Photo by Billkenney.com

Want to tag a trophy whitetail buck in Iowa this year? Well, data gathered from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources’ Trophy Deer Registry would suggest that there are in fact certain places and certain ways in which to hunt deer that improve the odds that your buck will be wall-worthy.

The Trophy Deer Registry is a record of whitetail racks taken in Iowa that meet minimum Boone and Crockett or Pope & Young guidelines (see the editor’s note at the end of this article). Since the registry is voluntary, it doesn’t comprise every qualifying buck in every county, and — owing to the time required to allow racks to air-dry and then be measured — it lags one year behind hunting seasons. But it has proved useful for tracking locations of kills and methods of take, and can arguably aid in predicting where and advising how to tag Iowa’s future trophies.

RECENT HISTORY
During the latest registration period (October 2003 through September 2004), 520 racks qualified for entry in the Trophy Deer Registry’s shotgun, muzzleloader and bow divisions. Shotgun hunters contributed 202 trophies, or 38 percent of the total trophy deer entered, frontloader enthusiasts added 39 entries to tally 7 percent of entries, and bowhunters added the majority of trophies, totaling 54 percent with 279 entries.

The analysis of the areas in which shotgunners, muzzleloader hunters and archers killed their registry-worthy bucks indicates strong trends in regional trophy potential and hunting practices.

Hunters in Allamakee County, in far northeast Iowa, and Marion County, in south-central Iowa, tied for the most entries to the registry, tallying 20 trophies each during the latest registration period. Entries in Allamakee County were equally divided, with 10 of the qualifiers being taken by means of shotguns and the balance slain by arrows. Those 20 entries helped Allamakee County maintain its longstanding position as Iowa’s top trophy-producing county, tallying 361 entries since the IDNR began to maintain the registry back in 1953.

Twenty trophies — 10 killed by shotgunners, eight taken by bow-hunters, and two brought down by muzzleloader hunters — added to those taken in over a half-century served to enable Marion County to continue occupying its position as second in all-time entries (269) in the registry.

Linn County, in east-central Iowa, added 19 trophies to become the third-highest producer of trophies during the latest registration period. Oddly, Linn County ranks only 27th in all-time trophies registered, raising the question of whether that county’s trophy potential has mushroomed, or if more of its hunters made the effort to register their trophies than in previous years. Of the trophies entered by Linn County hunters, five were taken by shotgun, 14 by bow.

Madison and Monroe counties both added 18 trophies to the registry to tie for fourth place in the latest registration. Hunters in Madison County took six of their entries via shotguns, nine by bow and arrow, and three by muzzleloaders. Monroe County deerslayers used shotguns to take nine of their entries, while archers claimed seven qualifiers; smokepolers contributed two entries.

TOPS FOR TROPHIES
Plot the aforementioned top trophy-producing counties on a map, and it’s obvious that far northeast and south central Iowa are our top regions for trophy whitetails. Allamakee County is regularly one of our top two counties for total deer harvested (antlered and antlerless), so it only makes sense that it also ranks high for trophy-caliber bucks.

Linn County has in recent years developed a strong reputation for its bowhunting potential, and archers there have helped boost the county’s standing in the registry. Time will tell whether it’s an excess big bucks or an appreciable increase in the numbers of bowhunters that’s the cause of Linn County’s recent surge in trophy registrations.

Marion and Madison counties are part of a region in south-central Iowa that’s gaining national recognition for the number and quality of whitetail bucks that originate there. Add Monroe, Warren, Appanoose and Lucas counties, and you have six of Iowa’s top 10 all-time trophy producers, all in south central Iowa.

It isn’t until 13th place in the all-time standings that a county outside the northeast, southeast, and south-central regions makes a showing. Monona County, in western Iowa’s rugged Loess Hills, has totaled 134 trophy entries in the registry. The only other outlying county to crack the top 25 is Harrison County, another western county blessed with the rugged terrain of the Loess Hills that helps bucks live long enough to develop trophy racks.

This doesn’t mean that hunters in northern and central Iowa should despair of tagging a buck big enough to meet the registry’s guidelines. Trophies have been registered from every one of Iowa’s counties. In fact, northwest Iowa’s pool table-flat, intensely farmed Pocahontas County saw a 100 percent increase in its trophy tally in 2004, when Les Traub of Rolfe entered a 160 1/8 rack taken in Pocahontas County in 2003 to increase that county’s all-time total to … two.

“There are trophy deer in every county,” said IDNR deer biologist Willie Suchy. “There are just more trophies where there are more deer, and there are more deer where there’s more habitat. That’s why northeast, southeast and south-central Iowa are always going to be our prime deer hunting areas.”

PUBLIC TROPHIES
Fortunately, some of our best regions for trophy deer also have some of our largest tracts of public timber.

Yellow River State Forest, the Sny Magill Bottoms, and the Green Island Area total nearly 20,000 acres of prime publicly-accessible deer habitat in northeast Iowa. In southeast Iowa, the various tracts of Shimek State Forest provide more than 5,000 acres of public hunting, and timbers around Lake Sugema, Lake Odessa and Lake Rathbun add several thousand more public acres to that region’s trophy hunting possibilities.

South-central Iowa also has plenty of public hunting areas, including tens of thousands of public acres in widely scattered tracts of Stephens State Forest, the Mt. Ayr Wildlife Area, and the land surrounding Lake Red Rock.

