to stay healthy.

 

Try to tell that to us Texans. Some of the best deer in the country are taken here near feeders that are completely legal. And there are a number of reputable and highly respected feed companies (Purina Mills for example) that produce feed designed specifically for deer.

I've always been amused at those who say that it's unethical to hunt near a feeder but yet they see nothing wrong hunting a lush oat or wheat patch planted specifically to attract deer. IMO, if you plant, place or position it with the intention of killing a deer near it, it's bait.

My recommendation for food plots is a mixture of oats and austrian winter peas. Soil test first to see how much (if any) lime is required to achieve the right pH. Otherwise your fertilizer will have minimal effect. Also, use Roundup before you prepare the soil for planting to ensure the best results for your seeding.

I do agree however that supplemental feeding will not increase the genetic makeup of the deer in your area but only help them reach their current genetic potential. Genetics can only be improved through selected harvesting over a course of many years.

 

Yes Purina does make various chows, but it is still against the wildlife code of most states to hunt over bait. "Bait shall mean grain or other feed placed or scattered so as to constitute an attraction or enticement...." Missouri wildlife code.

You can feed them all you want, but if you hunt over the feed......

Planting for conservation can escape the legal problems with scattering bait (grain). It is also much cheaper to overseed and establish a wildlife habitat that renews itself year after year.

Consider:
One deer can eat one pound of feed a day and you have 200 deer in your management area. That is potentially 73,000 pounds of feed per year.... in short, it is cheaper and easier to grow the food than to buy it. Throwing a 50 lb bag of feed down, once a week, isn't going to have much effect on the herd. (do the math). Nevertheless, it won't hurt to put out feed, just make sure you don't get crossways with your local conservation agent over whether he/she considers it baiting or not. It is not what you or I think that is important. It is what the law says that's important.

 

Texas Update:
I looked on the web, http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/publicat...l2003_2004.pdf and with certain restrictions (private property, nonmigratory game), baiting and hunting from a motor vehicle is legal in Texas....much to my suprise. How about other states.

 

In that case there are all sorts of things you could plant such as clover, peas, alfalfa, vetch, rye etc.

 

For the time being it is legal to hunt over bait in Michigan. But with the recent findings of TB and Cronic wasting diseise, in Michigan and Wi., its only a matter of time before that is stopped.

 

You can attract deer to your hunting area with white clover. If you overseed your open ares in the fall/winter, the seeds will workthemselves into the soil as the ground greezes and thaws during the winter. The freezing and thawing opens small cracks in the soil that the seed drop into. It is cheap (no disking etc.) and it works. You can do it with an your ATV. I like to throw in the mix, some Korean lespeceza. It is a legume that is a favorate of quail and other game birds, and deer like it too.