In recent years the supplemental feeding of deer has become
increasingly popular. Landowners feed deer everything from
corn to apples in an attempt to increase not only the
carrying capacity of the land, but also the quality and size
of both antlers and deer.
Brian Murphy, executive director of the Quality Deer
Management Association, believes providing feed properly is
more than just baiting.
"If done correctly, supplemental feeding is a year-round
program," he says. "People who are serious about
supplemental feeding are moving toward either a commercial
ration designed for deer or soybeans."
Still, many landowners ask, does feeding really do anything
for carrying capacity, antler quality or body size? That
depends.
"If supplemental feeding is providing more than just a token
spotting of food, it can increase carrying capacity, antler
growth and body weight," Murphy says.
But its effectiveness depends on how it's done. One feeder
with corn won't mean a hill of beans to the deer herd. Put
out multiple feeders loaded with high-quality feeds,
however, and you can make a substantial difference.
Still, experts say there are limitations to the amount of
improvement that supplemental feeding can make in antler
growth.
"Supplemental feeding can improve antler growth if you spend
a lot of money doing it," says Clayton Wolf, a deer
biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife. But in many cases
what you're contributing is pretty minimal. With hogs,
raccoons and other animals feeding there too, deer don't get
much of a share of the food.
If you have a supplemental feed available free choice so
that the feeder never runs dry, you can have an impact.
However, Wolf says, providing feed in amounts that can
affect antler growth can have some negative consequences.
"Operations that do that often have a much higher
recruitment of fawns," he says. "Typically, the range can't
handle that buildup of animals. And as a result, those
operations have to work even harder to get an adequate deer
harvest. "
Another potential negative aspect of feeding is the
increased potential for the transfer of diseases, including
chronic wasting disease and tuberculosis, among animals.
Supplemental feeding isn't a panacea to create big deer.
"Creating big deer takes a mixture of age, nutrition and
genetics," Wolf says.
"Unfortunately, people like to go for the silver bullet," he
adds. "They think if they buy a supplemental feed and put it
out there, they'll grow bigger deer. But it's just not that
simple.
"The deer may already have plenty of nutrients, and that's
just the maximum potential of that animal; nutrition won't
change the genetic potential of the deer herd. Antlers are
an expression of all three factors, so you've got to work on
all three factors at once," he concludes.