I am pretty lucky to live in an area where big whitetails and mulies are not uncommon. Hunting pressure is also fairly low and therefore most bucks that I scout out make it through the hunting season. I have been fortunate to take the 2 bucks below over the past 2 seasons and have set my sights on taking a buck that is larger.

My 2012 whitetail (161" gross):


My 2013 whitetail (168 5/8" gross)


Basically this year it comes down to either a booner or tag soup.

Nice pics, and nice bucks you got! Thanks for sharing.

Great pictures. Hope that Booner comes your way.

Love them!

Anybody in NY would drop the hammer on any of those bucks, especially the first four.
You live in a whitetail hunters heaven!

I second that all of those deer are trophys where I hunt!! nice deer good luck

Great looking photos!

Depends on where in Texas you're at.

Got some relations down around El Paso,and they never seemed to take any monster deer.

It's extremely rare for someone to shoot a booner once. Twice, is like lightning striking. Are your standards going to booner or nothing for the rest of your hunting career?

Even on the hunting shows, they're happy with 150 class deer.

I would say that if a 165" buck walked by towards the end of the season I may be tempted to pull the trigger. I am also always in favor of taking a character buck that may not score quite as well, although a young buck with lots of character (drop tines, extra junk) would still get a pass.

I am much more happy to get a good picture of that 160" buck and let him walk while I wait for a chance at a 170+ buck no matter how many years it will take. But with the quality of bucks in my area, I could see getting a booner every 5 years to be a reasonable quest.

I am also fortunate to get to chase around 200"+ mulies each year with my bow so not taking a monster whitetail each year is not that big of a deal to me. I am quite happy with tag soup every so often.

I am also a big supporter of the line of thinking that big bucks don't have an opportunity to get big if they are taken before their prime. The 150"-160" bucks must be passed on if there is any hope of seeing 170" bucks in the future.

I hope to get a legal buck this year (3 points to a side)

I've eaten tag soup for 5 years and I have not passed any up. A couple of misses in there, though.

We hunt all overgrown clear cut (the bush) so deer sightings are tough during the day.