Matt / PA

I think to put it in the simplest of terms........if you treat ALL deer EVERYWHERE with the assumption that they are pressured, skitish,paranoid, creatures of habit and hunt them carefully and according to weather and wind you'll be successful to some degree.......what animals are available to you is then dictated by where you are.

I hunt these PA deer like a frckin' Ninja and am still lucky to see a decent 2.5yr old buck where I hunt. I take that same skill set to somewhere where there are more deer, more mature deer.......more target animals and it seems like a piece of cake to shoot that same 2.5yr old and now I'm in the game for 3.5yr old deer and up without changing a thing about how I hunt.

I sincerely think hunting pressured deer and the tactics it takes to kill even average bucks in these places prepares you quite nicely to hunt a place like the midwest. From my experiences at least ,even if you are hunting pressured deer on public ground in Illinois it is still a breath of fresh air from pressured ground in a state like PA.
Then when someone like me finds himself on decent private ground in Illinois I feel like I've died and gone to Deersyneyland, and cannot fathom why everyone doesn't kill a P&Y buck every other year at least.

ICALL2MUCH

Not implying anything. But, I don't see how Steve's post would matter, if I was implying anything.

What is your perception of a 115" deer in your state, comparable to one in IL?

jnrbronc

Alright, I live and hunt in Iowa and haven't gone outside Iowa since '91 (Wisc hunt).

There are good and bad parts of the state.

I hunt (average) private ground (I own half, in-laws own the other half) and have been pretty lucky. Then again, I've hunted this ground for 20 years and I'm getting it figured out.

Hunting has changed dramatically for the better since I started hunting these properties in the late '80's. Used to be I'd only see a couple of decent bucks all season and would be lucky to get a shot at a buck. Granted, I wasn't a very good bow hunter then nor did I bow hunt as much as I do now. Now I see many more deer (both bucks and does).

This past year, the deer moved in the morning (I'd climb out of the stand at 10-11 am) and the evening (usually the last hour of legal shooting time). I did spend a couple of all day hunts during the rut but there wasn't much activity mid-day. I hunted many days this year and I think there was only one hunt that I didn't see a deer (not talking within range, just seeing a deer). I filled my buck bow tag on Nov. 5, so that slowed down my hunting somewhat, though I have continued to hunt the does pretty hard (every weekend and a few days during the week, day after Thanksgiving, etc}.

Permission is fairly easy for me to find, though it's getting harder every year.

The good things about Iowa? IMO, no gun hunting during the peak of the rut, limited non-resident tags, genetics, agriculture and roughly 98% of the land is privately held.

Things that I think threaten deer hunting in Iowa? Outfitters, leasing, non-resident landowners and changing the current restrictons on non-resident licenses (quota numbers and preference points). Selfish concerns on my part, maybe....

solocamcan

I don't know that it's much better or the fact that outside of So. IL...IL consist of mostly smaller tracts of timber, connected to other smaller tracts by fence lines and hedge rows...meaning if the deer are out in the surrounding fields feeding at night, come morning it's kind of easy to predict the travel routes to the bedding areas. I don't know how much wooded area Va. has, but if you have a huge area with let's say 200 deer inside this area, thereare SO many places for those deer to enter and exit from, out of view from a hunter. Where as the areas I hunt are 80 acres or less, surrounded by other 80 acres or less timber tracts. And even if you don't have deer walk within bow range, you will see deer most sits and can move your stand based on where you've been seeing these move in the morning and evening.

Vabowman

I can tel you this, a 115" buck is usually getting an arrow in him around here....honestly, I bet Va could rival lots of states if the hounds were gone and we had AR....most deer don't make it to 4.5 here and yet we have big bucks every year.

dukemichaels

Actually.. I was thinking he has a pretty good spot.

But now we're talking personal preference.. and thats a whole nother story.

Come hunt with me.. on my home piece.. where you'll be happy to see "a" deer.

I'm perfect for these kinda discussions.. cause I hunt all over every year.

ICALL2MUCH

Not familiar with VA, at all, but I would agree.

I would think that this is true, everywhere?

dukemichaels

Yup.. the same. Only we have less of them.. and the bucks that do get taken usually have more inches. But thats just genetics.

Deer are skiddish on good days on most farms.

GMMAT

Is this like that question about a train leaving Chicago and a train leaving New York?

They're both 115"? What are you asking?

If you're asking if they're "old hat" in IL? I don't know. Are there a helluva lot more of them (%-age wise) in IL? I haven't counted them.....but deductive reasoning (based on the TV shows, existence of outfitters, harvest photos from here and other forums, and a PM I got from Chief Illiniwek himself) tells me you have a lot more than we do.

My perception is....HONESTLY....we're talking about a 2.5 yr old IL deer and a 4.5 yr old NC deer.

ICALL2MUCH

From my experiences, this is 1000% accurate.