I let two nice ones get away from me this year playing the score on the hoof game. I should have been shooting deer instead of looking at horns. Next year I am probably going to go on and blast the first 8 or better I see and then get picky, especially on National Forest.
I like the antler restrictions here because we are allowed two bucks. One of them can be whatever, the other has to have 4 on one side. I have seen a nice uptick on the size of racks since they were put in place around 2012-2013. I live in meat hunter central though where people "feed their families" on deer. It keeps the honest ones from blasting the spikes and at least gives them a chance.
When they decided on the antler restrictions, I had brought up a kill a doe any day idea in meetings with the DGIF at the time wildlife manager. They do it for the kids already, why not do it for the adults? I called it a floating doe day. If you can shoot a doe, you kind of don't really have a great reason to shoot a spike in my mind. There are designated antlerless days, but on NF there are only like 2 doe days total in the season in our zone. Makes it a little unfair on a guy with no private and limited days to hunt. I would probably shoot a spike at that point too.
Last edited by Bperdue21; 01/10/22.
