Buck home ranges

[BHC]

I've read a couple hunting books this summer, and both discussed nailing down a bucks core "home range". The book I'm reading now 'whitetail advantages' , discusses collared studies performed in S Texas. During summer months bucks ranges were 150-300 acres, however their core range ( where they spend 50% of there time varied from 30-70acres... That's pretty small. And would be a huge advantage if you could figure out a bucks core. Obviously in the rut this increases. According to their study bucks ranges increase during the rut up to and even beyond 1000 acres. Again however I believe their core was only 89 acres on average.
It makes since that a buck would stay where he feels the safest most of the time. They identify with range shifts approx when bucks lose their velvet. Also as bucks age there range decreases. 1.5 yr old range is the largest as they often disperse great distances...

Just curious if any of you use this to your advantage in your hunting strategy? If so how? And how do you know you are in/ found his core?

 

[knightrider]

that maybe the case in texas where he has a bizillion does to choose from but not so here in the hills and hollers. bucks here are killed up to 5 or so mile from there summer home ranges during the rut

 

[Boll Weevil]

This is fascinating stuff to me, BHC. My observations are the same regarding decreasing range as deer age and range shift with velvet shedding.

I don't quite know what to make of it but bachelor groups on my farm (even individual bucks) appear to stick around throughout the year and from year to year. They seem for the most part to be regular homebodies and I believe it's possible that habitat diversity and maintaining sanctuaries may have some impact on this behavior.

In the last few years I've killed 2 mature bucks that I got on camera. My cameras are roughly set on a grid, I check them no more than once a month, and drive right to them on the ATV or tractor. Both bucks were homebodies until mid November when they started to stretch their legs a little and wander outside their core areas (which did not overlap).

In that time I got exactly what I was hopiing for...multiple pics on multiple cameras. One buck showed up on 3 different cameras; the other showed up on 4. The times and directions of travel really helped nail down what they were doing inside what turned out to be a very, very small triangle. Up until that time I didn't hunt either area, then moved a stand (midday in a driving rain), and only sat a stand when the wind allowed.

Both bucks cores appeared to be within an area designated as sanctuary...no more than 55-65 acres each.

 

[Shed Hunter]

NOBODY knows a bucks exact home range unless if they are doing a collar study and even then those collar studies may be completely different to the next property over. I have a few deer pics on public land that have a distance of over two miles on the cam site in the same week post season. I've seen them completely leave the area and have someone send me a picture of it two years later three or four miles away. Infact, I have a friend that sent me a huge buck picture a few years ago. Last season a TNdeer member saw the pic in my photobucket and realized he had killed the buck a couple of months later a pretty long distance away. I have a buck I've had on camera for three years now that does not leave a certain 350 acre property until late February (assuming just before he sheds as I never can find them) and then returns in just a few months. He sticks to a core area of no more than 100 acres.

Moral of the story-deer are individuals.

 

[Nealmeally]

1.5 yr old range is the largest as they often disperse great distances...

I've read a lot of these buck home ranges and travel artcles and books.. I've always read where a 3.5 year old travels the greatest distance during the the rut.. And I've always agreed with that from my observations. Mainly cause I ruled out 1.5 year olds traveling far, especially on the places I hunt. I see the same 1.5 year old bucks all season from the tree and trail cams. They seem to never venture far. The 2.5 year olds seem to hang close also. The 3.5 year olds hang close before the rut but some seem to vanish for several weeks during the rut. And some never return til summer months...

The 4.5+ year old bucks have smaller home ranges from what I've seen.. Camera activity is pretty steady up until the rut. They may be missing for a few days but show back up. Who knows where they go but I think when they get mature (4.5+) they tend to stay in a smaller home range. But they do the majority of their traveling at night if they leave their area.. I have several pics of mature bucks during the rut that walk by camera after dark and come back by just before daylight. Where and how far they go who knows.. But they didn't go far enough to where they wasn't back to their area before daylight..


I know this all depends on terrain, location, and pressure also. All deer are different but these are my observations over the years hunting in southern TN. I've hunted a lot of riverbottom land also. And have seen several 3.5 year olds over the years cover the most ground. Again this is just observation from sightings, trail cams, and keeping close contact with neighbors that border me and their trail pics and sightings also.. In my opinion a 3.5 year old covers the most ground during the rut.. And 4.5+ year olds tend to stay closer to home. Or at least return quicker if they do venture far..

