GForce

Here in my area the deer tend to 'farm', or 'yard up' as Cooper31 stated. This occurs hereduring extreme temperature drops and as their food sources are scarce. They move very little once they find a sheltered spot. I find many of these areas while shed and/or coyote hunting this time of year. Usually in evergreen forests.

The deer population in Indiana has been steadily increasing each year since around 1995 with record numbers. The harvest numbers have also set new records each of the past 10-11 seasons.

But you can not really get a reasonable estimationjust by what you can see from an interstate or major highway. I can take you down some county roads here just before the soybeans are cut and will guarantee you willsee 100-125 deer coming out into the fields in the evenings. That is in a two square mile block of farmland! The area has plenty of old growth timber for cover and is very close to a toll road, but you would never seeit without being on the county roads.

Here in late Augustto mid-September is the best time of year to get to see the monster bucks. 150-180 class. Not just a few, but by the dozenswith many morelesser bucks mixed in.

Red Lion

We have a ton of deer in MN, actually 1.5 million, but Wisconsin has more yet, actually 2 million or so. I drove from MN to Madison WI a few years back and once about 20 miles or so in WI, I swear I was seeing dead deer from getting smacked by cars ever couple of miles of so. The cheeseheads have some deer! Too bad about that CWD.[&o]

Doubled 150

My dad has a 3 acre food plot behind his house in southeast MO. Every evening there will 30-40 deer in it.

I regularly drive up and down I-55 from St. Louis to Sikeston, MO which is about 160 miles or so. Depending on the time of day, I'll see dozens of deer and turkey.

Red Lion

I have a hunting buddy that drives by a couple of farm fields right next to where we have bowhunted. He says he see 150 or so deer in each field every stinkin morning on the way to work.

Cougar Mag

Honestly the deer numbers aren't as high in several midwestern states as they are in many other states IMO. I believe a lot of that is due to the amount of land that is nothing but fields. At this time of year due to yarding up all or most of the deer in a given area may be in one spot and we may be hard up to find deer in the surrounding areas because of that. A friend of mine at work says he counted over 200 deer in one large field last February, but those deer were likely all together from miles around.

ILBOW

I have lived in IL my whole life I've never seen a deer off of the interstate.
now you start seeing the backroad country....well lets just say I hope you have a brush gaurd!!!!

MikeyL24

The farther you go East, the less land the deer have to roam in, and hence make themselves seen more in their day to day movements. I see multiple deer every day on a commute from NY to CT. I am in IL, OH, and MI for work and I don't see the deer in the same quantity when commuting.

Believe me, I would prefer hunting in those states where I don't see deer in plain sight, but, it's just to support my point.

GForce

Cougar Mag - I agree with your first sentence, to a point. Our deer population in Indiana may not compare to that of other states, but I will offer this for consideration:

I have deer hunted ina number of eastern states while on active duty in the Navy; and while yes, I would normally see many more deer each outing, few have compared to the ones that I have seen or taken since moving to Indiana. And I mean this in comparison to body and rack size, buck or doe.

Most of the eastern states whitetailed deer are much smaller in physical size, just as a comparison of Texas deer body size is to Saskatchewan deer. This is a natural phenomenon as follows suite in the differences in the wild turkey species. The southern most deer on the east coast - the Key Deer are the smallest of all the North American species. (I've seen them in the wild whileI was stationed at Key West Naval Air Station for two years). Smaller deer can inhabit an area in higher numbers due to their reduced intake demand.

I grew up in Alabama, at the time we had one of the highest deer populations of all the states. AL, MI and MS all claimed to have the highest population numbers. But all thisfails in comparison to the quality of the deer in the mid-west states.

If you want to compare sheer bodyand antler size, the midwest states absolutely have the most potential. Second only to the out-lying reaches of Canada.

Any other doubts: look at the record books for MI, IO, IN, OH, IL, MO,etc.....

lrhuntr

The midwest may have bigger bucks but the east has more dee... wait what! The midwest has more deer aswell. If a couple million in one state ain't enough to prove it then I don't know what will.