I am the same way - but we dont have booners - a rare 150 maybe - and it is a rare mature deer that even makes 150 here. In my area, the “average” 5.5 yr plus - scores 104. It is easy to tell what 3 yr old has potential. We dont have 100” 3 yr olds add 50” of antlers in a year or two. That means, most of our mature deer will not make 125”. Those are the bucks we shoot the most of. We dont have enough does to feel comfortable shooting one very often. Last year - we killed a 5 yr old 97” 7 pt, a 4 yr old 109” 8 pt and a nice 120” 3 yr old 8 pt my 12 yr old grand daughter killed by herself. That deer had some potential - but no hard feelings with the grand daughter killing it. Did not have a single picture of it until one min before she shot it. We did not kill a doe.
There is a lot more to deer hunting than killing a 150” buck every few years. The excitement after the shot, the tracking, recovery, skinning, cutting up and processing, making sausage, jerky, cooking and eating, the bragging and story telling. There arent enough 150” deer around for everyone to get a taste of it. I see no reason to not utilize these mature bucks that will never have trophy antlers. They can still be dang hard to kill. We have been hunting a deer for the past 3 yrs that is a 6 yr old this year that has been a four pt the last three years. He is a wary son of a gun. None of us has every laid eyes on him - a true trophy.
