Yeah but his spots are closer to us. It's a no brainer here. duke and I are young, the rest of you guys are old. Do the math.

My area is very similar to yours Greg. I have seen 2 bucks in the 180's that were killed by neighbors. I have killed 2 that gross in the 160's. There has been 237+ and 266+ nontypicals killed within a few miles of where I hunt. Every year there are a couple if notmore 170+ typicals killed. 130-140's are common but not everyone kills one.

My taxidermist friend has 17 bucks scoring over 170" in his shop this year. The most ever.

The past26 years I have been lucky enough to take several 130 to 140 class deer fairly regularly with a rare 150 class or bigger buck. Not sure if its because the amount of quality deer in that particular area or because we let 120"deer walk. I have seen some 170" deer every few years and have seen and heard of several in the 180s being taken.

The average big bucks in this area run from the mid 120's up to the 150's. A really big buck will goin the 160-170" range, and there are a few that go over 180" around this are every year.

Some of you may remember the pics that I posted earlier this year of a big 10 point my buddy and I were getting on camera, well, I found out a few weeks ago that the buck was shot by a rifle hunter on his land which borders the property that we had permission to hunt. I saw pictures but the story I go doesn't seem to add up. My buddy talk to the guy thats wife shot it, and from what my buddy said, the husband told him that the buck had a 27-1/4" outside spread, and grossed score at 167" with probablly 2-3" of broken tines.

I spotlighted 115 deer last night. The biggest buck would have barely pushed 100".I go out and run the lightsfairly often,1-5x per month between Mid-June through January. I see between 50 and 400 deer per night, depending on the weather, where I go, and how much time I have. If you add it all up, we're talking 2-4 thousand deer per year that go through my bino's.

So far this season, here's a look at the biggestbuck that I really got a good, long look at- he even posed nice for the video camera.

I dunno, maybe 135-140? 4x5. There are bigger deer than this one - but it's a needle-in-a-haystack scenario.You'llburn up a lot of gas and wear out a lot of tires finding a bigger deer than this one in my neck of the woods.

Top end bucks here--180 plus.

The land I used to hunt, I could count on seeing 3-4 150's a season. Now I am reduced to perhaps one a season and thats not a regularity. By that I mean I cannot pattern a buck like I used too because a nice buck I see may cross the road and be on property I cannot hunt. Plus I now have to put up with a few others who also have permission to hunt the same land. There are some bruisers around, mostly in the river bottoms and I lost my river land to a paper co.[:@] who says keep out.

Like most all of you I hunt a lot in the area's surrounding my town/community.I have seen a grand total of two deer that would top 120 inches in 20 plus years of deer hunting and an average of 25 hunts a year.A 31/2 year old buck represents less then 10 % of our buck population a 41/2 or older is a real old timer.

Duke,
Don't insult my intelligence, I'm not as dumb as you look. I don't like being accused of lying. Everything I have said is true. I don't know or care what "book" you own but I do know where most of the P&Y and B&C bucks come from in Wis. and Ill. I've been reading and studying this stuff forover 30years and hunting for longer than you've been alive.

I never said there was land left, whatever that means, you did. All I said was that Me and a couple of others gain permission or access to hunt land in these two counties every year. That is fact. You may wish to rethink whatever you've been doing for the last 3 years and try something else, you've got nothing to lose.

Tip: My friends and I are in the trades. We've been known to rewire, paint and add concrete to an entire barn for one season of hunting. Sometimes it leads to something more permanent.

This thread is about the top end bucks in YOUR area, not whereGregH hunts or how he gets permission.

PS. Don't hold your breath for that PM.

A top end buck for me where I hunt would have to be in that 160" class. I've seen 4 booners in the 21 years I've bow hunted. They ranged from 170" to 180" I'm guessing. The average big buck I see every year is in that 135" class, usually about 40 yards out. I see allot of 115" to 120" bucks, they get the pass every time. I know we have 190+ plus bucks around! I've seen the pics of a few from a friend of mines Cudde, he live's 10 minutes from me. This same friend of mine use to have the Minnesota State Record for Non-Typical Archery back in the late 80's, gotten beat since. His buck scored 204" non typical. Another guy about 5 minutes from where I also hunt shot another big non typical, he scored in that 230" range. There around here, just damn hard to actually get to see.