I have a good friend in a club in Fayette County. They have a bunch of land 3.5k acres and about 8 members. They ONLY shoot a deer after it has reached 5 years of age. They share game cam photos and keep up with their bucks age really good. They meet and form a hit list of bucks every season and do not shoot anything thats not on that list. They consistently kill 3 deer a year over 150, usually with a 160 in there. Biggest this year is 162. They do that year after year. If its 5 its fair game. Definitely not every deer they shoot at 5 is in the 150 range but most are at least 130. They do the things required to successfully kill those deer.
1. They have big acreage and low members.
2. Highly disciplined on their 5 yr old rule. You get one mistake and if you violate the rule again you are gone. No exceptions.
3. They share info with each other on their deer.
4. The members are seasoned hunters that have killed enough good deer that they are willing to wait on a exceptional deer. They don’t feel the need to kill a deer every season.
5.They feed protein in the spring and summer.
6. Limited guess policy and if a guest kills a deer it better be 5 years old.
This club is definitely not for most hunters including myself. The 4 yr olds on this club can be quite big and tempting for most hunters, myself included. I went one time as a guest and was really concerned about shooting a 4yr old on accident that I really didn’t enjoy myself.
No doubt that Alabama can produce really nice bucks if they make it to 5 years or older. The truth is that most hunters in Alabama just are not gonna wait that long and be that disciplined to wait that long and thats perfectly fine.
