“deer management”

Did you know there are 13.7 million hunters in the United States alone, according the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s National Survey of Fishing, Hunting and Wildlife-Associated Recreation? Did you know that in 2015, 43.1 million Americans lived in poverty (13.5 percent of the U.S. population), and 42.2 million Americans lived in food-insecure households? The NRA’s solution? Start an initiative to assist in providing food to the needy by capitalizing on the millions of active hunters we have here in the United States.

Again and again, GPS-collar movement studies of whitetails find that mature bucks are individuals. There are types, sure. Just as some middle-aged men are homebodies and others like to be out and about, there are categories we can put bucks in—but that really doesn’t help you decipher the specific pattern of an individual deer.

Think that you know where all the big bucks are? You might be surprised.

The Quality Deer Management Association and Powderhook have announced the release of the 2016 update to their "Deer Tracker" app, a free program that allows hunters to monitor deer activity and harvests in their surrounding region and throughout the country. New interactive features allow users to estimate the age and score of bucks in posted photos as well as locate nearby public hunting land.

Hunting’s post-kill rituals aren’t spontaneous gestures like high-fives or war-whoops, but perhaps that’s where they began.

Crossbows are not the evil, end-of-the-world weapons that some archers tell you they are.

Dreaming of the deer woods is all we are left to do for the summer. Right? Not even close.

You see a buck across a field in the soft, late light of a summer evening. You tell yourself he isn’t really that big. The velvet on his rack in the diffused light is giving the buck cartoon proportions. But he is big enough. You next look at the woods beyond the buck and wonder how you can get him in your sights in autumn daylight. To make that happen you have to concede and understand a few things.

A fundamental change to deer management is coming. Changes that can and will affect your deer season. Let Field Editor Frank Miniter explain.