Realistic expectations

Howboutthemdawgs

5 year old buck +
Just listed a piece of property. Talked to two folks in the last week who were interested. Good people, but both mentioned the same thing when we spoke. They are interested in 150’s or better type deer. Look I get it! Me too. As anyone knows I’m as trophy minded as they come. In my perfect world 150’s are getting a pass. I’ve owned land in western ky for 7 years covering 4 properties. I’ve seen exactly one deer out of the stand that would go 150 and I killed it. I’ve had a handful on camera over that timeframe but maybe talking single digits.
It brings me to my point. Expecting 150” deer consistently on smaller pieces of property for 99% of the country is not realistic. We have all the ingredients except restraint but regardless it’s the reason. There’s not one deer on my listing that’s 150”…I’m honest when I tell them it’s doable but probably not an every year thing. I wish more people had the mindset to aim high but I also get the impression a) a lot of people don’t know what a 150 is and b) even more people crap their pants when a 140 walks out.
 
I’ve bow hunted an excellent 200 acre farm in SE WI surrounded by even larger properties for the last 13 years. Neighbors all claim to pass bucks and want to shoot 150’s.

I haven’t seen more than a handful of legit 150’s alive or dead in those years….but I can’t even guess the number of 125-135 bucks taken in the area in that time. It’s in the dozens.

My point? Even in some of the best areas around, darn few people pass a good shot on a 130” buck. It’s pretty hard to expect 99% of all hunters to pass a bigger buck than they’ve ever seen. IMO.
 
A guy I work with 28 years old has shot some nice bucks around here all on private, maybe five or six in the high 140's-low 150's all with a bow. He lives in the same county I do, every year a half dozen nice booners are killed here, I've seen a few on the hoof in the last couple years, so there is potential.
He bought a 180-acre farm in Illinois three years ago totally expecting to kill booners every year...so far he has killed a couple nice 150's bucks and see's similar on his property but he isn't happy with it and put it up for sale. Says he is buying land in Iowa and wants to move there one day...where he can kill booners.

I think all these hunting shows have created unreal expectations for a lot of people.
 
A guy I work with 28 years old has shot some nice bucks around here all on private, maybe five or six in the high 140's-low 150's all with a bow. He lives in the same county I do, every year a half dozen nice booners are killed here, I've seen a few on the hoof in the last couple years, so there is potential.
He bought a 180-acre farm in Illinois three years ago totally expecting to kill booners every year...so far he has killed a couple nice 150's bucks and see's similar on his property but he isn't happy with it and put it up for sale. Says he is buying land in Iowa and wants to move there one day...where he can kill booners.

I think all these hunting shows have created unreal expectations for a lot of people.
He's likely going to be disappointed in Iowa too. There are very few farms in the country producing booners every year. Even less that are sub 200 acres.
 
100% my opinion - and I can only speak for myself and my area - which would be way down the list of potential trophy areas, but I hear SO MANY hunters managing for quality (trophy deer for here) who blame their neighbors on shooting all the 125/135” deer - which they do shoot a lot.- and again - speaking of my area - I had nine mature bucks on my properties last year that I guessed - or had past history with - that were at least five years old and none of them would have scored 150 - and never will. Most would not have broke 140. The two we killed scored upper 130’s and 108 I believe. Not nearly about all the deer will ever make 150 - even if they died of old age. I had one additional younger deer - 3 or 4 yr old - that was probably close to 140. Out of ten deer - one has a chance of making a 150.

I live for my family and to manage my ground. One of the pinnacles of my success is to grow a 150” deer on “my”’400 acres. I say on my 400 acres, knowing that deer would probably be visiting at least 20 other properties during the course of season. Many of these folks own less land than I do. As much as I would like all my area neighbors to pass every mature deer for me and my hunters to shoot or pass - I also dont feel it is realistic to think folks who own 50 or 80 acres of land, with kids, wives, granddads, and grandkids hunting - should pass every potential trophy buck. There is so much more to deer hunting than a set of antlers.

