MORE DEER COVERAGE • 2004 Deer Outlook, Part 1 • 2004 Rut Report in North American Whitetail Forums

By Larry Self

Most hunters will have a little luck on any hunt, but we all know the value of doing pre-season homework.

To help with that homework, we've analyzed where Volunteer hunters take big bucks. The 2003 record-setting harvest of 161,072 whitetails in Tennessee includes more than 95,000 bucks. From top counties and regions to the top public-hunting lands, here's where to get your horns and what to expect during the 2004 season hunt dates.

Other WMAs in the "deserving of your attention" category are AEDC, Cheatham, Oak Ridge, and of course, Presidents Island. There are also a couple of WMAs with buck regulation changes we'll discuss later in this section that are places to keep a watchful eye on in the future.

Another missing piece of information is the breakdown of the harvest at Fort Campbell. The Fort Campbell preliminary deer harvest of 707 whitetails was the only solid number available from there at this writing. As recently as 2002, Fort Campbell hunters harvested 245 bucks with 7 or more points. There's no reason to think they didn't accomplish a similar feat last season, but with the absence of the buck breakdown, we'll look only at available data for our top WMA outlook. Keep in mind, Fort Campbell did lead the WMA big-buck counts in 2002.

LBL hunters bagged 408 total bucks in 2003. Of those, 109 were 7- and 8-pointers, while 33 were 9- and 10-pointers, and seven bucks taken had 11 or more points. The 408 total LBL buck count was best among WMAs, as was LBL's production of 11-point-or-better bucks.

AEDC's 284 bucks harvested in 2003 were good enough for the second position overall, and the area's 39 bucks with 7 and 8 points ranked in the fourth position. AEDC's 10 bucks with 9 or 10 points also tied a little spot called Presidents Island in West Tennessee for fourth in that list.

On the Catoosa WMA, restrictions limit harvests to bucks with at least 4 points on one side. The regulation appears to be helping to produce older and larger bucks: Catoosa hunters took a total of 207 bucks in 2003, but 146 of them had 7 or 8 points; 34 had 9 or 10 points, and one had 11 or more points. Those figures made it the best WMA destination in 2003 for 7- and 8-pointers as well as 9- and 10-pointers. Catoosa's 34 bucks with 9 or 10 points along with LBL's 33 trophy whitetails put them head and shoulders above other WMAs in that category.

Presidents Island and its harvest restrictions, which allow the harvest of bucks with at least 9 points makes it enticing for Volunteer hunters. Presidents Island's harvest of 10 bucks with 9 and 10 points was the most yet for the area and claimed the tie with AEDC. For the second season in a row, hunters harvested two bucks with 11 or more points.

Oak Ridge is traditionally among the top when it comes to big-buck WMAs. Last year, new regulations limited the harvest of bucks to those with 4 or more points or a 15-inch minimum outside spread. As is often the case when new trophy regulations first take effect, the buck harvest here fell last year - down from 116 bucks with 7 or more points in 2002 to 50 in 2003. Still, Oak Ridge's 36 bucks with 7 or 8 points were good enough for fifth among WMAs, while its 11 bucks with 9 or 10 points was third, and the two bucks with 11 or more points tied Cheatham WMA for the second spot in the biggest antler category. Cheatham also made its mark by being third among WMAs with 43 bucks tagged with 7 or 8 points.

The buck harvest restrictions given time have worked for Catoosa WMA. Oak Ridge saw similar restrictions added last season and the effects will not be seen for a few seasons. Hunters can expect antler harvest restrictions at two additional WMAs this season: the Ernest Rice WMA and the Laurel Hill WMA.

Photo by Donnie Parnell

Daryl Ratajczak, the TWRA's new big-game coordinator, said the TWRA sets regulations first that are good for the resource. Our deer herd numbers nearly one million animals, and the TWRA is looking at regulations that both reduce the number of antlerless deer and limit the harvest of bucks in certain areas. Unit L was created to address high doe populations in many Region I and Region II counties. The new unit will feature 25 high-harvest counties previously in Unit A.

Hunters in Unit L will be allowed a total of only three bucks, just like Unit A, but only two bucks may be taken with any one category of weapon. An archer could take six deer, but only two of them can be bucks; if the archer wants a third buck, he'll have to wait for muzzleloader or rifle season. Counties contained within Unit L are Bedford, Carroll, Cheatham, Coffee, Davidson, Dickson, Fayette, Giles, Hardeman, Henry, Hickman, Humphreys, Lawrence, Lincoln, Macon, Marshall, Maury, Montgomery, Moore, Robertson, Rutherford, Sumner, Weakley, Williamson and Wilson.

"The antlerless harvest is driven by the number of does," Ratajczak said. "It's our management tool." He said the agency wants to increase the antlerless harvest in Unit L to 50 percent from the present 45 percent. A 10-county trial in 2003 (where more liberal doe harvests were allowed) produced the desired increase in doe kills. Increasing the doe harvest is simply an effort to balance the herd.