“Everybody assumes that our public ground gets overhunted,” noted Suchy. “In my experience, our public land is better (for hunting) than public land in most other states. Guys from out East or down South think they’ve died and gone to heaven with the hunting they get on our public areas, compared to what they’re us
ed to in their home states.

“Having said that, I admit that the public areas tend to get a lot of pressure during the shotgun seasons. But bowhunters who hunt those areas before shotgun season, during the rut, and muzzleloaders who hunt after shotgun seasons, when deer are looking for good winter habitat — those are the guys who are going to be happy with the deer they see in our public areas.”

PRIVATE VS. OPEN ACCESS
In recent years, grumbling has been heard among Iowa hunters increasingly taken aback by the ever-enlarging amount of land that’s being bought or leased for hunting. Much of that leasing or purchasing has so far occurred in south-central Iowa, but the activity is plainly on the increase in northeast Iowa. Willie Suchy has been monitoring the privatization of hunting access in Iowa, and said the process justifies some concern.

“There are some areas in southern Iowa and a few areas in northeast Iowa where leasing is preventing the harvest we need,” he said. “Some of the lessees have the attitude, ‘The more deer, the better,’ and they aren’t actively killing does — they’re just cherry-picking the biggest bucks, and that could cause problems down the road.”

Suchy explained that the IDNR’s deer management policy of encouraging the harvest of does is actually a de facto way to manage our state’s deer herd to maximize trophy bucks.

“If we don’t aggressively kill does, the deer population will grow and we’ll have all sorts of problems with crop damage, damage to the understory of our forests, and a lot of expensive insurance claims due to deer-vehicle accidents,” he noted. “For the most part, our hunters have done a fantastic job of buying into our strategy of killing does to fill their tags, passing up small bucks, and taking only the older, larger bucks for trophies.

“If hunters who lease hunting rights don’t follow the same strategy on the land they control, they’ll eventually have too many deer. The habitat will degrade, and the quality of the bucks will decline.”

Randy Scheel of Garrison and several of his deer hunting partners have seen the benefit of selectively hunting the several tracts of Hawkeye timber that they either own or have acquired hunting rights to. They have a tradition: If one of them kills a buck, he must pay to have the rack mounted. If the hunter isn’t willing to pay to have the rack mounted, he loses the right to hunt with the group.

“It makes you think twice before you take a shot,” said Scheel. “But in the past three or four years we’ve seen a major increase in the quality of deer in our area, simply because we take does for meat, and kill trophies only when they’re good enough to justify spending the money to have them mounted.”

Ryan McClanahan of West Des Moines is a recent and now fanatical convert to the strategy of harvesting only the biggest bucks. “I hunted with a shotgun for 10 years trying to get a trophy buck,” said McClanahan. “Then two years ago a buddy got me started bowhunting, (which) has been a revelation for me — you get longer seasons to hunt, and you have a chance to pick and choose which bucks you take instead of shooting at whatever runs by when you’re shotgun-hunting.”

McClanahan now takes two months off work each fall specifically to bowhunt. Last year, after using a trail camera to identify a big buck in northwest Dallas County near Perry, McClanahan hunted the buck every day for two months, finally watched it for 10 minutes as it followed a doe toward the hunter’s stand, and had a window of opportunity lasting mere moments during which it was in range and offered a clear shot.

The buck’s gross score of 168 points whetted McClanahan’s appetite for trophy whitetails. He and his hunting partners are currently studying trail-camera photos to identify this year’s targets.

“Trail cameras almost make it worse,” he observed, chuckling.” You have proof that some big ones are out there, but they just plain disappear during the season. The one I shot was holed up in a little thicket that was apart from the rest of the timber. It took me all bow season to get that one five-second opportunity to get him.”

This year McClanahan may use a new muzzleloader to increase his chances of tagging another trophy-caliber buck. “It’s all about time in the field, when it comes to getting a really big buck,” he said. “Muzzleloading season just increases the chance I’ll be there when a big boy comes out of hiding. They’re definitely out there — you just have to find them.”

SIZE DOES MATTER
While all of Iowa’s bucks come from the same basic gene pool and feast on the same smorgasbord of Iowa crops, indications are that bucks in south-central Iowa manage to produce racks slightly larger than average.

Analysis of entries in the registry over several years identifies a trend for higher-scoring racks to come from Warren, Monroe and other south-central counties. Hunters certainly take racks scoring 180 and larger in northeast Iowa, but the trend is for northeastern entries to favor the 150-160 range, while south central bucks lean more toward 160 and higher scores.

“The guys up in northeast Iowa know how to hunt deer,” said Suchy. “Even with the rough terrain they have up there, and the sheer numbers of deer that are available, it might be a little tougher for a buck to get enough years on him to produce a really huge rack. South-central Iowa has a lot of broken timber and brushy draws, and I think that broken habitat helps more bucks escape when shotgunners run drives through an area.

“In Iowa, it’s all about habitat and terrain when you’re talking about trophy deer If a buck finds the right habitat and terrain so he can live a few more years than the average buck, he’ll probably have an above-average rack, and maybe live long enough to become a monster.

“There’s probably one or more (monster bucks) in every county, but there are probably a few more than average in northeast, southeast and, especially, south-central Iowa.

“And,” Suchy concluded with a wry laugh, “that’s about as close as I can pinpoint it. Even us wildlife biologists have a tough time figuring out exactly where the biggest bucks are hiding.”

(Editor’s Note: Following are the minimum requirements, expressed as B&C or P&Y points, for inclusion in the Iowa Trophy Deer Registry.