Question for guys hunting larger antlered deer…

[Angus 1895]

If you look at the deer in my avatar , I found it freshly hit on the road in Minnesota near a park reserve. It was near Loretta Minnesota.

It had no body fat, no food in the rumen, and it’s large intestine had on fecal nugget about every 18 inches.

The meat smelled like a ketotic dying milk cow. I removed all four legs and gutted it, I needed help lifting the torso onto my flatbed pickup.

Unless this critter had access to “ bird feeders” common to the Mpls metro area. I doubt it would have made the winter.

 

[bueller]

The two top bucks I had consistent pictures of this season have survived. Never saw them in person. Whether their racks gain anything next year remains to be seen but regardless they are shooters for us.

 

[SwampCat]

I go for maturity also,like tonight I have a big 6pt that always bullies other bucks around and he smashed my decoy tonight.I will shoot him the 31st given the chance. I saw the most aggressive buck fight last night between a 150 10pt and a 1 sided buck.I also found a shed tonight in same field that had alot of skull so must have come out in a fight.These bucks aren't acting rutty they are acting aggressive towards other bucks so i can see how right now they could get severely injured

Our primary and secondary ruts have been over for three weeks. Have the buck pictures I get are of fighting bucks. I have never seen so much buck fighting this late in the year. It does seem like I have a larger than normal buck population on my place this year. I have more shooters now than I did at start of season

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

Our deer generally blow up when growing their third rack. We try to get them to four years old or older before harvesting but sometimes mistakes are made and they get shot at three. There is a much better chance that a given buck makes it to four years old than it is for us to harvest them.

 

[Tree Spud]

I think both really apply. The number 1 rule I have learned about mature trophy class bucks is that once you think you have them figured out, things will change. They don't reach that age by being predictable.

My property will hold and produce 160" plus class bucks. I have watched several grow up over 2-4 year periods. We focus on hunting 4 & 5 year bucks and getting a buck to 5 years old is a challenge even under the best circumstances. These are typically bucks that call our place home as there is an abundance of bedding, cover, food, & water. They have everything they need; however, they do wander to neighboring properties for feeding.

If you are going to target a buck that you have been watching for several years, I think the best approach is early season when they have developed some type of pattern you can identify. When i say early season, that would be the 1st couple of weeks for bow season which is in Sept for us. As you start to move towards mid October, their habits along with many other variables begin to affect their behavior. You also have hunting pressure increase and more neighbors chasing the same buck you are chasing.

Once that mature 4-5 year buck is off the board, you either need to have another somewhat unknown buck of equivalent character age and rack size replace him, or wait for one of those 3-4 years old to make that jump. I have watched via game cam pics when the mature home property buck (s) are moving, and then you will see a really good or even better buck come through in the same pattern that you did not know about. Sometimes it comes down to just being in the right place at the right time ... and a little bit of luck.