Ratajczak said it's extremely hard to get an accurate buck-to-doe ratio statewide. Biologically speaking, a buck-to-doe ratio of one buck to 1.2 does is seen as a theoretical optimum, but there's no magic number statewide. Tennessee has a diverse deer herd, as Ratajczak pointed out. There are some areas where we shoot a lot of does, some areas that have big bucks, and there are still places in the state where deer densities are light.

"Ratios don't grow big bucks," Ratajczak explained. "Food, genetics and old age are the key factors." He said antlers don't reach their peak until a buck is 4 1/2 years old. A harvest featuring over 95,000 bucks out of more than 161,000 total kill shows that deer ratios aren't as skewed as many people tend to think.

Fawn recruitment is another term that comes up when discussing the health of a deer herd. Ratajczak said the two are related in that fawn recruitment takes care of itself. When the deer population is at carrying capacity, fawn recruitment decreases, and when an area can handle more deer, fawn recruitment goes up. Partly this is a function of the tendency of does to increase or decrease fertility based on their physical condition: If the doe is healthy, she can produce two fawns. If stressed, she may only carry one fawn. The health of the population itself dictates how many fawns are recruited.

In Unit B, Ratajczak said he was somewhat surprised that 90 percent of hunters that voiced their opinion were in favor of reducing the buck harvest to two bucks. He said this regulation change for 2004 received more support than any other and that people show their support when they want a change.

One statistic that supported the change in Unit B is hunter success. In Unit B, of the 8,575 hunters that harvested a buck in 2003, 1,670 were successful in harvesting two bucks, but only 216 harvested the limit of three bucks. As Ratajczak pointed out, the new regulation only affects a low percentage of hunters.

The effects of the two-buck bag limit remain to be seen, and Ratajczak said it would likely be a gradual change. A positive effect will be that hunters may become more selective, allowing the average age of bucks in Unit B to increase. A negative effect would be that once hunters take their two bucks, they might not spend as much time in the field. Ratajczak said this scenario would result in a decrease in the antlerless harvest in Unit B.

Ratajczak said that, statewide, "We've pushed the age bracket with the three-buck bag limit." Prior to 1998 (before the buck limit restrictions), 40 to 45 percent of the bucks harvested had 4 points or less, and only 25 percent were 7-point bucks or better. After 1998, only 33 percent are 4-pointers or less, and an equal 33 percent of bucks harvested had 7 or more points. Put simply, the three-buck limit has brought the harvest of older, better bucks in line with that of younger, smaller bucks.

The top 10 counties from 2003 are (buck harvest numbers in parentheses) Hardeman (2,647), Giles (2,310), Henry (2,193), Fayette (2,174), Hickman (1,927), Lincoln (1,922), Carroll (1,917), Weakley (1,759), Madison (1,683) and Franklin (1,644). The first eight were in the top 10 list last year; Madison and Franklin counties replaced Hawkins and Montgomery counties, which were in the 2002 top buck list.

When it comes to 9- and 10-pointers, Montgomery County led the way with 207 bucks, followed by Dickson's 189 bucks, 174 in Henry County, 169 in Hickman, and a tie for fifth between Lincoln and Humphreys counties, both of which produced 16 such bucks.

The most 7- and 8-point bucks in 2003 were taken in Hardeman County (738) and Henry County (707). Lincoln took the third spot with 695, followed by Giles with 662 and Fayette County with 640.

Hardeman County had the most bucks in the state, but also the most for 7- and 8-pointers (738), and was third for 11-point-plus bucks (44). Henry was third for bucks overall, but was even stronger for big bucks, producing the most 11-pointers (50), second for 7- and 8-pointers (707), and third for 9- and 10-point bucks (174).

Montgomery fell out of the top 10 total bucks harvest in 2003, but was No. 1 for 9- and 10-pointers (207) and second for 11-point bucks or better (47).

In Region III, Fentress County was heads and shoulders above the rest with 25 bucks harvested sporting 11 points or better. Overton County produced 15 trophies with 11 points, while Cumberland, Morgan and Van Buren all had 14 big bucks. Region IV's new trophy hotspot has to be Campbell County, where 10 bucks with 11 points or more were taken in 2003. Sullivan and Johnson County hunters also bagged five trophies with 11 or more points.

Ratajczak said the simplest explanation is we just have certain areas where big bucks grow, and that the areas that produce the majority of big bucks all have "balanced" habitat.

A mix of good soils, a number of dependable and nutritious food sources (often including hardwood wood lots and agricultural fields) and good cover all produce conditions that allow bucks to grow big racks.

A prime example is found in Montgomery, Stewart and Robertson counties, which have produced the most trophy entries in regions I and II. Stewart and Montgomery counties each have nine entries. He explained that region of the state has some of the best, if not the richest, and highest in nutrition soil in Tennessee. Couple that with the fact there's a real good mixture of habitat and not just pure farmland, and you have a big-buck factory.