Deer Numbers

dto001

Howaya Lads,
It's 9 days into the season are you seeing the same numbers of deer as last year or do you think numbers are down? I myself think numbers are way down and they are very spooked! I'm starting to think its time that a tags system should be brought in for deer that are to be sold if its for personal consumption then it should stay the same!! Or something like that. Just my opinion. What are your toughts?

Cass

Deer numbers around me are the same as during the off season and in two of my permissions i'm seeing an increase in deer numbers compared to the last 4-5 years where they were well down.

A tagging system can be abused. You know the old line of though that the more advanced the system of control the more advanced the system to bypass the controls. As it stands if you sell to a game dealer you need to fill in a form with all your details, and have the trained hunter course. The course is being given some leeway because they implemented it too quick for everyone to have it, but it will be necessary for all in the future. That leaves a paper trail of who shot it, where, how much they got, etc.

I'm hearing stories of lads getting hit with tax bills, and lads on welfare having their benefits reduced or stopped based on the money they make from shooting deer. Now they are stories so not sure if it's true, but i don't doubt it would be done.

A tagging system might help for a while, and it'd be more than what is in place at the moment. It would also put in place a system to track who shoots the most deer for selling reasons to personal consumption. Also if you fail to use your tags you get less the next year. Perhaps even a small fee for each tag. Say €2, €3 up to €5 per tag. Then the dealer takes the tag, and returns it with your paperwork to the NPWS so one cannot be submitted without the other. IOW no re-using the same tag.

dodderangler

Seen plenty during off season and I'm seen same numbers now except the stags aren't about. Plenty of does around.
Came across 3 last night while out lamping.
They are around just don't think there's as many stags

One shot on kill

I was out last nite I seen absalutely noting. I have been seen groups of 4-6 hinds and calfs but have only seen one pricket. No big stags at all.

dev110

Will most of the bucks/stags not stay fairly elusive until the rutting starts?

Deerspotter

I am seeing more hinds and calves than ever this year and they are in places I haven't seen them in years
!
Stags won't be around till the rutting starts, unless you know where the bachelor herds hang out.
If you do know - then you'll know, numbers of stags have been declining for years. I now think that stags should not be allowed to be shot at all for about 3 years, to let the Sika herd balance out - as there is almost no rut any more.
I've seen crappy four pointer stags holding 10 or 12 hinds. That should never be the case. But with pay-by-weight at the dealers and the continued want for a trophy head - all decent stags are shot in too high numbers.

If they won't stop shooting stags, then they should be out of season in September, October and November and only in season for December - when you see them the least!

Shooting stags during the rut, is not sport it is culling. I can whistle a stag to within 50m of me during the rut.

DEMOLISHER

seen plenty does and fawns but also lot more males than other years,but usually wont see big stags till rutting starts

The Aussie

dev110 wrote: »

Will most of the bucks/stags not stay fairly elusive until the rutting starts?

Anyone game enough to put a week down as the start of the Rut, this long summer is putting thing back a bit by my reckoning.

PL05

Have to agree with some of what Deerspotter said. I think in order to keep the herd in balance stalkers should consentrate on culling more females and less stags, as shooting any amount of stags does,nt really have any impact on population unless their all shot of course. with Re: to fallow bucks, there does,nt seem to be many around with decent heads as they were always more inclined to be shot for their impressive antlers. its also well documented that quite a few fallow bucks dont reach their 3rd year as they are an easy enough target. In my opinion, if the birth rate is say 50/50 male/female then there should be plenty of spikers about and maybe the bigger stags should be left alone for a few years. I suppose what im trying to say is that at the end of the day its up to the individual stalker or stalkers to assess and manage the population on their permissions or leases whatever the case may be, ie. know how many deer are in the area and cull them accordingly and responsibly.

The Aussie

PL05 wrote: »

maybe the bigger stags should be left alone for a few years.

Herd management is not always a priority more's the pity.

Then the Elephant in the room of Poachers comes into the equation.
Leave a Stag and some Mo Mo (the Kanturk Low Life springs to mind) comes along and takes a Trophy for himself.
Greed is a terrible disease and not conducive to Deer Management.

PL05

The Aussie wrote: »

Anyone game enough to put a week down as the start of the Rut, this long summer is putting thing back a bit by my reckoning.

