Chances of Harvesting a Booner

[matchset]

i found this super interesting!

According to the Boone and Crockett Club as reported in June of 2009, only 1 out of 1.3 million deer hunters will EVER HARVEST a Boone and Crockett Whitetail Buck in their entire lifetime.

according to [Note from admin please read forum policy before posting again, thank you]

kind of puts things in perspective!

[MUSKY18]

WOW.....there goes that dream.

I am going to be the one that gets mine.....hope the rest of you do as well!

[Bear55]

I'd like to think my odds are a touch better then the rest of the herd.

[NaturesRespect]

will you let the data tell you that you have a 1 in a mil chance or would u rather forget that nonsense and let fate decide?

i truly believe there are manny giant bucks out there that people have not found its only a mtter of time that i will be the one to make the shot, if i play the game right and find them

[vister]

I'd like to think my odds are a touch better then the rest of the herd.

by the looks of the avatar, if you shoot that thing, you'll have two record entries with one shot!!

anyways, according to the stats indicated earlier...way off! I sure am willing to bet that more than one booner is shot in each state each year, which tells me something like one in three hunters shoot a booner in their lifetime, not one in 1.3 million?? its just that not that many people submit their dandy's to B&C or P&Y

[Abndoc]

I always let the B&C walk anyways...like catch and release...they have more swimmers right? Hunt for the future, I sure hope I'm right.

[sticknstring]

You have to hunt where booners exist in the first place!

[DonBo]

You have to hunt where booners exist in the first place!

That's the problem exactly! In 35 years of hunting I've seen MAYBE two that would qualify for B&C.

(dream sequence here...) but boy, that one. wow. 25 yards on the wrong side of the fence for 5-10 minutes. main frame 12, all i could do was count inches, all 200 of 'em, over and over...wow. (okay, back to the present. That was a nice break in the day)

[matchset]

i like what vister said; i believe a lot of it has to do with "submissions"

not a lot of guys are willing to pay "x" amount of dollars to have their name printed in a book.

ALSO,

B&C statistic has to do with NET score!

not gross, so that eliminates a lot of deer! i wont' say its easy to harvest a Gross booner, but its sure a lot more likely than harvesting a NET B&C!!!!

[mabr]

Id guess we hve a greater chance than they say, but not by much.

I honestly dont care about B&C. Now Pope and Young, thats acheivable. I also like the gross score, Who cares about deductions. The more bone the happier I am no matter where it is.

[mrklean]

i better start saving my money now

[Archerysniper]

I also like the gross score, Who cares about deductions. The more bone the happier I am no matter where it is.

Does your wife know this little secret of yours

[bottom-bouncer]

That a very believeable number 1 hunter out of 1.3 million. The stats just dont say why that number is the way it is. there are not alot of hunters who are going to let a 150 or 160 walk I would bet most hunters wouldnt let a 140 walk. and that is what has to be done to shoot a booner.

[nonteepical]

i like what vister said; i believe a lot of it has to do with "submissions"

not a lot of guys are willing to pay "x" amount of dollars to have their name printed in a book.

ALSO,

B&C statistic has to do with NET score!

not gross, so that eliminates a lot of deer! i wont' say its easy to harvest a Gross booner, but its sure a lot more likely than harvesting a NET B&C!!!!

minnesota hunters are pretty good at entering B&C deer. i don't know the odds, but it's pretty much guaranteed a once in a lifetime accomplishment and something to be proud of. Some hunters don't know how to go about getting it entered in the book for the "$40" entry fee and have the deer and hunter recognised in every printing forever.

gross isn't a score, so it can't eliminate anything.

[archerystud]

I missed my Booner in 95 so I may not get another chance.

A Booner would be nice but I'm happy if I can see a buck in the 135 inch or better range.

[vister]

I prefer gross scores. Nets are for fishing!!

[eyeguy 54]

REALLY!! Why should a rack be penalized for charachter!!!

[musky hunter]

Biggest deer I ever thought I ever saw was on my very first hunt when I was 16. I'll never forget it and it didn't quite allow me a shot. Nothing I have ever seen comes close, according to my elastic memory. That being said, I do believe the B&C club bucks are indeed at the very top of the pyramid, hardly any ever get there even if they do survive to die in a natural death, let alone be taken by a hunter. I have serious doubts that any exist where I hunt. It takes food plots and supplements, something few woods deer ever see.

[InTheNorthwoods]

That being said, I do believe the B&C club bucks are indeed at the very top of the pyramid, hardly any ever get there even if they do survive to die in a natural death, let alone be taken by a hunter. I have serious doubts that any exist where I hunt. It takes food plots and supplements, something few woods deer ever see.

