Ohio or Indiana huntinig
 

I'm from Wisconsin and i am considering doing a out of state do it yourself archery hunt next year. I am wondering if i can get some leads on a good place to hunt public land. I cant afford an outfitter so this seems to be the best option for me. An area i can hunt and camp with a small pop up camper is more what i'm looking for. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

There is plenty of public land in southern Indiana in the form of Hoosier National Forest. Like most public land in the midwest, however, it's not somewhere to find big bucks in and decent numbers.

I agree. I have lived in southern Indiana my whole life. There are numerous deer here, but I really think it's where you hunt. I have seen huge mature bucks, but of course seen a lot more smaller deer. I would look to hunt the Patoka Lake area or somewhere around the Dubois or Orange Country area, in my opinion. I also have friends in Pike and Gibson county, and they have massive bucks too.

I live about 45 minutes from a stretch of the HNF and have hunted there a few times, there are scary big bucks in there, but you have to go in deep. The best way is to go into one of the parcels off SR37 south such as Lake Celina or Tipsaw Lake and get a fisherman to tote you across the lake, you'll have little or no competition, but bring a deer cart for the pack out. The terrain is hilly, fatboys need not apply. Patoka Lake is good for volume of deer, but to find the big boys you'll need a boat there too. I've seen a gazillion deer in a single day there, but no big boys, they hide in the places where lazy folks won't hunt.

Thanks for help guys. I really appreciate it. It seems the HNF has what i'm looking for and might be worth a shot. Thanks again, and any other comments would be great.

Indiana has about 3% public land, and a large amount of it is in the south end of the state. The HNF alone is split into three different parcels, none of them small. Don't overlook the various state forests either, there are tons of them down here, some are as small as a hundred acres. You can locate them on a topo map pretty easily, the smaller ones often get little or no pressure simply because most folks don't even know that they exist, especially those bordered by private property. Try searching for state forests near where you plan to stay, odds are you'll find several with just a small amount of time spent with a topo map site. If you hunt small state parcels be sure to bring a GPS, and a map of the parcel with it's GPS boundary coordinates clearly labeled. Bordering landowners are often not aware that public land is just across their property line, or sometimes even where their property ends.

if you can access some private land via connections on here & are looking at Southern Indiana, I'd suggest trying to get into Orange or Washington counties. A couple of local taxidermists that I hunt & hang out with say the deer they mount from those areas seem to have antler size advantage over the surrounding counties like Harrison, Floyd & Crawford.

On a public land note, the Hoosier National is extremely overhunted & quite frankly, a dangerous place to be on the opening morning of gun season. I'd recommend the Harrison-Crawford State forest if you are stuck to public ground. It has lots of room & there are many "side" tracts of 50-300+ acres not directly connected to the main forestry area. Alot of hunters, including locals, have no idea about these smaller areas & often think it is unaccessible private ground. I hunt a select few of these pieces of ground & rarely see another soul. Alot of the ground is less than ideal habitat with sheer cliffs & rough terrain, but I have seen & killed more than a few 130+ class bruisers cruising there.

Indiana Bucks
 

hey man i live in northwest indiana 1 hr south from chicago, i hunt a private farm, the property meets up to public land called Willow Slough in morroco indiana.they have web site i see plent of good deer coming out of there. i shot these about 50 yrds from Willow Slough.

try the wayne national forest in south eastern ohio. i have killed plenty of deer here. i usually hunt in the vinton/athens/meigs county areas and jackson,hocking, and perry and surrounding areas have bits of the wayne also. there were some bruisers taken out of the wayne and tar hollow this year and every year but it is public hunting so you will want to get in well off the beaten path if you want to find mr. big. ohio is blessed with public hunting in about every area of the state if you look and we have some nice bucks slipping down these ridges and along these corn fields:confused0024:

here are some ohio bucks

try searching the raccoon valley wildlife ecological area or something like that it is in vinton county and near mcarthur they chave camper spots and i have hunted turkey and small game there and seen a pretty good amount of nice bucks there at night coon hunting

The edges of the HNF are indeed overhunted, and can be somewhat risky, but a hunter who goes deeper than the nearest parking lot or highway edge will do well, that's why I suggested a boat. You're right about the terrain though, it's mountain goat land much of the time with all those ridges and hollows. The larger tracts of Harrison-Crawford aren't too crowded if you go deep, but but bring a deer cart. Any parcels with horse or hiking trails are a waste of time IMO, easy access always kills a prime spot.