Gary - Once I'm tagged-out in PA, I pass 2.5's until I think I'm out of time. At that point, I take the bow off the hook andtag out. I will not eat tags, especially the expensive NR variety. I'll wait as long as I can, but IWILL shoot something when the sun starts to set on my season. I don't care if it's a spike - I'm going to the check station one way or the other. I DO still enjoy shooting deer.

I just checked my log books - this year, I saw and/or passedSEVEN 2.5's in Ohio between 10/28 and 11/10 - six days in the tree. On 11/10,I shot a tree on a 120-125 class 4x4, and shot a 110" buck 30 minutes later. I passed bigger deer than the one I killed.

You'd hunt all year to kill a buck thatnice back near home. I saw eight in six hunts in Ohio, and killed #8. I was out of time.

So you suggest that I'm not killing booners because I'm not passing up the smaller stuff... Well... I AM passing up the smaller stuff - until I get to the point where I have to choose between shooting a decent buck or just going home and eating my tag. The difference is, back home in Fayette County, PA, you can pass 2.5's until you're blue-in-the-face, and the chances of a 140+ walking around the ridge are probably in the .0026% range.


For what it's worth: I'm amazed by my math skillz, and the aforementioned bell curve results. Sofa King Awesome.

By the way, great post Matt/PA.