While those things can certainly help a deer grow, those factors alone will never make a booner. The single greatest factor that leads to giant deer is AGE.

Look back over the record books for the state of Minnesota and you will see that big bucks were taken years before food plots and supplements were contemplated. You should also observe that many of those animals lived in the era of big tracts of land and in big forrests where they went largely unpressured by hunters in many cases. This allowed them age and consequently put on the inches.

The single best quote I have seen in this post that quantifies why many people will never have a chance at a booner is because most people would never consider letting a 140" deer walk (much less a 160" the next year) when those are the deer that need to be allowed to grow if you ever hope to kill a booner in the area you hunt.

[JigginGopher]

Genetics plays into this equation greatly as well and is a must for big deer! I've read that any buck given time to age will reach P&Y. This is not the case with B&C. A buck without good genetics and food could live an entire lifetime without ever reaching B&C.

[96trigger]

Quote:

The single best quote I have seen in this post that quantifies why many people will never have a chance at a booner is because most people would never consider letting a 140" deer walk (much less a 160" the next year) when those are the deer that need to be allowed to grow if you ever hope to kill a booner in the area you hunt.

Talk like that will really get people fired up. I know its true, but its exaclty what some people are worried about with APR. Give them an inch, they'll want a mile. Not saying you want that to happen, just saying its an interesting comment that adds validity to what alot of people were saying about the "trophy hunters".

[bottom-bouncer]

Trigger when I made the comment I wasnt even talking about or leading towards the whole apr trophy hunter argument. A 140,150,160 they are all nice animals and unless you know for a fact that there is a larger buck in your area very very hard to let them walk. I dont even want to see those 140's because they are so tempting they can be around just dont want to see them especially on those cold wet mornings when I just want an excuse to go home and get back in bed.

[InTheNorthwoods]

Talk like that will really get people fired up. I know its true, but its exaclty what some people are worried about with APR. Give them an inch, they'll want a mile. Not saying you want that to happen, just saying its an interesting comment that adds validity to what alot of people were saying about the "trophy hunters".

I think you're reading to far into my comment. I was simply making an observation. Bucks that get to 170" typical, or 190" non-typical, don't get there without having been something smaller in years past and surving past seasons. In effect, I was making the observation that many of the (few) animals that ever have potential to reach B&C are killed before getting there.

At the same time, I also think you'd be hard pressed to find many "APR advocates" or "QDM advocates" who would scoff at a person for shooting a 160" deer (or even a 140" deer). The fact is, most hunters will never shoot a true 140" deer (which is an entirely different conversation). Furthermore, letting that 140" or 160" walk means nothing in the way of "growing a booner" in the future if the potential of that deer is tapped, so there is not much incentive to let a big buck walk to hope he'll get bigger for most people.

In the end, its a simple observation that a booner gets to that stage because he's old enough, without age, you won't have booners. More "older" deer increases the odds of growing a booner, but there will still be very few that ever reach that size.

[Q_Shot]

I heard 47.3% of statistics are made up anyways!

[musky hunter]

Northwoods:

Very good points. Seems to me that if I really wanted to take a big buck, the best chance is to book a hunt on a ranch that:

caters to hunters

manages exclusively for big bucks (clients don't shoot young bucks)

generally plant something for them to eat in a food plot

have a gene pool that prefers bucks that reproduce big bucks

limits hunting pressure

But if I were to hunt public land, I'd conisder Kansas, Missouri, Alberta, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio. The hunting shows frequently choose these areas, and mainly near agricultural areas, because taking a big buck on film is worth money and sponsors and they have to hunt big buck where they are likely to get one. And while Minnesota and Wisconsin certainly have big bucks, I don't think either state would be my first choice if I were going striclly for a B&C buck.

To be sure, I believe everything you said about age is true because it does take 6 years or more for a buck to get that big a rack.

I live in Superior, WI. The city has had an annual deer hunt for the last eight years. Prior to eight years ago, hunting was prohibited. In the last eight years, I heard that only eight bucks out of several thousand deer killed by archers in Superior are known to be B&C size. While that can't be verified as true, it came from a very knowledgable source. That more B&C bucks haven't been taken tells me there were never many even during the first years when the city was overrun with unhunted and presumably older deer. My speculation is that big rack genes aren't all that common in the city population. The food source is here, a railroad yard spilling grain and people feeding galore, now outlawed). And the heavy hunting pressure also supports the longevity theory that these city bucks can't live that long to get really big now that they are hunted and hunted hard.