400-50 MT MULEY TAG

I am from up there and have hunted it my whole life. It is beautiful country with high deer densities but low trophy quality. The season used to run from late October to Mid November. Access is tough as mule deer bucks in northern MT are pretty well safe guarded. Honestly I'm really surprised they did this. In typical MT FWP fashion they thought more about opportunity than herd quality and health. There's 100 Draw Doe tags for that unit. They should have given 100 more as herds are way out of balance. In my lifetime I have shot only one truly nice mule deer in that unit and maybe seen 6-12 other Deer killed that were mature truly great bucks for their perspective home zone, most in the 150-160" range 3 Just over 170" and two true giants of 185+. The deer in the picture below is the largest deer ever shot on my grandmother's ranch took 17 years to find a buck that big and I shot him 60 seconds before the other guy pulled up to shoot him from the BMA across the canyon.
There's two types of landowners in that unit ones who want every deer gone and others who will only let you shoot a doe. With a large plethora of hunters who don't care as long as it has antlers it's dead. The one positive thing I can tell you is. You will never eat a better tasting mule deer in your life.
I wish you the best of luck and feel free to PM me with questions.
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Hi MT
 
Beautiful buck……I know this is an old thread but don't know how to pm….. I was thinking of heading over there next week. My daughter has a couple days off work and I would like to get her a chance at a buck….. she's just not quick enough in the timber yet…. Do those BMAs south of the river get pounded?
 
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