The weight in the roe deer trophy

[Top Spanish Hunting]

I wanted to comment on the issue of weight when measuring a roe deer trophy. It is well known that this factor is the most important in scoring. I don't know what it will be like there in England, here in Spain we take into account the rosettes, height, pearling, antler color, weight, volume... CIC method.

It is also known that a roe deer trophy hunted at the opening of the season in April does not weigh the same as one hunted during the heat in summer.

Does anyone really know how much this affects? Is there any study of any average or percentage done?

It is also important to emphasize that old roe deer clean the velvet earlier, so they begin to gain weight before the young ones.

Soon I will leave here a trophy roe deer that we hunted a few days ago, a regressive animal about 7/8 years old (I will examine the jaw well to confirm it). It is a roe deer that can easily weigh 600 grams and will have around 170 CIC points. My question is, if I had hunted it in July for example, would this score have changed a lot? He had very nice colour already, nearly perfect, I think at least 1 month witouth velvet.

There are also those who say that what they add in weight is almost subtracted from rubbing and removing pearling and smoothing the horns, I don't know if it is true or not. This particular one has about 8 points, and the pearling is so exaggerated that they look like points too.

 

[ChrisWill184]

For a while I was weighing everything that looked like it might scrape a bronze medal through to gold medals (13 bronze, 2 silver and 2 gold when measured by CIC).

What I was able to gather was that wet weight was always 12 - 13% heavier up to start of June and then after say July, the wet weight reduced to about 10 - 11% heavier than the dry skull weight after 30 days.

It’s not a big range to check from and only in one area (Aberdeenshire) but it’s what I take from it.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

For a while I was weighing everything that looked like it might scrape a bronze medal through to gold medals (13 bronze, 2 silver and 2 gold when measured by CIC).

What I was able to gather was that wet weight was always 12 - 13% heavier up to start of June and then after say July, the wet weight reduced to about 10 - 11% heavier than the dry skull weight after 30 days.

It’s not a big range to check from and only in one area (Aberdeenshire) but it’s what I take from it.

So what you mean, if I understood it correctly, is that the roe deer gain weight in their antlers until summer and during the summer they lose that weight back due to the heat? That is to say, what a roe deer weighs shortly after cleaning its velvet is definitely what it would weigh throughout the entire hunting season?

 

[ChrisWill184]

No. The amount of tree resin, dirt, stuff that it rubbed its antlers on makes a more or less ‘protective coating’. When there is less antler colour due to time the antlers have been clean then the weight reduces more as they dry due to the antler being more porous.

Hence, they reduce less weight in summer time / end of the season as they have typically filled that porosity with dirt.

I am talking a difference in weight of 2 - 3% from start to end of the season (which we no longer have in Scotland) but on bigger animals it could be a CIC point or two. Not a lot but could be frustrating if you only score 129 CIC points!

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

No. The amount of tree resin, dirt, stuff that it rubbed its antlers on makes a more or less ‘protective coating’. When there is less antler colour due to time the antlers have been clean then the weight reduces more as they dry due to the antler being more porous.

Hence, they reduce less weight in summer time / end of the season as they have typically filled that porosity with dirt.

I am talking a difference in weight of 2 - 3% from start to end of the season (which we no longer have in Scotland) but on bigger animals it could be a CIC point or two. Not a lot but could be frustrating if you only score 129 CIC points!

Okay understood! very interesting and makes all the sense in the world. Here in Spain, the formula of 0.25 has been used a lot, which consists of multiplying the weight of the skull of the clean deer with the trophy by 0.25 and recently, with studies of various taxidermies, the conclusion has been reached that it is more accurate to multiply by 0.24 since on average it awarded a few more points with 0,25. It is not an exact formula by any means, but it is easily done and it gives you a "precise" approximation of the roe deer's score.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

I am also certain that the roe deer in the areas of Guadalajara, Soria and Burgos (which is where the best trophies are usually shot) are larger in body than the roe deer you have in England. This affects a lot when it comes to homologation since Spanish roe deer have larger and heavier skulls even though they have developed the same antlers (the latter is generally also better on average in Spain).

