NUTRITION: What Kind of Difference can It Make

 By: Charles J. Alsheimer

Contributing Editor

Within the past two years the whitetail world has been abuzz after seeing photos of the giant Arkansas buck known as 30-30.  Nearly every hunter with an interest in antlers was talking about genetics and what could be expected from bucks like 30-30.

Yes, that rack is exciting to see and read about, but it really amounts to nothing more than false hope.  Actually, 30-30 and other pen-raised bucks like him are freaks of nature.  The genetics that produced them create a lot of interest but unfortunately are seldom possible in the wild.

Writers and biologists can rave all they want about genetics but the average hunter in America (those who hunt free-ranging deer) must play with the genetic hand the good Lord deals them.

The good news is that most areas have decent genetics—more than adequate to produce 140+ Boone and Crockett bucks, which most of us consider trophy class animals.

Antlers are a product of four interconnected factors: genetics, habitat, management and age.  Nutrition is the foundation for the overall health of the whitetail population.  Without proper nutrition the health of all whitetails suffer with a byproduct being stunted antler growth.

THEY ARE WHAT THEY EAT

People are always hoping that the next bag of magic seed will turn their food plot into an antler machine, and many seed companies want hunters to believe their product can do that.  Truthfully it takes many nutrition variables, most of which can be controlled by man, to grow healthy impressive-racked whitetails.

For starters adult deer require between five and 10 pounds of dry matter each day, which works out to one to two tons of food per year.  To put it another way if there are 40 deer per square mile (which is realistic in most parts of North America) the land will have to produce between 40 and 80 tons of food per square mile.  This isn’t a big problem if your hunting area is in the prime farming areas of Illinois or Iowa.  However, if it'’ in New York'’ Adirondack Mountains or Maine'’ famed Allegash region where unbroken forest is the norm, then serious food/nutrition shortages become a real problem.

So, one of the challenges to producing healthy whitetails is being able to provide enough of the right kinds of foods.  Few people understand what a whitetail needs to survive.  During the last five years I’ve been working on three projects using two different captive whitetail herds. 

One of these projects deals with the role that nutrition plays in overall antler growth.  Both enclosures are quite large, one located I what would be classified a big timber country and the other in farm country. 

The big timber herd lives in a wilderness area where there are no food plots.  The food there consists of browse, natural beech mast and supplemental feeding.  There is no liming of the soil or fertilization at this location.

The farm country whitetails have browse, five lush clover food plots, oak and beech mast, fruit from apple trees and supplemental feeding which has a crude protein level of 17.5 percent.  In addition to farm country enclosure’s soil is pH tested, limed and fertilized for maximum efficiency.  It also has what I call a “browse buffet” available year around to all the deer there.  This consists of freshly cut browse being fed to the deer every day throughout the year, which allows them to get maximum benefit from leaf and browse nutrition.

TALE OF THE TAPE

Although the deer at both locations appear to be very healthy, studies I’ve conducted have been quite revealing from the standpoint of antler growth.  What I’m about to share with you is not a new study or finding.  Many respected whitetail authorities have done the same thing over the years with very similar results.

The comparison shows the two bucks during their first four years.  For the first three years of life, whitetails are growing bones and muscles and, in a buck’s case, anything left over during these years goes to antler growth.  It’s at age four (with no more bone and muscle to be grown) that a big growth surge is often seen in whitetail bucks’ antlers.  While increases in antler size is visible after four years, those increases are generally not as great as those between three and four years of age.  With this in mind I’ll use two bucks with similar genetics at age three and four to illustrate my nutrition findings. 

Buck #1: This buck lived the first seven years of his life on the big timber country enclosure.  When it was a 1.5 year-old (yearling) the buck was a very symmetrical 8 pointer with about a 12 inch inside spread.  Very good but quite typical for its age. 

The next year this buck was a typical four by four with one very small point at the end of one main beam.  When this buck was three years old he was again a main frame four by four with a sticker on one brow tine.  At age four it blossomed into a 140 class Boone & Crockett 9-point, vividly showing what happens between the third and fourth set of antlers.

