QDM itself is one big assumption that everyone shares the same goal..........bigger racked bucks. Again, I will state that I like big bruisers as much as the next guy but I don't judge the success or failure of my season based on it. I don't sit in my treestand and daydream of a spike buck walking down the path..........I do however know my woods VERY well and am extremely realistic about what I can expect to harvest. The woods I hunt are mostly state forest and it gets POUNDED by gun hunters EVERY year.......it's a miracle anything survives. So for someone to tell me that I should sit there and pass on 1 1/2 yr old bucks doesn't sit very well with me...........Seeing a deer in those woods is a good day........getting a shot opportunity is a GREAT day...........chances to take a deer may come every 20 minutes where you hunt but they sure don't around here.......if I imposed a personal ban on anything but 4 1/2 yr old or older where I hunt I would go the rest of my life without taking a buck cause there ain't no way in hell a buck is gonna live to be 4 1/2 in the battlefields I hunt.


There you go assuming again.

What if it isn't?

The oldest and biggest deer I have killed was a 13 pointer a couple years ago and it was one of the easiest deer I ever killed.......I was walking on the ground and he was coming through a field of goldenrod as I broke through the hedgerow.....I killed him with a gun but he was easily in bow range. I tend to think that a lot of the "Supernatural" powers of older whitetails is hunter created to pump up our egos and make our accomplishment sound so much better. Let's be real here.....hundreds of thousands of big bucks get killed EVERY year and we have enough technology in our hands to take almost all the guesswork out of it.........and most telling of all is you could take an average to below average hunter and if you put him in a honey hole with a good population of big bucks he will tag one. Look at all the dorks in the world that have 160 class deer on their wall because they had enough money to pay for a hunt in primo land with great bucks and even greater chance of getting one. They couldn't find their way back to the truck alone but put them in a unpressured spot full of big boys and he will have a mount on his wall anyone would appreciate. What's the old saying??.....don't judge a hunter by what is on his wall..........older deer are not dummies for sure but some people get all mythical and make them seem unhuntable.


When you talk about restrictions you include us all............and what business is it of yours anyways what other people do or don't shoot?? Ever notice the QDM crowd is always trying to convince everyone else they should be more like them??? Worry about yourself. If you want to hold off for a deer so old he os farting dust I couldn't care less........when you start telling other people they should do the same is where it gets irritating.


Dozens of guys here "suggest" people pass on smaller bucks........and most of them do it without using phrases like "better"....."more challenging"........or by trying to make others feel like they should be embarrassed to shoot a smaller buck. Sometimes it's not what you say...........it's how you say it.


You seem to be the one that doesn't like the fact that not everyone is drinking your Kool Aid.


Do you even see it??........you are pushing your definition of quality on other people as an improvement from where they are now........in other words......your way is better. PA tried to force that down the throats of a million licensed hunters and now they have a statewide nightmare on their hands......I am only an hour from the PA border and have hunted there myself and know many guys who go there every year.......a bunch of them have already said they are not going back and everyone I know in PA says the deer hunting is worse then they have ever seen it.........forcing QDM on PA has resulted in a LOT of unhappy people.



What does that tell you??........Wildlife agencies do what the most people demand.....they cater to the average hunter and their wants and needs. Bowhunting is not a good tool for herd control as it is........and for every hundred bowhunters you know pushing QDM there are 1,000 gun hunters that want the woods full of deer........period. You are in a serious minority whether you want to admit it or not.


I can't hunt in my yard............and if you had any idea how hard I hunt just to get the deer I do then you wouldn't be so wuick to dismiss it as not challenging.

Sound familar??..........you don't like it either huh


I'm just the one that pointed it out.

All that talk about no one cares about the small bucks at a check station unless it's a unskilled, unexperienced kid with his first deer meant what then??


So, obviously it is then............just admit it.......if bucks dropped their racks for good at age 2 1/2 no one would give a damn about tagging an older buck......guys walls would be full of racks still.......and not antlerless heads of old deer.


Killing a yearling deer is "too easy" for a "veteran" hunter huh?? Please tell me you are starting to see how condescending that sounds.


So have a lot of other people here........don't belittle their accomplishments by implying what they do is "easy" or not "challenging"

You see BOW?? This is the kind of elitest garbage the QDM crowd is famous for.

"pathetic".........."high standards"...............if you guys are really trying to "recruit" other hunters to your ideals then you might want to think about a better approach then looking down on them and trying to guilt them into a different viewpoint.

Everyone shoot what they want if it is legal by law.

It's statements like that, which breed contempt between those who are for it and those who are against it.

I'm with atlasman all the way...

As far as I'm concerned there is far too much emphasis on killing a big rack and I think it is unhealthy for hunting. It gives the anti's fuel and it teaches our young hunters that successfull hunting is all about horns. That may be what its all about for some of you but it's not for me. I've been deer hunting for 40 + years and I can tell you there is a lot more to hunting than that. I can tell you from experience that the thrill and satifaction of killing a big rack is temporary but its the sum of all the other joys of hunting that brings me back year after year. And BTW this condescending attitude that if you don't pass the smaller bucks is really irritating. Who do you people think you are to be telling anybody how they should be enjoyging the sport. I think maybe a big rack is all that matters to you and you realize how tough it is so you are trying to get everybody to cooperate to simply make it easier to get one. Though the strategy may work, I don't think it has anything to do with being a better hunter.