About 15 years ago - I was strictly a bow hunter, detested crossbows and bait, dog runners were the devil. Even contacted our G&F quite a bit - to the point the state deer bio and his assistant and the area biologist all came over to my place one day for a look around. They even admitted there were some regulation short comings - but were quite adamant they could not set perfect regulations for every corner of every county. They told me I should probably develop more reasonable expectations.

I still fought it for a few years, I retired and moved to my land, and also started having a grand daughter or two get interested in hunting. My views started to change a little bit also. It became blatantly obvious to me, what I had been wanting, was my land to be enclosed in a vacuum - immune from outside activities - totally affected by my hand only. It was like hitting in a batting cage where I controlled the pitching machine.

It became obvious to me that a much greater accomplishment was to grow that rare big deer in an uncontrolled environment. Where I had 15 adjacent land owners - many of whom were hunting for meat - a 2 yr old and 5 yr old buck was all the same in their eyes. Baiting was the standard. A crossbow at the back door to take that back yard buck. All the same if old Fido ran a deer through the yard. If you produce quality bucks in this environment, you have done something. You got out of the batting cage and stepped up to the plate with Nolan Ryan pitching.


I have embraced that attitude - and I enjoy my land and hunting much more. I take it as a challenge. I think a lot of land owners are not realistic about what their land will produce because they have this idea going in what they can make of their land if they stay in the batting cage - but fail to ACCEPT in a real game, there are pitchers throwing 100 mph, bad hops, seeing eye singles, bad calls - all these things totally outside your control.

Be realistic about what you can control and dont worry so much about what you cant - it is all part of the playing field.
 
Since 2013 we have shot the following on my 100 acre farm:
164 5/8
157 (after the tax man fixed a broken tine. 154 without the repair)
167 7/8
186 2/8
151
We passed a deer that someone else shot later that scored 148 or 149
We have passed a couple of young ones in the high 130s or low 140s
We killed about 3 or 4 mature deer in the high 120s to mid 130s
In 2022 I had a 170ish that we found dead in the food plot. Only visible injury was a really bad foot. Probably blood poisoning.
Last year I had a deer we estimated in the 170s gross, but we didn't get him. He survived season but no sight of him this year so far.

One year on my 20 acre place I had a bachelor group with 3 deer in the 160s. A trespasser came in ginseng hunting and that was it for them.
Year before last I had a mid to high 160 on the 20 acre place as well. When the corn was picked the deer disappeared. I almost had a clean shot the evening before but didn't want to risk hitting a corn stalk with an arrow and making a bad shot.
 
100% my opinion - and I can only speak for myself and my area - which would be way down the list of potential trophy areas, but I hear SO MANY hunters managing for quality (trophy deer for here) who blame their neighbors on shooting all the 125/135” deer - which they do shoot a lot.- and again - speaking of my area - I had nine mature bucks on my properties last year that I guessed - or had past history with - that were at least five years old and none of them would have scored 150 - and never will. Most would not have broke 140. The two we killed scored upper 130’s and 108 I believe. Not nearly about all the deer will ever make 150 - even if they died of old age. I had one additional younger deer - 3 or 4 yr old - that was probably close to 140. Out of ten deer - one has a chance of making a 150.

I live for my family and to manage my ground. One of the pinnacles of my success is to grow a 150” deer on “my”’400 acres. I say on my 400 acres, knowing that deer would probably be visiting at least 20 other properties during the course of season. Many of these folks own less land than I do. As much as I would like all my area neighbors to pass every mature deer for me and my hunters to shoot or pass - I also dont feel it is realistic to think folks who own 50 or 80 acres of land, with kids, wives, granddads, and grandkids hunting - should pass every potential trophy buck. There is so much more to deer hunting than a set of antlers.