Buck #2: This buck lived the first three years of his life on the same big country enclosure as Buck #1.  In many ways this animal is a testimony to what can happen when age and nutrition work in concert with each other.  When this buck was a yearling it was a spike—the right antler about three inches long and the left four.  At age two its rack was a very symmetrical 8-point with a 13-inch inside spread with about four-five inch-long antler tines.  When it was finished growing bones and muscles at age three the perfect 8-point buck had an inside spread of approximately 18 inches with six- to-seven-inch tines.  At age three this buck had a Boone & Crockett score of 122, approximately the same as Buck #1’s rack at the same age.

However, unlike Buck #1 (which remained living on the big timber country enclosure) Buck#2 was transferred to the farm country enclosure in October of its third year.  For the next 10 months the buck had all the (high octane) foods at its disposal, everything from browse to clover to acorns that were grown in rich soil.  In one year Buck #2 went from an 8 point scoring 122 B&C to a majestic 165.  By contrast Buck #1’s rack increased from three to four years of age but far less than Buck #2’s.

FUEL IS THE KEY

Was the dramatic increase in Buck #2 because of genetics?  It’s doubtful.  Why?  Because in comparing the two animals, the buck that turned out to be the largest from an antler standpoint was never greater than Buck #1 for the first three years of his life.  On top of this, Buck #2 was only a spike (a small one at that) at 1.5 years of age while Buck #1 was an 8 point as a yearling.

Both bucks are very similar from a genetic standpoint.  Also, they were born in the same place although it’s doubtful that they had the same father.  At any rate, they lived in the same type of habitat for the first three years of their life.  So there had to be something else that caused the dramatic jump in antler growth.  Based on these two bucks and several others in our study the reason for the dramatic jump in antler growth was nutrition.  Though there have been a few exceptions in the study the overwhelming conclusion is that nutrition holds the key to antler growth when other factors are equal.

Lest you feel this is an isolated situation, let me reiterate that our findings mirror research that’s been conducted in the past.  For years game managers across America have known that the quality of habitat is an important key to the kind of antlers that can be expected.

HABITAT STARTER

As good as the habitat potential might be its full benefit cannot be reached without water.  Without rain during the critical antler-growing period of April through July habitat cannot possibly provide maximum nutrition.  Let me provide an example.

During the last six years south Texas has seen the good, bad and the ugly when it comes to weather conditions.  In this decade they’ve seen one of the worst droughts to ever hit that region.  A byproduct of this was tremendous destruction of habitat from lack of rain.  During these years game managers were reporting as much as a 20 percent suppression of antler growth because of the loss of habitat brought on by the drought.  The horrendous drought of 1996 was followed with above average rains in 1997.

Thanks to 1997’s rain the south Texas habitat was as lush as ever.  Because of this all kinds of records were broken in 1997 for antler size.  People in this part of the country couldn’t remember a year when antlers looked so good.  On the Retamosa Ranch (where I’ve hunted in the past) owner Heffner Appling killed a buck with a gross Boone & Crockett score of 206 4/8.  Appling’s 186-pound field-dressed buck set a new Muy Grande record with a score of 438 4/8 (based on a combination of body weight and antler measurements), beating the previous record of 402.

Why did all this happen?  In large part because there was an abundance of water during spring and summer which resulted in nutritionally rich food.  Though rainy springs and summers make for lousy vacations it does wonders for outstanding whitetail habitat and antlers.  Liberal amounts of rain makes it all happen.

NUTRITION IS MORE THAN A BUCK THING

While people rave about how nutrition affects antler growth there is another side of the equation.  Although nutrition can be seen in antler growth the effect it has on the doe population is also critical.  During pregnancy and lactation it’s important that a whitetail doe gets a nutritionally balanced diet.

If she doesn’t fawns may get slow starts and be smaller than those born to well-nourished does.  It’s impossible to know for sure but it is possible that Buck #2’s spike antlers as a yearling were in part a result of poor nutrition during the first year of life.

Bucks and does are very picky eaters and will not eat just any kind of food unless they are forced to.  Each region of the country has specific preferred foods to which whitetails gravitate until the source is depleted.  Then, after all the “good stuff” has been devoured, the secondary, less nutritional, food is eaten.  It is thus important that habitat not be destroyed because it may take years of painstaking management to bring it back.

