• The SH Membership has gone live. Only SH Members have access to post in the classifieds. All members can view the classifieds. Starting in 2020 only SH Members will be admitted to the annual hunting contest. Current members will need to follow these steps to upgrade: 1. Click on your username 2. Click on Account upgrades 3. Choose SH Member and purchase.
  • We've been working hard the past few weeks to come up with some big changes to our vendor policies to meet the changing needs of our community. Please see the new vendor rules here: Vendor Access Area Rules

Nutterbuster Spreads(sheets) It Wide Open

Made a quick "enhancement" to the document.

Green states are Midwest States

Blue states are Mid-Atlandic

Yellow states are Southern

Pink states are Northeastern

Sources vary on a the correct geographical categorization of states like Kentucky and the like, but I think it paints a very clear picture. Green states need to simmer down about letting deer walk or the "average" 4.5 year old deer being a 120 "at least" in Alabama. Blue has bigger deer than the national average but suffers from too many folks millin' around. Yellow has smaller than average deer but luckily is pretty scarce in the biped department. Pink...well like I said...pray for @Vtbow.

I took the "middle man" in each region and will do county-by-county spreadsheets with P&Y entry and population numbers. I sorted them on bucks/mile. Not doing antler size since I think that's already handled well enough. Y'all have tonight to convince me I'm wrong for picking:

Northeast - New Hampshire

Mid-Atlantic - New York

Southeast - North Carolina

Midwest - Iowa

as average representations of each area. I think you'll like the data. It shows that in every state there are poor and great areas depending on your zip code, but that the difference between those two extremes is smoother in some states. Particularly for the lucky dogs in the midwest.

I'm also currently working on some way to establish a "reasonable public land expectation" threshold for each state and possibly be able to apply it to each county. I suspect that for most of the country a "public land trophy" could be:

Poor Area - A 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 80-100

Average Area - a 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 100-120

Good Area - A 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 120-140

as a rule of thumb, but I'm still reading and figuring.
 
I'm also currently working on some way to establish a "reasonable public land expectation" threshold for each state and possibly be able to apply it to each county. I suspect that for most of the country a "public land trophy" could be:

Poor Area - A 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 80-100

Average Area - a 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 100-120

Good Area - A 3.5-4.5yo buck scoring 120-140

as a rule of thumb, but I'm still reading and figuring.

I would only add that there are areas that have a near total harvest of antlered bucks annually, where a 2.5 year old is a "trophy buck" and a 3.5 year old would be considered a "once in a lifetime buck".
 
Last edited:
Soil quality only matters in as much as the quantity of quality forage it can produce, not the quality of forage.

This is true but if fertile ground can produce enough quality forage to allow 40 deer per square mile to reach their full potential and poor soil could only support 10 deer a square mile their are four times as many targets on fertile ground. Or the same amount of target bucks with inferior nutrition. Everything else being equal you’ll grow bigger deer(or more big deer)on fertile soil.
 
This is true but if fertile ground can produce enough quality forage to allow 40 deer per square mile to reach their full potential and poor soil could only support 10 deer a square mile their are four times as many targets on fertile ground. Or the same amount of target bucks with inferior nutrition. Everything else being equal you’ll grow bigger deer(or more big deer)on fertile soil.
Exactly. Just because you have poor soil, doesn't mean you have to have poor bucks. If managed correctly, like on that public hunting area in that research article, you can have great quality bucks. And, you can do it without planting or pouring.
 
Yeah but I would think that you can apply that same logic to all states. So assume all states have roughly the same percentage of people that don't register their py after they kill one. Should be a wash for the most part.

I agree it’s probably a similar percentage throughout the country. I’m just pointing out the numbers reported are very low.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
.0004 P&Y, I like those odds.... hehehehe

So does that mean if u kill a P&Y in Vermont or Florida ur pretty much the best trophy hunter ever?

It depends on where in Florida your talking about. There’s only a dozen or so counties in Georgia that I would rank higher than Madison and Hamilton county Florida.
 
New York is not mid Atlantic…..just sayin.

Delaware, Maryland or Virginia. Del Mar Va or Delmarva to us.
 
It depends on where in Florida your talking about. There’s only a dozen or so counties in Georgia that I would rank higher than Madison and Hamilton county Florida.
Yes we all know the panhandle has Florida’s best bucks but a dozen counties in one state versus 2 in another. Also Ga isn’t exactly high on these lists either. Although I definitely like the odds there better than here.
 
Y
Florida is one of few states you stand a chance of getting attacked by a bear, a panther, a crocodile, an alligator, and a shark.

edit: and shoot a deer.

gotta be in running for top spot for those criteria.
You forgot a hog lol I have seen them tree ground hunters that used bows and even single shot rifles. They are tough and sows get mean
 
Back
Top