I prefer to impress upon our young hunters that taking a trophy animal is only a small part of the deer hunting experience. Looking back, in my 40 + years I've taken maybe 5 or 6 of what most would agree are trophy size. If in that time that number had been twice that I don't think my overall experience would have been enhanced even slightly. In the remaining years I have, if I kill a couple more that would be great. If I don't that's O.K. too because killing a big rack isn't what its all about.

Here is what Fred Bear said about why he hunted...

"I hunt deer because I love the entire process; the preparations, the excitement, and sustained suspense of trying to match my woodslore against the finely honed instincts of these creatures. On most days spent in the woods, I come home with an honestly earned feeling that something good has taken place. It makes no difference whether I got anything; it has to do with how the day was spent."

"Life in the open is one of the finest rewards. I enjoy and become completely immersed in the high challenge and increased opportunity to become for a time a part of nature. Deer hunting is a classical exercise in freedom. It is a return to fundamentals that I instinctively feel are basic and right."

"I have always tempered my killing with respect for the game pursued. I see the animal not only as a target but as a living creature with more freedom than I will ever have. I take that life if I can with regret as well as joy, and with the sure knowledge that nature's ways of fang and claw or exposure and starvation are a far crueler fate than I bestow."

Interesting, and not a word about killing a big rack.

Just another thought. There has been a lot of talk here about making it more challenging. By the words of those advocating it, the pupose of "passing the buck" is to increase the chances of bagging a big rack. Its purpose is to make it easier to get your trophy not more difficult. How can anyone reconcile a philosophy of increased challenge with "passing the buck"?

I was going to try and stay out of this...BUT

1st of all the night mare in PA has EVERYTHING to do with the herd reductions and little to do with the antler restrictions. There are some places where the herd reductions haven't hit hard, and the AR have worked wonders. But for much of the state there are just far less deer and that is causing the rift.

As for the passing on small bucks thing I am VERY middle of the road. I have shot a tons of small bucks and don't care to shoot another one ever. It's difficult for me to see how someone could keep getting excited over shooting a little first year buck, when basically its a foregone conclusion with them.

BUT I also realize that in my areas 4 1/2 year old deer are as common as big foot. It is still quite a challenge for me to find and shoot a 2 1/2 or 3 1/2 year old buck. That's just the way it is, they aren't a common thing due to the hunting pressure. I think places where mature bucks are running around everywhere are about pointless. If all the bucks are big, it lessens the value.

So if a person is at that point of thier life, or in a location where shooting ANY buck is still a challenge to them, no one should knock it. But if it's pretty much a given that the guy is going to shoot a buck with ease, I'd really hope he'd start challenging himself a little more, and calling him on it, shouldn't be taboo.

rybohunter wrote: Calling him on what? Did he do something wrong? Nobody who takes a small legal buck owes you or anybody else an explination and it is arrogant to think that they do.

There are hunters that absolutely focus on the meat side of hunting and and will take 5 or 6 deer a year if they can. They literally look forward to filling the freezers with venison to suppliment the cost of feeding their families. They don't give a damn about what sex the deer they take is or how big the antlers are on a buck, they just want to get the meat with as little time spent as possible. A great year is one when they can fill all of their tags in the first couple of days of gun season. I also know hunters that are pure trophy hunters and won't even eat a bite of the meat. A perfect season for them would be to kill 1 monster on the last possible day of the season after spending countless hours in a treestand and passing on dozens of smaller (but still big) buck. They would rather take a big buck or no deer at all. They might understand the need to trim doe from the population but would rather somebody else did it. They will shoot a doe only out of a sense of "it's the right thing to do" to improve their chances of killing a big buck in the future.

This of course is 2 ends of a spectrum. Most of us fall in between. What you value from the hunting experience should be left entirely up to you. As long as you are hunting legally you don't need to explain anything. It's time for the trophy hunters to give it a rest. If you want to pass on smaller bucks, that's fine go ahead and hunt anyway you want but please stop assuming that that's what everybody wants. Please stop trying to get everybody else to "help" you get your big buck. If its that important to you then meet the challenge and go out there and get one. They are out there right now!

Yea I know it takes all types, I'm not refering to either extreme. I'm talking about the guy who can shoot a couple does for meat and that's plenty. He's already shot a couple dozen bucks in life and they all sit in a box in his basement. He only shoots it to say he got one. Some one should be able to suggest to him, hey why not wait and try to shoot something bigger.... without it being viewed as cramming thier views down his throat. That's all I'm saying.

I spent my entire hunting life shooting the first buck to walk by because that's what I was supposed to do. I spent several seasons only hunting a couple weeks and for the longest time I NEVER experienced the thrill and excitement of hunting during the rut cause I was tagged out. I finally went against my teachings and started waiting on a buck that I want to shoot and in the mean time, shoot as many does as I can. My enjoyment and experience has gotten so much better since doing so. So if I can enourage other guys in my position to try passing on some smaller bucks and get a little more enjoyment out of thier hunting, I think its worth it.

I am by no means looking for people to "help" get my buck. I don't pass on little ones in hopes that they will grow up, I pass on them because I am waiting for the bigger ones I already know exist.

I thought the two went hand in hand........the herd reduction was part of the restriction plan........shoot bigger racks and improve the buck/doe ratio.......or am I wrong about that?


Couldn't agree more.