About 15 years ago - I was strictly a bow hunter, detested crossbows and bait, dog runners were the devil. Even contacted our G&F quite a bit - to the point the state deer bio and his assistant and the area biologist all came over to my place one day for a look around. They even admitted there were some regulation short comings - but were quite adamant they could not set perfect regulations for every corner of every county. They told me I should probably develop more reasonable expectations.

I still fought it for a few years, I retired and moved to my land, and also started having a grand daughter or two get interested in hunting. My views started to change a little bit also. It became blatantly obvious to me, what I had been wanting, was my land to be enclosed in a vacuum - immune from outside activities - totally affected by my hand only. It was like hitting in a batting cage where I controlled the pitching machine.

It became obvious to me that a much greater accomplishment was to grow that rare big deer in an uncontrolled environment. Where I had 15 adjacent land owners - many of whom were hunting for meat - a 2 yr old and 5 yr old buck was all the same in their eyes. Baiting was the standard. A crossbow at the back door to take that back yard buck. All the same if old Fido ran a deer through the yard. If you produce quality bucks in this environment, you have done something. You got out of the batting cage and stepped up to the plate with Nolan Ryan pitching.


I have embraced that attitude - and I enjoy my land and hunting much more. I take it as a challenge. I think a lot of land owners are not realistic about what their land will produce because they have this idea going in what they can make of their land if they stay in the batting cage - but fail to ACCEPT in a real game, there are pitchers throwing 100 mph, bad hops, seeing eye singles, bad calls - all these things totally outside your control.

Be realistic about what you can control and dont worry so much about what you cant - it is all part of the playing field.
That’s mostly my point. I have a small sample size, but if the two guys that are interested are both expecting the un-expectable (new word) it’s probably a very prevalent mindset.
The one difference is my area could absolutely support it. We have everything they need. Abundant corn, beans, wheat, even some alfalfa, big woods with a lot of hard and soft mast, topography, etc. I have seen Illinois and Iowa and ne Missouri; we have all they have and maybe even an environmenta advantage or two. What we also have is corn piles and rifles and crossbows and proximity to millions of people….thats our handicap to 150’s on small properties regularly.
 
Since 2013 we have shot the following on my 100 acre farm:
164 5/8
157 (after the tax man fixed a broken tine. 154 without the repair)
167 7/8
186 2/8
151
We passed a deer that someone else shot later that scored 148 or 149
We have passed a couple of young ones in the high 130s or low 140s
We killed about 3 or 4 mature deer in the high 120s to mid 130s
In 2022 I had a 170ish that we found dead in the food plot. Only visible injury was a really bad foot. Probably blood poisoning.
Last year I had a deer we estimated in the 170s gross, but we didn't get him. He survived season but no sight of him this year so far.

One year on my 20 acre place I had a bachelor group with 3 deer in the 160s. A trespasser came in ginseng hunting and that was it for them.
Year before last I had a mid to high 160 on the 20 acre place as well. When the corn was picked the deer disappeared. I almost had a clean shot the evening before but didn't want to risk hitting a corn stalk with an arrow and making a bad shot.
That’s obviously phenomenal but it’s also the anomaly.
 
In my experience the 99.9% guys wanting to shoot a 150" buck will shoot a 130". And I'm talking about in midwest areas that can indeed grow 150" bucks. There are plenty of places where a 130 is the buck of a lifetime. That I get too.
 
That’s mostly my point. I have a small sample size, but if the two guys that are interested are both expecting the un-expectable (new word) it’s probably a very prevalent mindset.
The one difference is my area could absolutely support it. We have everything they need. Abundant corn, beans, wheat, even some alfalfa, big woods with a lot of hard and soft mast, topography, etc. I have seen Illinois and Iowa and ne Missouri; we have all they have and maybe even an environmenta advantage or two. What we also have is corn piles and rifles and crossbows and proximity to millions of people….thats our handicap to 150’s on small properties regularly.
I agree 100%. I been right there with you for ten long years. Bow only. No bait. No rifle. Talked to all the neighbors and tried to get them to buy in. A lot said they would -‘and last week of season they would shoot a 125. Or they would tell me - I couldnt make little susie pass that 130” deer. But you have to. It doesnt matter who is shooting the deer, the end result is that deer wont ever be a 150. That is the point - you have to get everyone to play your game. for that to happen - everyone has to buy into what you want.

