At the turn of the 20th Century, many southern states had whitetail herds not large enough to support hunting; Tennessee even reported it basically had no deer at all. (G&F file photo)
August 06, 2024
By Colin Moore
Nobody remembers exactly when or where Dow Gilmore killed the whitetail, but the shoulder mount of the buck is still on the wall at King’s Outdoors in Chipley, Fla. It would probably score in the low 150s, big for a deer in a state where most hunters settle for far less. One thing everyone is sure about is that Gilmore, who co-owned King’s for most of his adult life, tagged the 10-point buck while hunting with hounds somewhere in northwestern Florida’s sandhills.
Though the rack was never measured according to Boone and Crockett Club standards, those who saw it regarded it as the biggest whitetail the Panhandle had produced up to that time. And anyone who knew anything about deer hunting accepted as gospel that Gilmore’s buck wasn’t born in Florida, but rather in Wisconsin.
How might a deer from the upper Midwest wind up in Florida’s Panhandle? Although unlikely, it was possible. Gilmore, who died in 2014 at the age of 73, downed the buck during an era when wildlife managers were trying to revive the Sunshine State’s deer herd by importing whitetails, some of which came from Wisconsin, a state famous for its big-bodied bucks with heavy racks. It’s no coincidence that the “Jordan Buck,” a previous world record, came from Wisconsin, as did thousands of other typical bucks listed in the Boone and Crockett Club (B&C) record book.
Florida wasn’t the only Southern state that looked to the Badger State for whitetails with high-octane DNA. For obvious reasons, hunters wanted Wisconsin bucks in their woods. And as implausible as it might have seemed, even game managers and conservationists thought they could turn around declining deer numbers in their respective states by infusing native deer with superior genes. They had everything to gain and not much to lose, and their efforts produced results.
Advertisement
CATASTROPHIC COLLAPSE At the dawn of the 20th century, Southern whitetail populations in most areas were at the point of collapse. Wildlife managers in some states estimated populations in the hundreds, rather than the hundreds of thousands as they are today. Even the sight of deer tracks was a cause of wonderment for hunters who grew up in a region with fabulous deer habitat but few deer.
Several factors played a role in the decline of deer stocks in the South, principally poaching, overly generous bag limits (or none at all), no closed seasons and scant law enforcement. Though whitetails are among the hardiest and most prolific mammals on the planet, human predation in the U.S. was such that deer populations couldn’t hold their own, much less thrive. Between 1890 and 1900, for instance, the state of Tennessee reported it had no deer, for all practical purposes. In other states, meanwhile, whitetails were too scarce to support hunting seasons.
By the turn of the 20th century, the deer population had dropped precipitously from an estimated 30 million animals during the Colonial period to about 300,000 in the entire country, according to the U.S. Biological Survey (today’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ). Most of the deer left in the South were concentrated along the Gulf Coast and in the more remote reaches of the Appalachian and Ozark Mountains, as well as the more densely forested uplands of Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.
Advertisement
THE BIG TURNAROUND Hunting was a major culprit of the rapid decline of Southern deer, but it was also the cause of its resurgence. Perhaps most important was the proliferation of hunting ethics. Men who had grown up in poverty and once hunted to provide food for their families became more affluent, and deer hunting gradually took on greater significance as a sport than a means of putting meat on the table. In Southern states, hunters began to clamor for healthy deer populations, and the era of hunting clubs began.
In response to hunters and conservationists, states with few regulations affecting deer harvests started to implement and enforce them. Part of the general plan was to also “reseed” deer in areas with healthy pockets of native whitetails or where habitat would have been able to nourish newly introduced animals.
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES Those well-intentioned efforts produced unexpected results—both good and bad. Funding was an issue at first, as most states didn’t earmark money from general funds for conservation programs. Hunting and fishing license sales carried most of the burden, and even that money was occasionally diverted elsewhere by politicians.
In 1937, the Pittman-Robertson Federal Act in Wildlife Restoration Act was passed, signaling a major change in conservation efforts. The federal law established an 11 percent excise tax on sporting firearms and ammunition to be used only for projects benefitting fish and wildlife. As an incentive, states that complied with the new law began to receive federal dollars based on the number of hunting and fishing licenses they sold.
Deer restoration was at the top of everyone’s list. States began to trap whitetails from one region and release them in another. Some wildlife agencies restocked with deer from other states if only because native whitetails available for relocation were scarce. As most hunters who grew up in the 1960s and 70s can verify, it didn’t take long for a few deer stocked in the right habitat to become a herd.
Some states didn’t require help. Wisconsin, for one, had no need to import deer, and its second-growth forests became a ready source of whitetails for other states. Eventually, more than 4,000 Wisconsin deer were stocked elsewhere, mainly in the Southeast.
