Waiting for antlers to drop

[Pydpiper]

One of our favorite family outings is to head to the woods with our bows, jump cotton tails and shed hunt at the same time.
We use bows because we like to bring our dog, a great nose in the bush, but terrified of guns. Everytime she sees me take a gun out of the house she gives me the "are you freaking kidding me" look. Happens a few times a day.
This has been an odd winter, and I haven't been following whitetail long enough to know when they start to drop, or why.
Anyone seeing any signs of sheds yet? The wife has been building an antler chandelier in the living room, so far it is made of my harvests and a couple donations from a good buddy. We want to make it larger, thicken it up.
Our whole living room is antlers, everything has small antlers laying around it, keeps a room warm. Lots of forks and small 6s, but comfortable all the same.
Hunting skills aside, we would like to add to this theme we have running, and good sheds will trump my harvested mini antlers.
Almost that time, right?

[newbie]

double post

[newbie]

Antler growth cycle is linked to day lenthg/light cycle. Here is a good tlread David... google is your friend .


http://www.iwla-rh.org/html/DGIF_articl ... tlers.html

[Pydpiper]

Thank you.

[Ont_Excal]

Some of it might be day length cycle but certainly not all because antler drop does not coincide with the calendar days as far as I can tell in my area.
Have seen bucks carry their head gear well into February but not every year.

I have read that hormone levels cause a buck to keep their antlers and that coincides with available does for breeding.
Once all does including this years fawns get bred then hormone levels drop and so do the horns which are a key part of the breeding cycle.

[racking up points]

From what I can tell, the bucks are still using their antlers to fend off challengers for prime food sources. Last week I saw two bucks scrapping in a field and in years past, bucks that had headgear were still using it to chase off other deer from my feed piles in Feb-Mar. The only way to know what your deer are doing is get your boots on the ground, but around here, bucks are still antlered.

[bob watkins]

my grandson and i both shot bucks before xmas antlers dropped . his buck was 170# good healthy deer i had mine on camera one week small 6 next week one antler 5 days later no horns at all. mine was shot dec 22.

[R.J.]

Hey David ... I saw a rack buck tonight .

I have seen bucks shed as early as late December and as late April 7th ( Yep way back in the late 80's a buck was hit on the 401 near the Sweaburg Road cut off and he still had both sides on )

Lots of theories and good articles > I would take Charlie Alsheimer's word as gospel when it comes to Whitetail Deer Behaviour ...

http://charliealsheimer.com/ca/articles.html

Good luck on the antler chandelier ... post some pic's when it's done !