I have an across the road neighbor. He understood - he high fenced his 1400 acres. Said it was still a lot harder to grow a trophy caliber deer than he thought it was going to be
 
I'm in the same boat in MN as what you describe in KY, Dawgs. My limit in MN is 140" and I'm almost 11 years at my home place there have probably been 4 or 5 bucks that even clip 140 and only one or two that break 150. My property down the road has nicer class deer on it and can probably add 10-20" to those numbers but those deer are still few and far between. It has led to tag soup for me in MN the majority of the time since I started hunting with those guidelines.

Part of the fun for me is building the properties up to see what the ultimate potential can be, I think in a few years I will be closer to a 140" harvest potential annually in MN.

WI is another story and why I've continued to invest more time and money over there. More topography, bigger tracts, better season structure all equals bigger deer.
 
You can talk to your neighbors and get all the agreements you want on holding off on smaller deer (<140"), but when the sun rises on opening morning, all bets & agreements are off. The 125-135" guys are going down.

I've had at least 3 160" - 180" deer on my property last 5 years. Have watched each of them as the went from 3 yo to 5 yo. Two of them were wounded with a bow by my fence sitting neighbors, and they disappeared, both neighbors have wounded multiple bucks that came off my property. The other one wandered to a neighboring property and was harvested. Having said that, a 150" + buck is still a big deal.

Having trophy class bucks on your property is one thing, getting yourself in the right position to take one is another thing. keeping them on your property is even tougher task.

Like stated above, my goal is greater than 140" and a 4-5 yo deer, I eat tag soup quite often. The other challenge I previously faced was limited stand time. When the neighbors can walk out there door and be in their stand in 20 minutes any time or day of the week, tough to compete with that.

Setting realistic expectations, especially when you are are trophy focused ( I am also) is hard. You need to balance setting challenging goals, but still having fun with the hunting.
 
Last year was the exception, but normally we have pictures, mostly at night, of a 150 class buck. I hope last year was the anomaly where we didn’t have anything mature at all. Tracts around me are smaller and smaller, things are only getting tougher. I can hope to get a crack at a 150 twice a decade at best.


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We've killed a 187, 167, 160, and a 150 off our 63 acres along with a few other 4.5+ yr old lower scoring bucks. Our neighbors constantly say, we wish we could shoot big ones like you and say they are gonna pass the 2.5 and 3.5 year olds but every year it's the same story, we'll he looked big coming in or I gotta feed the family. It gets old when every year they claim they are gonna pass deer and never do.
It used to be we would have at least 1 buck over 150 to hunt but last year we didn't have one and this year we don't even have a buck on camera that will be close. I guess that's what happens when 23 bucks get shot within 2 miles of our land last fall.
 
I think a huge part of the equation which it seems a lot of people tend to overlook is age versus score. For example, last year, I had pictures of nine different bucks that I was pretty dang sure were at least 5.5 year old deer - and none of them would have broke 150 - a couple would have been low 140. I live in an area where the average 5.5 yr old deer scores right at 115. That is extrapolated from a few check stations, DMAP records, locker plants, etc. From the years of hunting my place, I would have said the average 5.5 yr old deer would have been closer to 120 - but the 115 figure might be right on - including inferior bucks, broke antlered deer, etc.

Point being, if I lived in Iowa, Illinois, or KY - instead of the piney woods of south AR, we might have multiple 150’s on our property each year. A better question might be, how many 5.5 yr old bucks do you have on your property each year - or if you had ten 5.5 yr old bucks using your property - how many of them would you expect to score 150. I would say if I had ten mature bucks using my land, there would be a 50/50 chance one would scratch 150.