 

[BHC]

The 1.5 yr old travel the farthest due to dispersal. They pack up and leave the area they were born in.
The book also touches on, the fact that deer are individuals. SOME bucks in the study traveled several miles during the rut. However the numbers above were closer to the norm. Maybe not exactly, I was goin off memory. On our property most bucks that are photographed in July are caught on camera in nov- dec.
Most bucks we kill during the rut we have summer pics of. I know they venture to our neighbors, but based on cameras I would guess our deer are similar to the ones in the study. That's why it kinda caught my eye.
We do occasionally get a buck on cam that seems to disappear in September, but that's not the norm.....

 

[BSK]

The problem with defining buck home ranges is that they vary so widely by location. Even within a study in one location, range sizes can be so different that "average" numbers are meaningless, as virtually no bucks have ranges near the average. In individual studies I've seen range as small as a few hundred acres, and as large as 18,000 acres. And that's for just one year. The next year, an individual buck may have an equally large range that is not in the same area as the previous year's range. So over a lifetime, a buck may cover an absolutely huge area. And on the other hand, I've seen individual bucks in studies have unbelievably small ranges. In a study in Louisiana, a mature buck never left a single 70-acre thickly regrown clear-cut during the entire duration of the study.

In addition, from season-long trail-camera surveys I and others have conducted, it appears home range behavior is HIGHLY local, in that bucks behave one way in one location, and very differently just a few miles down the road. Most of my data come from just one part of TN--about 5 counties with somewhat similar habitat and terrain in the western Highland Rim area--yet I've seen just about every pattern imaginable. I have no doubt that the widely varying patterns mentioned in the posts above are completely accurate for each area.

The only predictable pattern I've seen between locations is that seasonal shifts in buck range appear least often in areas that are either very, very low in habitat diversity (the same habitat for miles in all directions, so shifting range seasonally provides no benefit) and in highly diverse habitat (why shift range when good habitat is all around?). Where I tend to see the most seasonal shifting is where big blocks of habitat are in close contact, such as where thousands of acres of upland timber meets hundreds of acres of agricultural bottomland, or where "suburbia" abuts large tracts of rural land.

To further confuse matters, GPS-collar research over long periods of time (years), such as is being done at Auburn, proves exactly what so many others are pointing out--that every buck is an individual. Some individual bucks are HIGHLY mobile their entire lives, with virtually no "home range" as we perceive it, while other individual bucks are highly immobile their entire lives, and have VERY small and distinct core areas where they spend the majority of their time.

 

[BHC]

Yea I guess there is no standard. It's just gunna vary with each situation. I think if someone is strategic enough with their cameras every now and then u will pen point a buck that has a small home range and take advantage..
I also think u can identify a buck that spends a lot of time on your property. But us very mobile( visits several plots or scrapes per night and or maybe day). This situation can allow a group of guys to capitalize on how much that buck is traveling. I think a lot of my success and failures the last 5 yrs is attributed to my ability to identify "killable" bucks. Twice in the past few yrs I've found very killable bucks in the summer that I was able to get an opportunity at opening week. However I chased one buck for two yrs that I probably shouldn't. It wasn't that he wasn't killable, he just wasn't killable on our property.. At least the chances were very slim... In the end I spent a lot of time hunting that buck, when I could've been pursuing a much more "killable" deer...

 

[BSK]

If trail cameras have taught me anything about hunting, it is that bucks can be anywhere on my property. By comparing where we get pictures of a particular buck on my 3/4 square mile property, and where we end up seeing or killing them, the two often don't match well. We may get all of the pictures of a particular buck on one end of the property, but end up seeing/killing him all the way at the other end.

In addition, cameras have taught me when mature bucks are most killable--when I get the most daylight pictures of them during the hunting season. And that would be two brief times: the first week or two of bow season, and then during the 10 days to two weeks just prior to peak breeding. Since I don't bow hunt, that pre-peak-breeding window is my only real opportunity to kill a mature buck. That window is the last few days of October through about November 12. Observations of mature bucks while hunting after Nov. 12 have been extremely rare.

 

[AlabamaSwamper]

2014 was no different that years past.

7 bucks killed

6 were summer residents (All killed from Nov 11-Christmas. Most in November.

Running multiple cameras scattered on plots. Got pics of 3 older bucks (3.5+ in this case) that were not summer residents. One 4.5-5.5 walked across a plot at 10:30am during peak rut one time, one stayed 1 week during peak rut and was what appeared to be a 3.5y/o 6pt, the other was a small 9pt that was killed but I don't run cameras in that area so who knows.

