Finally some good news. Good news for deer hunters in the southeast!!! This good news comes in the form of a radio telemetry study conducted in the bottom land hardwoods of Louisiana. Why is this good news, you ask? Well because the telemetry study has shown that it might be a lot easier to grow big bucks on small tract of land because deer home ranges in the telemetry study were a lot smaller than other telemetry studies that have been done elsewhere in the country.
Before reading further keep in mind that this study only reflects on deer in bottom land hardwood forest on rich soil, with little variability in available habit. Similar studies, yet much less extensive, done in Mississippi in the past on mixed pine and hardwood tracts with poorer soil showed larger home ranges than this study. So don't just assume because you hunt in the deep south that your deer will behave exactly like the deer in this study.
Now on the specifics. The study broke the numbers down into a few different groups, such as bucks, does as well as by age. What it showed that bucks older than 1.5 years old on land enrolled in a quality (not trophy) plan will have a home range on average of just a bit hunter 300 acres during the fall hunting season.
The home range will be large in the spring and smallest during the summer. But what we are interested in the most is the fall numbers, since that is when the deer we hunt will be subject to being killed by our neighbors. And of course it is our neighbors that always get the blame for everything right. I didn't do a survey but I am sure the neighbors shoot'em all attitude has got to be the number one reason given for not managing your own land.
Well this study shows that the old conventional wisdom of needing 2000 acres to seriously manage your deer herd isn't always the case. Things to consider are that even if you have 291 acres which matches the average size home range during the fall, that still the chances of a deer living exclusively on your property are approaching zero. This is because their home range is unlikely to be entirely on your property even if it would fit. After all home ranges aren't often rectangular... think about it. And unless you have more land surely the range is going to lie both on and off of your property. Some only partly on your land and others mostly on your land. It will certainly be a mishmash of all combination's possible.
So this brings down the amount of acreage needed for serious management down from 2000 acres to something on the order of 300 or 400 hundred, with improvements being seen on managed tract of even as little as 200 or so.
But lets not stop there. Suppose you don't hunt on bottom land hardwoods, suppose you don't live in the south, that doesn't mean this study doesn't have any significance to you. How so? Well this study along with others have show that home range size is very closely related to the conditions found on the site. Meaning that food plots and forest thinning's can reduce the size of a deer home range... which reduces his time on your evil neighbors deer black hole of a property.
So there you have it the short short telemetry study broken down to what really matters to you. Hope you enjoyed the little article and can put it to good use.