I get the impression that a lot of folks are short on mature bucks. I feel I have a realistic number of mature bucks - but it is a true anomaly of a buck that scores 150 even as a mature buck. And saying that, we probably have more liberal deer hunting regulations than 90% of the people on this forum.
 
A better question might be, how many 5.5 yr old bucks do you have on your property each year

I'm going to guess it was zero last year. I'd give it 30% chance that one buck I had 3 pics of and the neighbor shot was 5.5. Next best was probably a 3.5 with mediocre antlers but he made it through season last year and is in trouble if I get a shot at him this year; mediocre antlers and all.
 
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Murphy's law pretty much sums up my bagging anything big. I've seen several big racks over the years. I use to put in a lot more effort when I was younger but now I'm just enjoying being out there and shooting a nice buck would just be a bonus. I keep passing smaller deer and have wound up with tag soup the majority of the last 15 years but I'm ok with it. Someday!
 
I always thought as long as you had a good amount of ag around, a buck with good genetics could reach 150+ if given age.
Where we are at in South central Wisconsin, ag is all over and thus we see bigger bucks. One thing that I can't quite wrap my head around is how northern Wisconsin used to crank out giants every year. Now you don't hear or see many giants being taken. I know wolves are an issue and their is less deer around but back in the mid 1900s, their wasn't many deer then either.
 
I think a huge part of the equation which it seems a lot of people tend to overlook is age versus score. For example, last year, I had pictures of nine different bucks that I was pretty dang sure were at least 5.5 year old deer - and none of them would have broke 150 - a couple would have been low 140. I live in an area where the average 5.5 yr old deer scores right at 115. That is extrapolated from a few check stations, DMAP records, locker plants, etc. From the years of hunting my place, I would have said the average 5.5 yr old deer would have been closer to 120 - but the 115 figure might be right on - including inferior bucks, broke antlered deer, etc.

Point being, if I lived in Iowa, Illinois, or KY - instead of the piney woods of south AR, we might have multiple 150’s on our property each year. A better question might be, how many 5.5 yr old bucks do you have on your property each year - or if you had ten 5.5 yr old bucks using your property - how many of them would you expect to score 150. I would say if I had ten mature bucks using my land, there would be a 50/50 chance one would scratch 150.

I get the impression that a lot of folks are short on mature bucks. I feel I have a realistic number of mature bucks - but it is a true anomaly of a buck that scores 150 even as a mature buck. And saying that, we probably have more liberal deer hunting regulations than 90% of the people on this forum.

9 bucks at 5.5 yo is amazing. I usually have 1 or maybe 2 5.5 yo on the property. Typically at least one of those will call our property home for several years due to bedding, great sanctuary, food & water. They will start to wander as the rut approaches. If i had 9-10 5.5 yo olds on the property, I would be probably be on YouTube as one of the talking head experts LOL!!! 🤣

I agree with you that age & rack size do not correlate. Hitting 150 and above requires the genetics, soil nutrients, food sources, good sanctuary with minimal disruption. Many bucks don't have the genetics to get 150 or bigger. When you have 9 pointers, you lose a lot of score. Takes a solid 10 pt to get to 150 and above, both with mass and height.

You then throw in rut stress, hard winters up here for us, predators, poaching, and hunters taking a significant number of 2-3 yo and the pool gets smaller, and genetics aren't allowed to be realized. It takes a very smart buck to get through the war zone here to get to 4.5 - 5.5. that

In one of my discussions with Steve Bartylla who I respect alot as being very reasonable in his assessment, said that 140 class buck is a good buck and that some bucks in the north will actually start to go downhill after 5.5 up north. he also concurred that the right conditions & genetics need to be in place to crack that 150 mark.
 
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