The 6 bucks were killed within a few hundred yards of their core summer range or inside it and this either directly prior to, during or directly after peak breeding. All were photographed constantly the whole season, mainly at night.

 

[benellivol]

If trail cameras have taught me anything about hunting, it is that bucks can be anywhere on my property. By comparing where we get pictures of a particular buck on my 3/4 square mile property, and where we end up seeing or killing them, the two often don't match well. We may get all of the pictures of a particular buck on one end of the property, but end up seeing/killing him all the way at the other end.

In addition, cameras have taught me when mature bucks are most killable--when I get the most daylight pictures of them during the hunting season. And that would be two brief times: the first week or two of bow season, and then during the 10 days to two weeks just prior to peak breeding. Since I don't bow hunt, that pre-peak-breeding window is my only real opportunity to kill a mature buck. That window is the last few days of October through about November 12. Observations of mature bucks while hunting after Nov. 12 have been extremely rare.

My father in law has killed two 5 1/2 year olds right after Christmas hunting over corn he left standing. He killed both around noon on brutally cold (mid 20's for a high) days. Both came out in the corn before all the other deer and left as soon as deer started showing up. I guess there was no other food.

 

[BSK]

2014 was no different that years past.

7 bucks killed

6 were summer residents (All killed from Nov 11-Christmas. Most in November.

Running multiple cameras scattered on plots. Got pics of 3 older bucks (3.5+ in this case) that were not summer residents. One 4.5-5.5 walked across a plot at 10:30am during peak rut one time, one stayed 1 week during peak rut and was what appeared to be a 3.5y/o 6pt, the other was a small 9pt that was killed but I don't run cameras in that area so who knows.

The 6 bucks were killed within a few hundred yards of their core summer range or inside it and this either directly prior to, during or directly after peak breeding. All were photographed constantly the whole season, mainly at night.

AS, your place is virtually the "poster child" for properties that see very little seasonal shifting of buck ranges. However, I find it very interesting that this seems to be a very common situation in counties along the AL and MS borders. And I have no idea why this pattern is so regional. I do see this pattern in other areas, but it is not as dominate in other areas as it seems to be in southern TN.

 

[diamond hunter]

I hope this is a pattern I see on my 2 acres or corn

 

[Boll Weevil]

I find it very interesting that this seems to be a very common situation in counties along the AL and MS borders. And I have no idea why this pattern is so regional.

Being in a border county also this is precisely what I see too...really interesting.

 

[BHC]

Same for us.. Most bucks killed during the rut are killed very close to or exactly where we got summer trail cam pics. Also bucks we don't kill stay on camera in the same location all yr... A few will disappear around velvet shed, but this only happens to bucks that are photographed with in 200 yrds or so of the property line...

 

[AlabamaSwamper]

2014 was no different that years past.

7 bucks killed

6 were summer residents (All killed from Nov 11-Christmas. Most in November.

Running multiple cameras scattered on plots. Got pics of 3 older bucks (3.5+ in this case) that were not summer residents. One 4.5-5.5 walked across a plot at 10:30am during peak rut one time, one stayed 1 week during peak rut and was what appeared to be a 3.5y/o 6pt, the other was a small 9pt that was killed but I don't run cameras in that area so who knows.

The 6 bucks were killed within a few hundred yards of their core summer range or inside it and this either directly prior to, during or directly after peak breeding. All were photographed constantly the whole season, mainly at night.

AS, your place is virtually the "poster child" for properties that see very little seasonal shifting of buck ranges. However, I find it very interesting that this seems to be a very common situation in counties along the AL and MS borders. And I have no idea why this pattern is so regional. I do see this pattern in other areas, but it is not as dominate in other areas as it seems to be in southern TN.

If you came a sign that said "Alabama" or "Mississippi", would you keep going if you didn't have to?

 

[BSK]

If you came a sign that said "Alabama" or "Mississippi", would you keep going if you didn't have to?

Well, OK, there is that!

 

[Winchester]

Here in my area of Eastern TN our bucks Fall range shifting will depend heavily on the Acorn crop, as we have very little agriculture in this area. Where I photo and kill bucks on good Acorn years is vastly different from Acorn failure years.

 

[bowriter]

Just using a little common sense that I borrowed, I have come to believe there are only four things that cause a buck or any deer, to range shift.
1-Food
2-Sex
3-Habitat change
4-pressure

Provide those four things and there is no reason to go anywhere. In addition, after 15-years of watching the bucks around here, they either have no core area or have a tiny one. They stay in about the same place, roughly 20-acres, all year and year after year.