Will wild horses cause deer to abandon an area?
Filed under: Miscellaneous
We hunt in SE Oklahoma, just north of Hugo. Our area is in the foothills so the landscape is rolling and heavily wooded with post oak, red oak, elm, white oak, and pin oak. This year we have a solid acorn crop for the deer, and we have planted some very small food plots in various natural openings in the canopy. One thing we are contending with in regards to our food sources is wild horses and I am wondering how we deal with this as we start looking at trying to measure our deer population after this season. The horses are grazing in our plots and eating at our feeders that we set out. To the extent that we didn’t see any deer on our cameras….only horses and pigs. We do see some deer sign but not as much fresh sign as in the past. I didn’t see any new rubs this year nor any new or active scrapes. It makes me think the deer have moved off to other areas due to the horses. Thanks in advance and I enjoy the wealth of information you provide. God bless and have a great hunting season.
Regards,
Scott Tullos
Scott,
I used to work around wild horses in Nevada. They were fun to watch but did a lot of damage! They destroyed browse in that desert environment and literally sealed springs shut by trampling.
I suspect the wild horses are attracted to the feeders and food plots and will dominate them. Wild horses have very few predators and have no reason to abandon quality food sources that are easy to obtain. You might try using electric fences to protect the food plots. However, horses tend to walk through most types of smaller fences. A better technique may be to stop feeding and see if the horses will leave and seek an easier food source.
Deer rarely leave their home range. They will readily shift to a different part of their range to avoid danger. Horses typically have a much larger home range and I suspect they will move on once the easy food sources are removed.
Enjoy creation,
grant