I agree, we need the temp to drop right down, but could,nt hazzard a guess when, with way weather is these days.

PL05

The Aussie wrote: »

Herd management is not always a priority more's the pity.

Then the Elephant in the room of Poachers comes into the equation.
Leave a Stag and some Mo Mo (the Kanturk Low Life springs to mind) comes along and takes a Trophy for himself.
Greed is a terrible disease and not conducive to Deer Management.

Spot on.

greengrasscork

I've been out in hills in kerry 4 times in the last week and have seen a lot of bucks and stags all travelling in their batchelor herds saw 5 red stags in one group and came across 2 groups of 3-4 sika bucks and a few solo bucks. Female numbers seem to be up in the permissions im hunting. In general numbers are up from what ive seen so far. Heard a sika whistling and saw him starting to mark his rutting hole yesterday morning but as previous lads said its still too mild yet to get things going.

DubPredator

Anyone know how to go about changing the regulation 're shooting stage? I agree that no stags should be shot for at least 3 years and reduce the number of hinds

Deerspotter

Start lobbying the NPWS to get the hunting seasons changed - but have your evidence.
Proper herd management is a great idea, as has been said. But I've been with hunters and begged them not to shoot the stag and they said to me "so just leave it for the poacher?" which is a statement that has too much truth in it these days. So if the poachers had no market for the stags either (as they'd all be illegal) then they'd be left alone for a while.

wexfordman2

Deerspotter wrote: »

Start lobbying the NPWS to get the hunting seasons changed - but have your evidence.
Proper herd management is a great idea, as has been said. But I've been with hunters and begged them not to shoot the stag and they said to me "so just leave it for the poacher?" which is a statement that has too much truth in it these days. So if the poachers had no market for the stags either (as they'd all be illegal) then they'd be left alone for a while.

Or how about just make the sale/purchase of stag carcass to game dealers illegal ? Perhaps that would then do what you are pushing for but push the onus onto legit shooters to act responsibly.

Might be a good test to measure the impact of poaching/commercial deer sale etc to see the impact it would have on stags over a few years.

323

Way down in areas where the were in the past. Seeing some where were none before, well away from the range of the drive by shooters and commercial lampers.

Deerspotter wrote: »

Start lobbying the NPWS to get the hunting seasons changed - but have your evidence.
Proper herd management is a great idea, as has been said. But I've been with hunters and begged them not to shoot the stag and they said to me "so just leave it for the poacher?" which is a statement that has too much truth in it these days. So if the poachers had no market for the stags either (as they'd all be illegal) then they'd be left alone for a while.

From past experience dealing with them, talking to the NPWS is a total waste of time. Unless that is, if are talking about reducing deer numbers.

Tried it, but in our case herd management just did not work with attitudes here.

Was told last year by a number of otherwise very conservative stalkers to go out and shoot every large stag you see, even if meat used only to feed the dogs. Idea being to make it uneconomical for the commercial shooters. From the number of commercial shooters out in force already this year, unfortunately beginning to agree with this strategy.

Deerspotter

A decapitated and gutted deer could be very hard to sex - so I'd say trusting the game-dealers to regulate the poachers might not be the best idea.

wexfordman2

Deerspotter wrote: »

A decapitated and gutted deer could be very hard to sex - so I'd say trusting the game-dealers to regulate the poachers might not be the best idea.

I suppose, but if followed with unannounced inspections, it might be a bit of a deterrent. Or perhaps if the organs had to be retained for inspection ? I know a bit of fiddling could still be done, but surely making it as hard as possible would aleviate the problem.

Its just frustrating to see measures put in place to tackle poaching, which affect legit and responsible shooters. TBH, I would be happy to pay into a fund which helped to pay for game dealer inspections etc, even if the fund was collected as part of my deer licence.

thetl

I wonder what sort of effect the wide spread use of sika deer callers/ whistles during the rut is having on stag numbers.There are a lot of people using them especially commercial outfits ,a lot of stags being shot during the rut now would never have been shot 10 years ago before callers were common place.
In theory there should be more stags around as the season for stags used to run to the end of February giving hunters an extra month of stag shooting .

deano2882

i got a phonecall earlyier off owner of 1 of my permissions he was out on quad and seen a massive stag and a couple of younger stags n a herd id prefer to leave the older stags an take out younger 1.s a lovely sight a massive stag wit doe.s n he wud prob breed beta young than smaller stag.s maybe im wrong??

