Episode #153 - What Should Buck Doe Ratio Be?

Published: 2023-01-22
Episode page
Duration: 61 min

In this episode

buck-to-doe-ratio

• Mike Soyster asks whether Don targets a certain buck-to-doe ratio on his property or takes a ‘more the merrier’ approach. 51:05

chicago

• Don says Chicago has the most ridiculous gun laws in the nation and yet is a war zone. 14:42

chris-yates

• Terry says both he and Don got word today that their new trucks are in transit. 20:16
• Chris Yates has expanded his business around Kansas City and now owns a GMC dealership. 20:42
• Don encourages listeners buying any truck or car to check with Chris Yates and Victory Chevrolet. 21:26
• Terry says Chris Yates gives back significantly, including contributing to Lester’s Feet and doing mission work in the Kansas City area. 22:16
• Terry saw a photo of Chris Yates duck hunting with the Duck Commander family, having flown to West Monroe with Jace Robertson. 22:27

consulting

• Terry says January is nearly as busy as the start of hunting season due to consulting work and the volume of Real World product orders. 1:16

consulting-schedule

• Terry plans to keep consulting through the weekend, then spend a week in the office catching up before the Ohio trip. 56:42

consulting-travel

• Don says he hasn’t been home much this week, having traveled to Missouri and Iowa for consulting visits. 1:30

consulting-trip

• Don and Steve Shields looked at four total properties in Iowa over three days on the consulting trip. 2:35

consulting-visit

• The consulting-visit contest winner, Adam, and his brother-in-law John manage their roughly 100-acre family farm west of St. Louis. 2:13

deer-management

• Terry says the difference-makers are restricting who can hunt, having great habitat and genetics, and managing the herd instead of exploiting it. 5:20

dnr-management

• Terry says when a state DNR genuinely values and manages for the betterment of the herd rather than for revenue, real improvement can happen. 6:45

doe-management

• Terry asks Don whether he cares more about the number of does shot or which specific does are shot. 53:24

ehd

• Terry says he started hunting Illinois hard around when EHD broke out, and then they didn’t hunt the area for three or four years. 8:05
• Don had to back off his two-does-per-buck harvest goal in 2012 when EHD hit and wiped out much of his deer herd. 54:47

events

• Don will be in Plymouth, Indiana for the tag out field day January 27-28. 17:03
• Don and Terry will do a live podcast recording February 2 in Middlefield, Ohio. 17:09
• On February 18 Don will be at the Whitetail Management Summit in Salina, Kansas with Wes Delks and Dr. Bronson Strickland. 17:40

friendship

• Don says Terry has had his back more than once when he needed it, making Terry a very good friend. 28:04

friendship-origin

• Scott Barkman asks how Don and Terry became friends despite living in different states and working different jobs. 23:32

giant-miscanthus

• Ben Allgood asks why he was blocked after noting Giant Miscanthus was found wild in Indiana and listed as invasive in Idaho. 32:41

giveaway

• Hardcore Hammers is giving away over $1,000 in hammers, axes, and hatchets to five winners, exclusively for Chasing Giants listeners. 19:10

gmc

• Terry says both he and Don are switching to GMC trucks this year. 20:32

hardcore-hammers

• The Giants coupon code gives listeners 10% off Hardcore Hammers products, and the company donates an additional 10% to Lester’s Feet and Purple Heart Homes. 18:24

illinois

• Don reports the Illinois governor signed a bill making it illegal to buy or sell semi-automatic firearms. 13:55

illinois-decline

• Don says it saddens him that fewer hunters remember how good Illinois hunting used to be, since you’d need to be about 50 to recall it. 7:12

illinois-vs-iowa

• Don says Illinois has better soil than the Iowa farms he visited, but Iowa has better deer because of better DNR management and age structure. 6:03

iowa

• Don believes a 200-inch buck could be killed off any of the four Iowa properties he scouted this trip. 4:48

iowa-deer-habitat

• Don says Iowa is far better than the rest of the country for deer habitat and buck age structure. 5:03

outfitters

• Terry says outfitters moving in created leasing opportunities that turned Illinois deer hunting into a money sport. 8:55

personal-history

• Don shot his first 200-inch buck in 2004, the year he marks as when Illinois hunting quality started declining. 8:34

podcast-growth

• Don says the podcast’s reach keeps growing, with more than one sponsor amazed by the response from even a single mention on the show. 19:58

poker-joke

• Terry jokes that fewer people win enough poker money to buy a farm than lose a farm gambling. 3:38 (light moment)

poker-player

• A consulting client, a young professional poker player, cashed in big in Vegas and used the money to move back and buy a farm in Iowa to deer hunt. 3:01
• The poker-player client came from an area with smaller deer than Iowa, which is part of why he bought a farm there. 3:17

political-joke

• Don jokes that if liberals held a convention instead, there’d be buildings burning and riots in the streets. 12:16 (light moment)

rural-king

• Don heard that Rural King pulled all their semi-auto pistols and handguns off the shelves. 14:07

shot-show

• Terry says despite it being a big city, he never once felt unsafe or disrespected at SHOT Show in Las Vegas. 10:41
• Terry attributes the safe, positive Vegas experience to tens of thousands of gun enthusiasts and second-amendment conservatives being gathered in one place. 11:19
• Terry says SHOT Show was the biggest trade show he’s ever attended outside his own industry. 12:41

