I read that Lake County in the far north suburbs of Illinois is the 5th best county for Pope and Young entries in the U.S. WOW I live in Lake county cool! I knew we had big deer but thought urban sprawl changed it alot.

Congrats, now show us the bucks....

As far as Field and Stream....I can not stand that magazine[:@] I used to have a subscription many, many years ago....I decided the magazine wasn' t what I wanted from a hunting mag...and besides, the advertisement pages out numbered the actual reading part....now the story turns worse...

I sat in a automotive store waiting on an oil change....I picked up a F&S...an article by the editor....his bear hunt.......he was really in favor of hunting bears with dogs.....but when the guide offered to catch some suckers in a nearby stream, throwing them on the bank and hunting over them....he went into a tyrant about how evil that was and baiting was simply wrong....talk about a black eye for hunters...being slammed in a public hunting mag by a fellow hunter....

Now, I won' t slam hunting bears with dogs, he considered it more challenging......COMON!!!!!!! Standing under a tree bear and smoking a cigar while trying to decide to shoot it or not.....or......hunting over those suckers when a bear can and do wind you, see you etc.. and they move off....

Bear in a tree or bear on the ground at eye level......hmmmmm

That guy simply put was a ignorant(lacked knowledge) clown and I' ll never send the mag another cent.

Rob, I agree with you on the bear hunt. The only reason I bought the mag was the cover had a great picture of a big buck.[:-]

I also read that article about Illinois. If I' m correst...the article entioned you can get a trouphy deer in EVERY county in Illinois. People from IL have known this for years!!!!