FOLLOW THE FOOD

Whitetails truly are what they eat.  And the key is being able to provide the right fuel.  For healthy fawns to be born and antlers to benefit, nutrition must be a 365-day a year proposition.  It cannot be just a summer food plot thing or a reaction to a winter starvation scene.  If whitetails don’t have a good balanced diet throughout the year the chances for them to “be all they can be” is diminished. 

Having spent more than 30 years in the whitetail game I’m convinced that the reason why Illinois whitetails have bigger racks than those of northern Maine (for example) is far more than genetics.

The Illinois whitetails have the most nutritional food source on planet earth, everything from soybeans to corn to crops grown on highly fertile soils.  This land is capable of producing foods with more than a 20 percent protein content.

On the other hand northern Maine whitetails live in unbroken wilderness where timber stretches as far as the eye can see.  There is no agriculture in this region so the deer there must feed on browse and other native foods, which provide little more than eight to nine percent protein.  So, from Day One bucks in this region are at a disadvantage when it comes to producing antlers like their cousins in Illinois and similar locations.

HOW TO MAKE IT HAPPEN

Obviously to achieve full antler potential a buck must be allowed to live to maturity.  However, this isn’t possible in the real world of whitetail management where the majority of whitetails killed in most states are one or two years of age, with very few reaching the mature ages of three and four.  Even so, nutrition can be used to improve the antlers on all age classes of bucks.

As the previous segment states optimum nutrition has to be a 365-day affair.  A key requirement for the best one to four year old bucks is many good food sources that are available at different times of the year.  For this reason it’s important to have food plots (if this is how you want to feed your deer) containing different varieties of plants that mature at different periods during the year.

If food plots are part of the plan it’s critical to have a soil pH test done on every location to determine the specific soil alkalinity.  There are two ways to do this.  For about $10 your local farm co-op can conduct a detailed soil analysis including its mineral needs, or you can bring a soil sample to your county’s Cooperative Extension for a similarly priced test.  Either way, proper pH is necessary to maximize plant growth.  If you neglect this step you’re likely to be throwing away money on fertilizer and seed.

Ideally, you want a soil pH of seven.  But in parts of the U.S. where the soil is extremely sandy or rocky, that’s out of the question.  At the very least, work at getting your soil pH over six through the use of lime treatments.

If lime is the cornerstone of food plot preparation, fertilizer is the mortar that makes food things happen.  Commercial bags of fertilizer have three numbers on the label, for example “10-10-10”.  The numbers refer to the pounds of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium, respectively, in 100 pounds of fertilizer.  Don’t rely on the local co-op for recommendations on which fertilizer to use—they could try to sell you whatever mixture they’re overstocked with.

Instead, ask the technician who prepares your soil pH test to recommend a fertilizer for whatever type of seed you’ll be planting.

THE BENEFITS OF NUTRITIONAL VARIETY

Early in the study in which I’m involved it was thought that we could simply feed deer “out of the bag” during the winter months to give them the nutrition they needed.  After a couple years we came to the conclusion that bag feed, even though it contained 16-plus percent protein, wasn’t enough.  We realized that balance was the key and started feeding liberal amounts of browse in the winter months (apple, oak, white cedar, soft maple and cherry) in addition to the bagged feed.  During the summer months we also provided the farm country study deer with heavy amounts of browse that was leaf covered.  In addition to forbs and legumes whitetails love the lush leaves from certain trees and at certain times of the year (specifically spring and early summer) leaves provide a very nutritious food source.  After we implemented this there was an improvement in body condition and antler size. 

Obviously the kind of nutrition I’m providing in my study is not possible in the wild.  However, the same principle can be applied by planting food plots and selectively cutting trees during the winter months so deer will have the necessary browse they need.  In addition (where legal) placing mineral licks in strategic locations can provide deer with the minerals and vitamins they need for optimum antler growth.  With this kind of approach your whitetail herd will have the food types they need.

The bottom line to any whitetail nutrition is balance.  By providing a balanced highly nutritional food source antler growth can be as much as 20-25 percent greater—and in some locales more—depending on other variables.  For this reason food plots and nutritional supplements are a viable way of increasing the body and antler size of whitetails wherever they are found.  One thing is certain, only with the aid of good nutrition will your antler expectations ever be met.