5mature bucks out of 6 hunts.2 were 3 1/2s, 1 was 5 1/2, 1 was 6 1/2 (killed) and 1 was 7 1/2+.

This was a weird year for me, I've never had one like it. I've never seen so many old mature bucks so early in the season. I only hunted 6 times and I saw all those mature bucks on 3 of those hunts. On 2 of those hunts I saw 3 mature bucks each hunt and 2 of those were 5 1/2 and older. Weird.

What I think happened was that I stumbled on an old doe that was just coming into estrus and the bucks were flocking around to check her out. I got pretty lucky.

Between the 3 spots I hunt in Ill. I usually see between 3-9 different mature bucks per season. In my Wis. spots I see between 0-3 mature bucks per season. The difference between Wis. and Ill. Is that Ill. has a much shorter gun season and one county doesn't have a gun season. So more bucks live to become older. The Ill herds contain more mature bucks than the Wis herds ( so does Ia and Ks).

I can't complain. See avater for pic (I'm at work no access to pics here).