Keep shooting those small bucks year in and year out, like you do in MI, and you'l never see the book bucks that I see and have taken in IL and WI. Shooting or arrowing a spike to small 8 point is a waste, want meat for the freezer, shoot the does...pass on the young bucks. In three years you'll be amazed by the results....

I agree. We hunt in an area in the UP that was QDM and still practiced by the local hunters. In the past it was spikes and small 4's, now we shoot only 2 1/2 year + 8 pts. I personally took three wall hangers in the last 4 years!

The DNR guess of the deer count is just that. They don't want the truth since they can then inflate number to suit their needs for selling more licenses. PERIOD! Where do they always take their count? Try the farmland where they shine large fields. Which by the way are posted closed to hunting imagine that bean counters.

The dnr doesn't know how many deer were harvested. They don't want to know, that way they can have more doe permits to make more money. It is not sound management and never was intended to be. Money is the driving force.