My neighbors shoot everything. I lease 40 acres in Allen Parish and to the north and south I have two clubs that are 'brown and down' and they hunt right on the edge of our property. I am wanting to grow big bucks but they keep shooting all my deer I am growing. We have strict rules where deer must be 12" wide and a 6 pt or better unless its a kid's first buck and they can shoot anything. Most my land is cutover and my 2 uncles and I have 5 stands. We feed corn and rice bran all year and have cameras out also. We have 3 food plots of wheat about 1/8 acre each. We have pics in the summer of several does, a spike, a 4 pt, a 6 pt, and a 7 pt and a 'good 8' but only at night. Only one of my uncles bowhunts and we both killed opening day, he shot a doe and I thought I shot at a doe (it was dark) but it was a spike (honest mistake).
Opening day of youth rifle, I brought my kid and my uncle brought his. Both kids saw does eating corn that morning but we were holding out on a buck as they had killed does last year. My kid was able to shoot a 6 pt late that evening. We tracked it but never found it as it went into a slough we couldn't cross.
Opening day of rifle, I had two does under the feeder but holding out for that big 8 we have pics of. My uncles both killed does and one of them shot the 7 pt we had on camera. It was only a basket rack 12" wide but pretty tall.
The rest of the season we hunted hard. Two times we stayed til 10:30 am but never saw that big 8 nor got pics of it. What really chaps me is that the last weekend of rifle, I watched that 4 pt feed under my feeder at daylight and he walked over to the neighbors property line and I heard a shot. I know they shot that little buck
Please tell me how I can go about talking to my neighbors about letting some deer walk so we can get some big genes into our area? And what can I plant on my property this time of year to ensure that the deer have plenty of protein to grow big antlers?
Thanks in advance