Earn A Buck program........

[Sagedawg]

  Ive read a few articles about some of the states that use this as a deer management tool. This requires that you take a doe before you can go after your buck,IF our game department was to use a program like this, what does everyone think the results would be? Myself, I think that this would be a good tool for certain units, but the units that it would benefit have access issues, so that would be one problem to get through. Anyhow just wanted to know what others think about it.


  Sage

[archery288]

I think it would be a good benefit to some units - but, to other units I think it would destroy the deer herds if everyone were allowed to take 2 deer!  Just my 

[MIKEXRAY]

I don't think our woods are over populated like the states that have that as a rule. I think the buck to doe ratio is fine, atleast in the areas I hunt on the wetside and eastside. I always see lots of bucks, not as many as does but not to far behind. I would not want to be forced to take a doe first, it would suck to see the buck your after and can't shoot because you have not harvested your doe yet. Like you said maybe some units but not mine.

[boneaddict]

I've never killed a doe, and really don't care too.  I already donate a bunch of my meat and really don't need to kill something just so I can go hunt what I want.  I can see its usefulness where the whitetails are out of wack, but I would just assume they give out more doe tags or youth hunts.  That would give folks that wantthe meat or not the ability to take big bucks the oppurtunity to kill their deer.

[Ray]

Let me guess that the earn  a buck program is assuming that you have 2 deer tags. Can you get 2 deer tags?

[robodad]

I hunt "Earn a Buck" units all the time in Wisconsin and I can tell you that yes it really sucks to have to pass up a buck cause you don't have the sticker yet but as a management tool it may be OK, Wisconsin's deer population is out of control, we kill around 500,000 deer each year statewide and still the biologists say they are still 50% over the over winter population goals.

To bring it into perspective, there are as many deer killed by cars and trucks in Wisconsin as the total deer harvest is in the state of Washington.

Would I like an opportunity to kill a few does ?? yep !! I would harvest as many as I can get tags for.

I'm not a biologist but from what I have seen with the whitetails in Wisconsin is the more of them you kill the more of them there are.

Out of state (non-resident) doe tags are over the counter for $2

[Snowman]

I think in the areas that have a out of control doe ratio to bucks, that they should just sell the danm tags over counter and let people who want them buy them. They do that in minnesota and works great. Tired of everything going to draw. Pretty soon every danm thing will be a draw.

[wastickslinger]

I like the idea of a second doe tag but not the idea that you have to shoot it first.

[Bigshooter]

If you look at states that do this they have a couple million deer.  We don't have enough deer to do this.  Some states like Wisconsin have over 400,000 deer killed in a single hunting season.  Do we even have 400,000 total deer in washington?

[Opportunist]

The area I hunted in Iowa is one of these areas now. Whitetail up the ying yang, to bad I suck (shot a dink the last day)! I have no problem whacking does, especially cornfed ones, they need a killin' and I'm happy to accomodate. But Washington doesn't have enough deer for this kind of approach and way to many hunters. The herd would be decimated in short order. I wish we had a deer over population problem!

[LongTatLaw]

I hunted an earn a buck area is Wisconsin and I think in some ways it promotes or at least tempts people to waste game... meaning.

The rule where I hunted is this... you must kill a doe before you can kill a buck. When you take the doe into the check station (often a local gas station) they check it in and then give u a sticker on ur tag that says you can now kill a buck.

however, if u are hunting (often from a stand) and kill a doe... u can kill the buck that shows up 30 seconds later and check em both in at the same time.

unintended result...  some shady hunters will kill that buck first and hope to kill a doe before the day is out and then pretend it happened the other way around...

if a doe doesnt show... people tend to stay on stand after legal hours or even shine trying to kill that doe...
if its unsuccessful, they then have a completely illegal buck to ....? get rid of?

its all messy... not the law... but the resulting behavior.

I saw a decent buck before any does and it was hard to swallow!

Georgia has too many deer so they up'd the number from 1 buck and like 3 does per year to 6 does... and for many years now... its been 2 bucks and 10 does per year with one 40$ (in state) license (no tags, no draws). The 2nd buck has to have 4 points on one side but thats the only restriction ... oh, and u can only kill 3 deer per day

however, the average hunter only kills 1 buck and 3 does...  so the numbers are still too high.

then again...some of us would get all 12 every single year!  with an open season from sept 10 - Jan 31st  it wasnt too hard....lol

any way

not a fan of earn a buck... just make a few more tags available for CHEAP purchase in the target areas.

[Dman]

I've never killed a doe, and really don't care too.  I already donate a bunch of my meat and really don't need to kill something just so I can go hunt what I want.  I can see its usefulness where the whitetails are out of wack, but I would just assume they give out more doe tags or youth hunts.  That would give folks that wantthe meat or not the ability to take big bucks the oppurtunity to kill their deer.

I would agree on the whitetail portion being a possibility, looking at the population trends, whitetail harvest has been ever increasing the last several decades with no sign of slowing.

[wannahunt]

Like others have said before I don't think we have a big enough deer herd to have a doe first hunt. Even thou I would love to have a second tag to harvest a doe I would rather they took care of the surplus using Youth drawing tags instead. The Youth hunts have really gone down the last few years and I think this would help the future of our sport to give the kids more oportunities to have sucess.