Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Where would you go?

Where would you gun hunt if your goal was a 160" or better buck. Personally I'm not interested in high fenced land or a "canned hunt". Money is always a big concern. $7,500.00 for a S. Texas hunt is out of the question, but $5,000.00 for a Canadian hunt is possible. With the add on expenses of a Canadian hunt you could probably hunt KS. or Iowa twice. Any thoughts?

I'm guessing whitetail.....

Along the Arkansas river in SE CO. Or Kansas. If it is mulies, eastern Co. Contact Tom Tietz

If its whitetail Illinois.
Muleys = Arizona

If it's Sitka Blacktails I'd go to Alaska, those other places don't have any.

Sorry! Yes whitetails.

Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Alberta & Saskatchewan would be my top picks, with Eastern Colorado thrown in as a sleeper.

You can do a quality Sask. hunt for a little under $4,000 that includes airfare, rental car, license, ect.

$ 4,000.00 is a deal. I've been to Sask. twice. The outfitter I've hunted w/ is charging $4800.00 w/o the extra money for hotel stays, car rental, license and more expensive airfare. I think Buck Paradise is $5,300.00 just for the hunt. My guy usually runs about 99% success rate. Ave. between 145"-150". I need to check out E. Colorado, as I don't know much about that area. Thanks!

Bingo. The very best secret hotspot (not so much anymore) is E Colorado whitetails. Huntsonora on this very site guides out there, and recently posted some brutes. That would be my #1, followed by Wisconsin, Kansas, and the obvious midwest states of Iowa and Illinois.

Not Michigan!

Not Wisconsin either. We only have little bucks here.

Can ya'll be a little more specific as to which areas of Mich. & Wisconsin I should avoid?

deep in the WV mountains. for a winter.

I'd opt to share a blind with Tiffany!

Me too... That is a book rack if I've ever seen one.

Yeah but how would it look on the wall???

Canada....reasons are as follows:

First, the gene pool is there.A whitetail that grosses 160 or better comprises a very small percentage(maybe less than 1 or 2 %) of the total buck harvest continent-wide.I don't have the stats to prove this, but doubt I am far off.If you want to kill a 160 class buck, you have to hunt where the "top-end" is substantialy higher.I believe that Manitoba, Saskatchewan,and Alberta(huge geographic area)has the largest concentration of that class of bucks than anywhere else on the continent.

Second,you want to hunt a minimum of 10 days.In the lower 48,most outfitters offer hunts of half that duration;and in the best areas,the season itself may not run that long.I never go to Canada for anything less than 10 days,and prefer 14.While many Canadian hunts are offered on a 6-7 day basis,the long seasons there provide the opportunity to arrange a longer hunt.

Third,licenses......many lower 48 permits are on a draw.You cannot be assured of getting a permit every year in the same area.Killing a 160+ buck may take 2-3 trips....anywhere...unless you are very lucky.This is because ,even where there are a lot of them, there are not many of them.You may need to go back more than once to get it done.Canada licenses are over the counter for the most part, or available through outfitters,no draw.

Fourth,in some areas(most of Alberta, parts of Sask and Manitoba),you get to hunt farmland,... during the rut...with a rifle.This is a tough combo to come by in the best big buck areas of the lower 48.Buck movement is most intense in the pre rut,and rut periods.It falls off in the early post rut,as exhausted bucks pull into heavy cover ,move little,and start to recoup from all the rutting activity.This is a tough time to hunt,but is what you get with a rifle in places like Kansa,and Eastern Colorado.Good as they are for monsters,rifle seasons do not coincide with times of peak buck movement...this is a deliberate management decision by game departments to protect them during the vulnerable times of the rut.

And a buck pulled into an open field by a hot doe is a lot easier to judge as to size. To kill a 160+,you may have to pass a lot of 140-150 class deer;if you can do it. Not many can,all the time...me included

Good Canadian regions are vast, and lightly hunted by our standards.Farmlands are adjacent to huge,vast areas of bush that hold enormous whitetails that never see the farms until they begin traveling for does.And low hunting pressure,coupled with vast tracts of land protect these bucks,rather than more restrictive seasons.A mid western hunter,accustomed to property lines,and small tracts,will be blown away by the shear volume of unhunted territory that surrounds him in much of Canada.

You have to break this down into the regions that provide YOU with the very best opportunities to kill a large buck;taken in the aggragate,all things considered,I feel that Central Canada offers any individual hunter a better chance for a buck of this size than anywhere else;unless of course you live in a top Lower 48 area known for huge bucks,have acees to great property already,etc.

I do know that I have only once in my life,seen two sure positive B&C contenders at once when I was hunting.The smaller was killed by another hunter,and he grossed 174;the second buck was a giant,even by Canadian standards.Discretion dictated I did not shoot.But I am unlikely to ever see another whitetail the size of that one that "got away".But if I do,I suspect it will be in Central Canada,where I try to hunt every year.

It takes a lot of buck to impress them up there;when I hauled in the biggest I've killed ( a 9 point grossing a bit over 160)my outfitter said, he 's a nice buck but why did you shoot him?...Keep doing that, you'll never kill a big one...

The guy I've been going with for the past 27 yrs. is charging $2,800 for a 6 day hunt. That includes meals, lodging, caping & quartering of your deer. He takes 8 hunters per week & we stay in a comfortable cabin. I'd guess that over 90% of the hunters are repeat clients, he's never had to advertise.

What I like best is that he'll let you hunt however you like. If you like bait, they've got 30 or 40 sites with a bunch of trail cameras set up. If you'd like to track, the area is so vast that you'd never see another human footprint.

Success varies, the hunters sitting over bait will almost always kill a deer, the ones that prefer not to..probably in the 25% neighborhood.

If you want the guy's name & number, shoot me a pm.

Which parts of the state? ALL of them.

Thanks guys for taking the time to reply. I have been fortunate enough to hunt S.TX four times,KS. 5 times,and Sask. twice. I have taken 3 deer that gross over 160"(all in KS) and others in the 140's and 150's. I have only hunted the Meadow Lake area of Sask. Standard Sask. 6 day hunts. My gut tells me Canada is the place to be, but I don't know if I'm huntng w/ the right outfitter and in the right area. Again thanks for the replies.

Chris