In reality, body size is much more important when it comes to dominance, but short points in your deer herd means hunters get the short end of the stick. I like to think that Mother Nature would want bucks to have long tines so that they could use them more effectively to defend themselves. Short-tined bucks not only look inferior, they could be, possibly. When we think of great whitetail bucks, we immediately think of deer with longer points, particularly from the G2 on up. The only way to ensure that whitetail bucks have brow points on a property is to remove what you can see, bucks without them.īucks with short antler points are undesirable to most hunters and deer managers. I have been on several ranches where many of the bucks were missing brow points. If bucks are missing one or both brow points, then these animals should be considered for removal from the herd. Plain and simple, whitetail bucks should have brow points once they reach 2 years of age. Not only are bucks expected to have brow points, but the presence of these tines is genetically dominant over deer with one or no brow points. Below are 7 potential reasons to cull healthy whitetail bucks.īrow points (G1s) are important. Although the reasons for culling bucks may vary from hunter to hunter and between ranches, there are some physical features by which all bucks are measured.

It takes a long time to skew the genetic composition of a free-ranging deer herd and, depending on the size of the property, may not be possible. It would be unfair to compare deer from South Texas with a deer from East Texas or Alabama or Indiana for that matter.Ĭulling is best prescribed when there are too many deer for the habitat, otherwise there is no need to remove anything. Property objectives, habitat condition, food availability, and the genes found in the local deer population (for antler growth) all determine what a cull buck on a particular property will look like. Bucks found on a property must be judged against other bucks on the ranch. After all, culling is relative to the buck population in question. In addition, the reasons for culling bucks are also closely tied to the manager’s objectives.Ī cull buck on one ranch may be a trophy on another. Each fall, hunters email me photos and ask, “Is this deer a cull buck?” It’s a simple enough question, but the answer depends on the quality of the whitetail bucks found on the ranch. To attempt to improve the buck segment of any deer herd, some type of culling must take place on an annual basis. White-tailed deer management and the culling of bucks often go hand-in-hand.

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