DNA CUTS BOTH WAYS Although the main purpose of early restocking programs was not to develop super bucks but to reverse the decline of whitetails, biologists also wanted to match deer to available habitat so they would reach the genetic potential apparent by their body size and antler development. Nevertheless, well aware of Wisconsin bucks’ mythical status due precisely to their heft and rack size, biologists opted to stock deer of impressive dimensions certain to score highly with the hunting community. The ensuing years, however, would prove that soil and habitat composition will trump deer genetics, which many hunters see as a reasonable rationale for stocking big bucks from outside their natural range.
In the past few decades, researchers found compelling evidence that a deer’s genetic background plays a role, for better or worse. For instance, deer from outside a region might be susceptible to diseases such as Blue Tongue or Chronic Wasting Disease . In a study of 5,659 whitetails conducted in various Georgia counties from 2011 to 2014, researchers led by Dr. Karl Miller of the University of Georgia’s Deer Laboratory found that some bucks were prone to a virulent cranial abscess similar to those found in bucks and does from Sandhill Game Farms (now Sandhill Wildlife Area) in Wisconsin. More than 600 whitetails from the game farm were stocked in Georgia in 1962, and decades later their genetic propensity to serve as hosts for cranial abscesses is still apparent.
“When we did the survey, we found that bucks in nine of 11 sites where Wisconsin deer were stocked developed cranial abscesses, while bucks from Georgia and Texas stocked in other areas of Georgia weren’t affected,” says Dr. Miller. “The obvious conclusion is that the genes of some Wisconsin bucks and does carrying a virulent strain of bacteria wound up in Georgia. Every time you move a deer, you’re dealing with a whole genetic package that has its good points but also some that are bad. That includes disease and parasites.”
GENETICS MISHMASH The Florida Big Buck Registry , created in 1982 to keep tabs on bucks that score more than 160 points (typical), currently lists five entries. Three of them came from northern Florida counties. The biggest, which scored 168 1/8, was taken in 1977 in the Panhandle’s Gadsden County.
Florida’s rut is typical of Southern states where deer from far-flung places were translocated. In southern Florida, it runs from late July through August. In the northern and central areas, it takes place in October and November. And in the extreme northwest reaches, it’s in February. Biologists think latitudinal and longitudinal changes are partially responsible, but differences in habitat and nutrition also play a part. Genetics factor as well, as whitetails from seven other states—including Wisconsin—were stocked in the Sunshine State and left their genetic footprints, however faint.
“So many deer were moved around between so many places, [there was] such a mishmash of deer,” says Dr. Miller describing the genetic anomalies resulting from the multi-generational diaspora.
MYSTERY BUCK The researcher’s remarks bring us back to Dow Gilmore’s buck. Was it a Wisconsin whitetail released in Georgia that perhaps came south? Probably not. It was definitely not part of the first generation stocked in the Peach State in 1944 and 1945, but could it have come from the second batch of 591 Wisconsin whitetails released in southwestern Georgia in 1962? Some of these could have filtered down to the Florida Panhandle, which isn’t that far away, or interbred with native deer and produced a line—albeit a short one—of superior whitetails.
Surely, Gilmore must have felt some satisfaction knowing it was he who tagged the big buck with the impressive rack that still hangs on the wall of a store in Chipley, Fla. It certainly gave fellow Panhandle hunters something to marvel at and aspire to. But like a lot of dust-covered racks adorning the walls of hunting camps, bars and pool halls across the region, Gilmore’s trophy represents more than the result of one hunt. It’s also an example of the success of early efforts to return whitetails to the South, for what Southern hunters owe Wisconsin a tip of the hat.
POPULATION BOOSTS Tallies and origins of whitetails stocked in Southern states In 1993, the Quality Deer Management Association and the D.B. Warnell School of Forest Resources at the University of Georgia produced A History of White-Tailed Deer Restocking , a book co-authored by J. Scott McDonald and Dr. Karl V. Miller, tracing deer restoration from 1878 to 2004. Overall, about 3,000 Wisconsin whitetails (O. borealis) were stocked throughout the South, with Tennessee (662) the primary recipient. But efforts to reestablish or boost existing deer populations differed from state to state.
North Carolina’s restocking program began in 1890 in what would become the Pisgah Game Preserve. Over time, 3,319 whitetails, mostly in-state specimens, were used to bolster declining populations. In South Carolina, all restocked deer were trapped and relocated within the state. Florida stocked deer from seven states, including 616 from Wisconsin. Georgia also used deer from other states, including Wisconsin and Texas. In Alabama, where stocking began in 1926, 3,176 in-state deer have been relocated, along with 579 from out of state. In Arkansas, seven subspecies have been stocked; 2,702 were in-state deer and less than 100 came from elsewhere. Mississippi imported 850 whitetails from Wisconsin and 358 from other states between 1931 and 1980. Louisiana relocated nearly 2,500 native deer between 1949 and 1990, plus 559 from Wisconsin and Texas. Oklahoma relied on native deer for most of its relocation efforts involving 8,956 deer. And Texas, where the whitetail population is 4 million strong, has never acquired deer from out of state.
This article was featured in the South edition of the June-July 2024 issue of Game & Fish magazine. Click to subscribe .
