Les and I judged these bucks to be about 2 and a half years old. Their bodies are just too petite to be much older. Good gene pool huh?

Also, I think we have yet another Ohio record. See the link: New Ohio record deer

Great photos, the racoon looks trophy class also!

Hey Doc, Really nice racks for their size. Is this in an area where rifle hunting is prohibited?

Those are dandy's Doc. I would think 3 and a half or 4 and a half though. Even with good genetics and food that's a lot of antler for a bucks second set.

Jeff

Nice racks. Two and a half is probably about right. Bucks can grow very respectable racks in 18 months if they have the genes and a good diet. Check the teeth after you harvest one and see how you did guessing.

You cannot use a high power rifle for deer in Ohio, unless you hunt behind a fence.

These deer are nowhere near 4 and half years old. I've been aging deer too long. To give you an example of what some whitetails can achieve, the guy who farms deer in Ansonia where I buy my deer urine bought a buck from an amish farmer. That buck's first rack was 11 points, 17" wide, with medium mass and medium tine length. It taped at 122". No "special" genetic breeding here for rack size. ONly farming for urine. These deer are native Ohio deer.

Since I've lived here I've killed 2 deer with a bow that aged 1 and half. 1 8pt., 1 10pt. The 8 scores about 118, the 10 scores about 120.

The deer in the pictures above are very petite. They are young, and we will let them go another 2 years minimum.

Doc - just curious but why did you shoot those two 1 1/2 year deer if they had that much potential?

quote:

Originally posted by Rattlesnaker:
Doc - just curious but why did you shoot those two 1 1/2 year deer if they had that much potential?

Excellent question. I was hunting in an urban area and we were informed by the rangers that if we didn't bump up the kills in Cincinnati, they were going to stop hunting all together and bring in the snipers. I usually fill all of my urban permits there and only sometimes my buck tags. In both cases, it was opening day here in Ohio and within a week I'd be leaving for a western trip. The goal both years was to fill the tag before I left.

Plus, try and preserve our hunting priviledges in Cincinnati. Not many people know this but about 2 miles down the road from where I hunt, a HUGE buck was killed that taped only about 6" less than the famous Ohio BEATY buck. It was killed about 10 days before Beaty got his. Obviously it didn't receive any recognition. That is what I shoot for when I hunt down in the city, but my biggest concern was my western hunts and our priviledges.

Good question though. Here they are:

Those are really fine deer to be so young. Most of the deer I see are inevitably young or small racked due to high hunting pressure.

quote:

Originally posted by Perforator:
Those are really fine deer to be so young. Most of the deer I see are inevitably young or small racked due to high hunting pressure.

Well, that is usually the case in several places I've hunted in the past. In the past few years, I've seen 1 and 2 year old deer in Ohio have antlers equivical to what a SC deer would take 3-4 years to grow.