Deerspotter

A stags condition is less to do with breeding and more to do with nutrition, so even if a small, bad quality stag does some breeding, it could still produce a Master stag as long as the hind is healthy and the calf gets the right nutrition.
Lads have been able to whistle stags without callers since forever. But I guess not everyone could do it, or knew how to. Now that anyone can get a caller - the stags have NO chance.

ah sure !

deano2882 wrote: »

i got a phonecall earlyier off owner of 1 of my permissions he was out on quad and seen a massive stag and a couple of younger stags n a herd id prefer to leave the older stags an take out younger 1.s a lovely sight a massive stag wit doe.s n he wud prob breed beta young than smaller stag.s maybe im wrong??

i am coming arround your place next week Deano2882 :P

deano2882

ah sure ! wrote: »

i am coming arround your place next week Deano2882 :P

giv me a bell ill hav the kettle on :-) hopefully be out nextweek myself awaiting licence in post it was sent off by super yesterday after long disscussion over granting me a mod..

PL05

Maybe a tread should be started with genuine stalkers reporting sightings and numbers, sex, age etc of deer. any evidence of poaching also. without giving away where your permissions are of coarse. this could be done by just giving province. run it for a month or so and although it may not be 100% accurate as counts go [what counts are 100%] it might give some idea of numbers, sex, age and amount of poaching going on and which areas. also deer been shot.

The Aussie

Deerspotter wrote: »

Start lobbying the NPWS.

I have been since April, and a few others, because I hate TV and have an hour or two free each night, don't tell to many people though, the Man Tears are truly embarrassing..........




Sorry, Shame Secretions.. You know, the blokes who go out for "Fox" and come home with "bigger Fox"

But being serious though, contact them with your concerns, the NPWS are good at replying and seem like decent people

rowa

Whats the situation with the price of deer this year ? Are the values still high ? I ask because i thought the price couldn't remain high for long and when it went down the poachers would find some new scam to make money.

ah sure !

deano2882 wrote: »

giv me a bell ill hav the kettle on :-) hopefully be out nextweek myself awaiting licence in post it was sent off by super yesterday after long disscussion over granting me a mod..

a cookie would also be nice to go with the tea
going Friday morning so will stop on my way back if you are there , this way you can have a closer look at the big buck the farmer saw the other day :eek:

4200fps

Yes numbers are down in well shot areas.Their habits change as soon as the season starts I notice. I seen nothing but calfs and does, I wouldn't be far off if id said I seen 100 deer within the week. 10% were males. There all going to pop out everywhere grazing after the rutt after loosing their condition then the ratio of male/female be near even compaired to now. There is still plenty of spots that are heavily populated and its never near the deer signs you see on the roads where most waste days looking. Tagging won't work. Waste of time. I could sell as many private as to a game dealer and thats a fact! Only thing that will help deer population is restrict the amount of deer licences thats issued, let the goverment put a ban on game dealers buying in wild deer. That would put alot of shooting them. Salomon tagging is tampered with. Hot water opens them when shown how. Another thing about tagging, Johnny up the road has a deer licence and doesn't go to game dealers use his tags. Theres several loop holes

4200fps

This is wrong but a fact. Alot of rangers not them all but some are called to inspect grounds by the NWPS to insure there is deer for first time applicants. You know what some do is walk a field or two and see tracks and see no deer. Licence granted and the place lamped alive at night. Rangers are too soft and don't realise whats going on. Half to blame in my good opinion and I witnessed this personally

sikahuntejack

(1) Too many hunters have deer permits it seems everyone who shoots has one, A cap has to be put on the amount of permits handed out each year. (2)Anyone who brings in more than 50 deer to the game dealer in one season should not get a permit for the following season we all know to get that amount of deer lamping has to be involved. (3) WHEN YOU SEND BACK THE RETURNS ON HOW MANY DEER YOU SHOT IT SHOULD BE CHECKED WITH THE GAME DEALERS TO SEE HOW MANY YOU DROPPED INTO THEM, IF THE NUMBERS DONT ADD UP YOU SHOULD NEVER BE ISSUED WITH A DEER PERMIT AGAIN, :mad: