Doesn't meet AR's

One of the benefits of putting in the effort to go MLD, aside from the extended hunting season, is being able to be exempt from AR's so you can take these guys out.

Whilst AR has done wonderful things for our area of Tx, especially for public hunting, they do have their downfalls. Luckily a large ranch that borders our properties is mld so they handle the culling for us!

I should be clear that before we went MLD 5 or 6 years ago, we liked the results we were seeing from AR's, but there was always that one goofy buck running does that you couldn't do anything about. This guy was pestering 4 small does (late rut for yearling does?) and my father-in-law put a stop to that foolishness.

AR is a great thing for deer and hunters alike but bucks like this need to go. Maybe an exemption on bucks like these is something that TPWD should consider.

That's a crazy looking one.

Good to get that fellow out of the gene pool. Still a pretty cool deer.

Good move and should improve herd genetics

Agreed. Great buck to take out of the gene pool

Looks like a good one to be removed!

AR has definitely improved the bucks in my county. That being said i have a few bucks that will never meet AR and are the bottom end with inferior genetics but unfortunately I am not MLD. I wish they would waive AR rules for archery and youth seasons so some of the inferior antlered bucks could be removed.

How old was that deer, just curious?

Glad you are rid of that one. I have seen several bucks on my home place in North Parker County that will not make AR, some old some young. High racks seem to be the gene pool there. I don't know the answer as to what to do about it.

He was estimated at 3 yrs old

That was one ugly buck! He should still eat good though!

Agreed. A warden could issue a special tag to be used with your buck tag. It could be issued by a game cam or other pic.

I stopped using game cameras several years ago. Honestly I found that they took the enjoyment from my hunt. I would see that one incredible buck and hunt hard for him, passing on other extremely nice bucks that were better than anything I had ever killed, but not as nice as the one in the picture. Of course, the only pics were at 1am, not in the daylight.

Now, I'm blissfully ignorant of every deer on the place that hasn't stepped out in front of me, then when one comes out that I think is really nice, I have nothing to compare him to and I'm left completely satisfied after pulling the trigger. I find that MUCH more enjoyable.

Thankfuly, the MLD eliminates the need for the "mother may I" with the warden

A warden is not going to tell you to break the law..... use your own judgement shoot what you can afford

not all reg's are 100% perfect....but they help the majority of the population. There is usually an exception to every rule.

I listened to a TPW game biologist on a radio show claim they would never issue exemption permits for individual deer because of the resources it would tie up. Imagine all the game cam photos they would receive of 12 1/4 “ deer that someone would want an exemption for. His only solution was MLD. Made sense once I heard him out. I’m beleive it was on a Lone Star Outdoors Podcast.

It's called shoot em and kick em in a bush. Minus straps..

is there any drawbacks to MLD?

only "drawback" we see is trying to kill all of the deer that the biologist assigned tags for this year. At some point you get tired of cleaning deer and your freezer is full.

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