 

[Pete6.5]

I wanted to comment on the issue of weight when measuring a roe deer trophy. It is well known that this factor is the most important in scoring. I don't know what it will be like there in England, here in Spain we take into account the rosettes, height, pearling, antler color, weight, volume... CIC method.

It is also known that a roe deer trophy hunted at the opening of the season in April does not weigh the same as one hunted during the heat in summer.

Does anyone really know how much this affects? Is there any study of any average or percentage done?

It is also important to emphasize that old roe deer clean the velvet earlier, so they begin to gain weight before the young ones.

Soon I will leave here a trophy roe deer that we hunted a few days ago, a regressive animal about 7/8 years old (I will examine the jaw well to confirm it). It is a roe deer that can easily weigh 600 grams and will have around 170 CIC points. My question is, if I had hunted it in July for example, would this score have changed a lot? He had very nice colour already, nearly perfect, I think at least 1 month witouth velvet.

There are also those who say that what they add in weight is almost subtracted from rubbing and removing pearling and smoothing the horns, I don't know if it is true or not. This particular one has about 8 points, and the pearling is so exaggerated that they look like points too.

I guess you have cut your head already. I think you gain more points by submitting a full skull rather than cutting it first. I don't think the just out of velvet or fully coloured makes much of a difference in weight but it does make a difference in colour score.

 

[Pete6.5]

I am also certain that the roe deer in the areas of Guadalajara, Soria and Burgos (which is where the best trophies are usually shot) are larger in body than the roe deer you have in England. This affects a lot when it comes to homologation since Spanish roe deer have larger and heavier skulls even though they have developed the same antlers (the latter is generally also better on average in Spain).

What would be your heaviest body buck? I thought England, Scotland and Sweden had the history of producing the biggest trophies.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

I guess you have cut your head already. I think you gain more points by submitting a full skull rather than cutting it first. I don't think the just out of velvet or fully coloured makes much of a difference in weight but it does make a difference in colour score.

Im talking about a full skull. in spain we never cut the skulls.

 

[Pete6.5]

600gram full skull making 170 points?

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

What would be your heaviest body buck? I thought England, Scotland and Sweden had the history of producing the biggest trophies.

The world record has been hunted In spain (252 points). Now there´s another one even bigger hunted last year also world record, but when this record appear some years have to pass before the score become official, altough everyone know they are the new world record.

So spain would have the first and sceond hunted in 3 years difference. A good roebuck year like this one in Spain more than 20 bucks are officially measured above 180 points and here I will say the vast majority of bucks arent officially measured as hunting grounds are public and people dont want other hunters to bid for them.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

600gram full skull making 170 points?

easily weighs 600 grams. That means it would very probably be above that, my guess is 170 points yes.

 

[VSS]

I guess you have cut your head already. I think you gain more points by submitting a full skull rather than cutting it first. I don't think the just out of velvet or fully coloured makes much of a difference in weight but it does make a difference in colour score.

How can cutting the skull make any difference? I thought roe antlers were "weighed" by displacement in water?
Happy to be corrected - I don't know much about scoring.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

This buck for example hunted last year in Spain gave 262 CIC points, its measured in a video and it´s not fake but the owner wont officially measured it so no one bids for his hunting ground. It will be world record. Like this theres many cases in Spain of huge bucks not measured.

 

[sh1kar]

What would be your heaviest body buck? I thought England, Scotland and Sweden had the history of producing the biggest trophies.

Body wise the largest I have shot was c 22kg larder weight (gralloched, head and feet off, skin on)

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

How can cutting the skull make any difference? I thought roe antlers were "weighed" by displacement in water?
Happy to be corrected - I don't know much about scoring.

Yes volume is taken into account but also the clean skull with the antlers weight.

 

[VSS]

Yes volume is taken into account but also the clean skull with the antlers weight.

Thank you

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

What would be your heaviest body buck? I thought England, Scotland and Sweden had the history of producing the biggest trophie

Normally 25-30kg. North of Spain 20-25kg. But theres areas where you hunt 35kg bucks maybe even heavier

 

[Pete6.5]

My experience is that it's not always the biggest bodies that grow the biggest trophies.

 

[Top Spanish Hunting]

My experience is that it's not always the biggest bodies that grow the biggest trophies.

Imeant biggest bodies biggest skulls, and the bone adds lots of weight which directly transfer to more CIC points.