Meat hunter bags one with a rack - is he any good?

T

Tomas

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I've always hunted for meat...cow tags for elk, or spikes, bagged whatever mule deer I saw, no regard for antler size. Frankly, I never really paid any attention to a "nice rack" (in the ungulate realm) while hunting.

So this year I'm hunting an area on public land in Idaho where our group (also a bunch of meat hunters) knows elk and deer roam, and I see this guy, a 5x5, climbing the rocks. I'm looking through the scope and the rack seems pretty good. 180gr .308 Fail Safe breaks his spine behind the head and it's over.

I've only been hunting 9 years now, but the guys in camp say he's pretty nice. I take the rack to a guy I know who scores these and he says, after a bit of measuring and what not, 152 7/8. He also said something about 180 and above being valuable. I'm just wondering, and be honest, is this a "nice" typical, "average", ho-hum? Seems like 152 7/8 is a long way from 180.

Either way, I'm keeping it.

tx.

tom
 
It isn't a big trophy rack. It is a very nice one though and nothing to sneeze at.

Really the only one you have to impress is yourself.
 
It's a respectable buck, and certainly worth being proud of.

My father-in-law killed this buck many years ago, and it scored 268 and change. This one would be "valuable" if it were for sale. It's not.

Yes, that's a full-sized freezer behind it.

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Looks to me what I'd call a "real nice young buck". Not a bragging buck, but plenty nice. I'd saw the front of the skull and mount that rack on one of those little plaque deals like I've seen at WalMart. On the wall, it's always gonna be a memory of a good day.

I have a bunch of antlers nailed to a crossbeam in my garage. Even after all these decades I remember those hunts and the folks I was with, the kind of day, all that stuff. Memories...
 
My boss would fire me for failure to shut up and stop bragging to everyone if I shot that deer.

I guess its all in the eye of the beholder, but seriously, that looks like a keeper (especially on public lands) to me.
 
He would be better BY FAR than any deer I ever pointed a gun at... The rack would either be on a beam in the barn or possibly my first indoor rack on a plaque as Art describes...

It would surely end up being my hat rack of daily wear ball caps.

Very respectable deer and looks like a good meat deer to boot!

Brent
 
Just mumbling out loud, from the picture. I could easily be way wrong.

Offhand, from the thickness of the antlers, I'd figure a fairly young deer. 2-1/2 to 3-1/2, maybe. However, the antlers are sorta dark, which commonly means a tad of age, so maybe 3-1/2. Older bucks might not necessarily be wider or have more points, but the beams would likely be heavier.

IOW, he oughta be real good eating. :D

Our desert mule deer down here seem to maybe have ears a bit longer than those in the picture. Figure here, tip to tip of 19 to 20 inches, so antlers sticking out wider than that mean it's a pretty nice buck. The biggest I've ever seen down here was an old Grandaddy who stuck out at least a good four to five inches either side of his ears. Sway-backed, pot-bellied and seriously BIG! :) Unfortunately, it was a couple of months prior to season opening. :( Aw, well, rationalize: Nuthin' but horns and sausage.
 
Thanks all for the replies.

He has been a good eater. I don't really eat tons of burger, don't do jerky, and only a little sausage...I steak 80% of my meat, and even the stuff on the thighs has been tender, sweet even, and yummy.

Art, his inside spread is 20 inches, so them are some pretty big ears, methinks.

tom
 
This mule deer has a decent size rack. It hung around our back yard for many years............................except during hunting season.

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I am like you the first critter I see without antlers gets whacked, unless it has nice antlers like the one you found. So naturally I have never shot a deer with antlers. I can't see shooting a forky horn during archery season when I can shoot a doe.

As far as your deer goes though I would mount him (on the wall) and be happy to have a nice looking animal like him.
 
Congrats first. I'm a meat hunter too and I believe the worth of a trophy is the hunters alone. ALL My deer are a trophy for one reason or another, to remember the hunt or shot or time spent.He looks like a fine Deer to me. good job.:D
 
I'd like to have this guy measured out but he hung out on my property and I didn't shoot him. I was selling a couple of rifles to a guy that offered me $5000 if I let him shoot the one that was even bigger that hung around this guy. I have a picture of the bigger one but it has a buckeye tree in the background and you can't tell what's horn and what's branches. He had so many tine splits that I couldn't count the points on one side, he looked like he was crossed with an elk. This one is more typical.


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