My hunting buddy and I in 11 chances never got squat, zip, Nada, nothing, guess we have to go hunting coyotes. Cheers NC

Ouch! Sorry to hear that NC.

I drew deer with 0 points and Elk with 0 points. deer for the 7th year in a row.

baltz Have you considered buying a lottery ticket. Cheers NC

I just pick the correct tags to draw. Having hunted the units with hard to draw tags. I know that the tags in easy to draw units have the potential to produce good bucks. I do not get to hunt the high juniper, But I get to hunt every year in the unit where the best bucks live during season. Hunt every 5-6 years in a unit with a 25% chance of killing a nice buck or hunt every year in units with a 15% chance of a good buck. While some guys build points waiting to hunt, I have been eating venison. 1 nice buck and 2 meat bucks in the last 6 years. 2 years I passed on deer early to eat tag soup. 1 year I hunted a true monster all season. My priority is to hunt. Not wait to hunt. Plus I have a bear and Cougar tag, So if I cut fresh sign I can jump on it.

baltz526,

Good argument for the deer hunter rather than the trophy hunter.

I drew Applegate ML deer for the 2nd year in a row. Last year I was a shoe-in on preference points, this year I drew from the 25% pool, a 12% chance. One year I was one of 3 people who had enough points to draw a tag in a hunt but didn't .. and 600 or so other people did. That's my typical luck, so I'm pretty happy with this year's tag. I bought a used .45 cal TC Seneca a couple years ago. I killed last year's buck with it with a 245 grain home-cast conical I pan lubed. I am thinking about a 127 grain PRB this year. Puts it roughly in the single shot .357 magnum rifle category.

Tom

I quit applying for Oregon tags decades ago. All I want to hunt I can do OTC in areas I like to hunt. Just thinking about applying for tags and ODFW reminds me of that response ODFW got from that couple about wanting access to their land. Haha.

For me the area is covered by OTC tags but the time is not. I like it enough to make it worth jumping through a few hoops. If I were to adopt your view it would amount to cutting off my nose to spite my face: not an empty victory, but an empty defeat. But, of course, you gotta do what you gotta do for your reasons, and likewise, I gotta do what I gotta do for mine.

Tom

Yeah, I get it. that's one sweet tag you got. I've been on that one a few times guiding buddies.