We had a miserable winter here too, 5 feet of snow in the fields. But it seems to have worked out to my advantage. Last year we had an absolutley ridiculous number of does & fawns...way more than Ive ever seen before. For every 60-80 does / fawns youd see maybe 1 little buck, next to nothing for mature bucks. This year the numbers of does / fawns is way down. Stands that I was seeing 50 does a night (and 0 bucks) from last year now Im seeing maybe 6 or 8 and lots more bucks. I suspect we lost a lot of the does / fawns and the majority of the healthy bucks survived. I'm sure the mature bucks were there last year, they just didn't have to look for does near as hard cuz they were everywhere.
This year is shaping up to be mighty promising.
I hung a stand this morning right in the middle of about a dozen scrapes and I couldnt count the rubs. Beautiful spot tucked way back in the bush away from the road and no other hunters can set foot in there. Only access is right through his yard. Super excited about that one.
