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Cull buck??

My opinion is I don't shoot any bucks to cull, period. In other words, I do not look for a reason to shoot a buck other that I "want to" shoot him. The buck either meets my personal criteria or he does not. The majority of bucks I see from the stand do not, so 99% of the bucks just walk on by. I shoot does every year and occasionally kill a good buck (preferably 4.5+) every few years. The buck in the photo could walk by me 10,000 times and I would never pick my gun up. He is safe to roam and do his thing. Now if I have a new hunter with me (youth or adult) and he/she wants to fire down on any buck, I'll gladly encourage it and help them drag it out. YMMV
 
Young. I'm gonna say 2.5 and could possibly develop into something decent. If he didn't change much next year put a kid on him and get him out of the herd. That's my opinion. I don't like to see 2.5's shot that have really good genetics but at the same time I'd rather see that deer shot than a 125" 3.5 year old 8 or 10pt. To each own but that's my mind set.
 
Just a below average 2 1/2 year-old (depending on location). Odds are, he's never going to be top-end, but he could certainly be a decent buck with age.
 
I had a deer like that back in Illinois.
He haunted the same area for four years, antlers never changed in shape, just got more mass.
I finally took him out for the meat, he weighed 192 field dressed
 
Andy S. said:
My opinion is I don't shoot any bucks to cull, period. In other words, I do not look for a reason to shoot a buck other that I "want to" shoot him. The buck either meets my personal criteria or he does not. The majority of bucks I see from the stand do not, so 99% of the bucks just walk on by. I shoot does every year and occasionally kill a good buck (preferably 4.5+) every few years. The buck in the photo could walk by me 10,000 times and I would never pick my gun up. He is safe to roam and do his thing.
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Pretty much my personal buck philosophy.

Andy S. said:
Now if I have a new hunter with me (youth or adult) and he/she wants to fire down on any buck, I'll gladly encourage it and help them drag it out. YMMV
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Not necessarily on this.
In some places I hunt, this buck would not be a legal buck due to age or antler restrictions.
If it is a legal buck, I will explain to another hunter why I personally don't want to shoot it,
and will likely just say "the choice is yours".

If he decides to take it, then I'll congratulate him on his trophy, and gladly help him with every aspect.
 
Here's a similar buck. He was a below average 2.5yr old with small antlers that didn't have much for tine count or length. Didn't even have the height of the OP buck. But going from 2.5 to 3.5 made a big difference. He grew a pretty nice, unique rack with a split G2 and 3" flyer off his right base, not to mention added considerable height and mass. He didn't turn into a P&Y trophy but he did grow, and next season if he's still around I'd bet he'll be real near that P&Y trophy at 4.5. If he survives to 5.5 he'll likely be a shooter for anywhere in the world, let alone southern middle TN. Will he ever be world class B&C? No probably not. But he'll be a big, unique rack buck that never would have been if I "culled" him for being an underachieving 2.5yr old.


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I don't really see anything about him that screams cull. I think tv shows have exacerbated that term and the average hunter isn't accomplishing anything by shooting a true cull. I agree with you that many times it's from an injury or damage while in velvet.
 
In a wild deer herd there is no such thing as a cull buck. First, you don't know if that buck will catch up and express his full potential with a giant rack once he hits 4-5 years old. Secondly if he's a successful breeder the doe is also half the DNA. All of us have seen beautiful daughters come from two homely looking parents. If you just want one less mouth on a marginal landscape then that might be the only reason to take him out of the herd. The king ranch did a study on allowing 10 point bucks to walk and killing 8 point bucks. After several years there were no more 10 pointers than on another property with no selective harvest. If you want to kill him then go ahead but you won't change the genetics of the herd.
 
TX300mag said:
I don't shoot cull bucks. I prefer the term "management buck." It applies to the only bucks I manage to kill.
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Ha! I like that!

"Culling" bucks to improve local antler genetics has proven - through many research projects - to not work. It is not possible to increase future antler size by removing low-end-for-their-age bucks.

However, in very unique circumstance, there is call for the use of "management bucks." But again, in very unique circumstances most of us do not face.
 

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