I usually try and hold out till after I've shot my buck to shoot does. I hunt in states that you can shoot 2-4 does in a year though. I agree though as long as you're happy with it a doe is just as good. For younger hunters its really a confidence booster to harvest a couple does prior to taking a big buck.

It's all depends on what your after...that's a very broad question!

Ya can't eat horns. I try to take a limit of doe's when I can.

Hey guys....yeah, I usually try to hold out, too. This year, though, I held out and am staring at an empty freezer. NOT a very good feeling. Next year will be a different ballgame.

big bucks are ok but the young bucks & yearlins' have the best meat

I always take the first legal deer I see, and will follow the laws of the state I am hunting in, if more are allowed I will do whatever to legally fill my freezer, which this year, alas, is devoid of any venison. I do like the smaller does, because they are much more tender and taste so good.

I think shooting does creates a good balance in herd ratio. Besides does are just as much of a challange as bucks are to shoot.Sometimes does are a little more cautious. At times it may seem easier to hunt does, but most times there are more chances at does because they out number the bucks. Thinning the doe ratio would make bucks work harder and move more if it was harder for them to find a doe to mate. If we had an unlimited supply of females roaming our homes us guys would never leave the house to look lol. If more people would let bucks grow up there would be more trophies to hunt. The problem in the area I hunt in is there is not a lot of large tracks of land to hunt on. My spot is only 50 acers. So when I let a young buck go the surrounding hunters shoot them. So if you can, shoot the does and let the bucks mature. My buddies and I make up our own buck contest with a $10 entry fee for the biggest buck. This seems to alow a lot of smaller bucks grow up. It seems that most bucks don't get any rack size until they are 4-5 years plus.I agree, a freezer with doe meat is better than none.

We have a small plot of land in West Virginia and we shot every buck that walked by and occasionaly shot does. About seven years ago one of our neighbors started shooting does and laid off the bucks. About three years ago we started seeing bigger bucks and we killed some of the biggest bucks in 20 years of hunting this property. Last year we started our own antler restrictions and told the guys to shoot does. We had the hardest time trying to convince them to shoot does. In the end we told them to shoot only big bucks and does or don't bother coming up. This year we didn't shoot any bucks but we did manage to fill our freezers with does. We also donated several does to the local food bank.

I always shoot two or three does. I haven't bought ground beef in the past thirty years. It's legal here to shoot a doe a day for the whole season, gun and bow, (mid Oct. to the end of Jan.) which I think is far to liberal, but I'm not the one they asked when they made the rules.

I hunt on public land and dont see as many deer as most will but so I would take a doe but usually hold off 'til later in the season.

A book I wrote in 2004 explains just about everything you can do with a deer carcass in addition to butchering and cooking the venison. The title is "MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR DEER" (retail $16.95, pub. by Stackpole Books, 252 pages, with many photographs and sketches. You can order it at any bookstore, see it at www.amazon.com, or buy it direct from me. See details at www.denniswalrod.com in the My Books section. In addition to butchering and cooking, I tell how to mount antlers, tan hides, making sausage, antlercraft, making hand-soap from the tallow, tying fishing lures from the hair, and so on. I also wrote a book titled "ANTLERS: A GUIDE TO COLLECTING, SCORING, MOUNTING, AND CARVING" that is availble at the same sources shown above.