trail-cameras

• Matthew Montag asks whether they recommend trail camera maintenance in late winter/spring to prevent moisture damage. 47:28

travel-schedule

• Don plans only two or three days home before heading to Ohio for about a week of consulting visits and seminars. 56:27

underwear

• A client’s wife told Don to tell Terry to stop talking about underwear on the podcast because her husband bought some at Terry’s urging and hated them. 4:13

unkillable-bucks

• Scott Barkman asks whether some bucks are truly unkillable depending on bedding, nocturnal behavior, and unpredictable travel patterns. 23:52

whitetail-master-academy

• Don gave away a free consulting visit through the Whitetail Master Academy. 1:57
• David Adams asks whether joining the Whitetail Master Academy gives access to all past posted questions and info. 45:52

Deer activity

• unnamed buck (harvest) 8:37
• unnamed buck (history) 24:34
• unnamed buck (harvest) 26:24
• unnamed buck (hunt) 45:05

Listener questions

Question: Scott Barkman asks how Don and Terry became friends despite living in different states and working different jobs. 23:32 — asked by Scott Barkman

• Answer: Don says he met Terry through Patrick’s Simpson Outdoors, which was looking to start a TV show, and that’s how their friendship began. 27:12
• Answer: Terry says Don later hired him to rebrand the company from Real World Wildlife Seed to Real World, and they’ve worked together daily ever since. 27:33
• Answer: Terry says a person tried to drive a wedge between him and Don, causing real division for a time before they resolved it and grew closer. 28:27

Question: Scott Barkman asks whether some bucks are truly unkillable depending on bedding, nocturnal behavior, and unpredictable travel patterns. 23:52 — asked by Scott Barkman

• Answer: Don says if a buck lives on huntable property, he doesn’t believe there’s such thing as an unkillable buck. 29:59
• Answer: Don says with the right property access, he believes he can eventually kill just about any buck. 30:33
• Answer: Terry says he doesn’t believe a buck only ever moves in the dark. 31:50

Question: Ben Allgood asks why he was blocked after noting Giant Miscanthus was found wild in Indiana and listed as invasive in Idaho. 32:41 — asked by Ben Allgood

• Answer: Don says he found another source confirming Giant Miscanthus is not on the invasive species list in any state. 36:00
• Answer: Don argues native red cedar is far more invasive than giant Miscanthus. 36:23
• Answer: Terry commends Ben for the respectful, well-framed tone of his question. 38:16
• Answer: Terry says other commenters wished harm on him and Don’s families and were borderline threatening, unlike Ben’s respectful question. 38:25
• Answer: Don says anyone who feels wrongly blocked can email or message him and he’ll consider unblocking them. 40:52

Question: Matthew Montag asks whether they recommend trail camera maintenance in late winter/spring to prevent moisture damage. 47:28 — asked by Matthew Montag

• Answer: Don leaves the SD card in each camera when pulling it, bringing the whole camera inside so he can trace any problem card back to its camera. 48:19
• Answer: Terry recommends removing battery trays and batteries and letting cameras dry completely inside to prevent corrosion. 50:30

Question: Mike Soyster asks whether Don targets a certain buck-to-doe ratio on his property or takes a ‘more the merrier’ approach. 51:05 — asked by Mike Soyster

• Answer: Don says almost no individual landowner controls enough ground to meaningfully influence a buck-to-doe ratio. 51:46
• Answer: Don recommends shooting plenty of does but forgetting about hitting an exact ratio, since it’s unachievable for most landowners. 53:10

Question: Terry asks Don whether he cares more about the number of does shot or which specific does are shot. 53:24

• Answer: Don says he cares more about which specific does are shot, favoring those with twin buck fawns and older, wiser does. 53:35

Question: David Adams asks whether joining the Whitetail Master Academy gives access to all past posted questions and info. 45:52 — asked by David Adams

• Answer: Don confirms every video ever posted stays in the growing, archived Whitetail Master Academy library. 46:11
• Answer: Don adds there’s a live members-only event coming up Monday where questions can be submitted in real time. 46:29

Sponsors this episode

• ASIO Gear

Don recapped a busy consulting week, including visits to Missouri and a giveaway winner’s roughly 100-acre farm west of St. Louis, plus a three-day Iowa trip where he and Steve Shields looked at four properties. Don argued Iowa’s deer quality now surpasses Illinois’s despite better Illinois soil, crediting Iowa’s DNR management and age structure, while he and Terry discussed how restricted access, habitat, and genetics separate top properties from the rest and lamented Illinois’s decline since around 2004. Terry described SHOT Show in Las Vegas as unexpectedly safe and the largest trade show he’d attended, and Don relayed reports on new Illinois gun restrictions. Listener questions covered how Don and Terry became friends through Simpson Outdoors, whether any buck is truly unkillable, a disputed Giant Miscanthus invasiveness claim, trail camera winterization, and Don’s preference for selective doe harvest over chasing a fixed buck-to-doe ratio.

Unofficial fan project. AI-synthesized from public episodes; may contain errors.