I've never hunted it, but there is ALOT of public land in the golden triangle of IL......ie pike, adams, brown etc.....like mult 15,000 acre parcels.....checkout the IDNR website.....they post it etc...., I assume other guys know if the land and hunt it, but ya october archery....public land, maybe you'll get lucky? Stan potts patterned and killed a monster on public a while back. If there was ever a place to get lucky that sounds like it, I'd just be worried about other hunters, maybe plan a M-F hunt, id go archery last days of october.....