Yes, I know this will most likely start a raging war, but thats okay. I have read the story on the site about what makes a trophy, but it got me wondering, what is YOUR definition of a trophy? Along side that what is YOUR definition of "fair chase" and how does that affect how you look at your "trophy". What really is fair chase? Is it a rifle that kills a deer from 800 yds. before anything even knows a shot was fired? Is it a texas guided hunt that pretty much guarantees a "trophy" at a high dollar amount? Or a caged animal that has no actual chance of escaping? What about guides? If you struggle to kill a button buck in your home state, but then go with a Guide and kill a 140's buck with a super long range rifle, does that really count to you? I know it's all personal opinion, but what is your "trophy" based on? Inches maybe, memories, or even the challenges you overcame to harvest that animal? What really makes the animal special to YOU?
Fair chase for me is an uncaged free ranging animal. No fences or cages period. The animal should be free to go where it wants when it wants. As for weapon, that really is the individuals choice. Bow, crossbow, slug gun, or rifle it makes little difference in my opinion. Sure, some weapons give you a tremendous advantage. But who really are we to judge in that regard? Again as long as it's not in a fence or drugged animal... have at it. Trophies come in all shapes and sizes. I have a little ten pointer that I killed a couple years ago that I patterned and countless pics of. I'm proud of that deer and think he's a trophy even though he didn't have the headgear that other bucks I've taken have. For me, even a doe with a bow is a trophy in its own right.
what do you guys think about a guided hunt, because 2 weeks ago i went to a place called FE hill ranch in fairfield texas, it was a guided hunt, and you drove around in a truck, put on a spot and stalk or just shot your deer from the top of the truck with a high powered rifle, it just doesn't seem real even though it was a low fence hunt, it was over run with deer, and I shot 4 bucks in one day, look it up and tell me what you think (FE hill ranch in fairfield texas). do you guys think this counts?
I start right after the season is over. Jan 15th. Shed hunting, checking trail cam's, and putting out feed and mineral. Seeing who made it and who I can't find on cam's. Then it is off to shed hunting to see where these ghosts live. After that it is time for food plots and right in to the season again. I work my tail off all year to give the deer the best that I can. I don't shoot anything less than 150". That is my choice. A deer taken with a bow to me is a trophy. I'm not a fan of high-fenced hunts. I'm not a fan of pay to play hunts at all. To me that is an easy way out. That is not hunting to me. That is shooting fish in a barrel. The bigger your wallet the bigger the fish. JMO
I don't care for guided hunts in general but some would be okay on free range animals. I'd like to kill an elk and a caribou but both areas are so far from what I'm familiar with that I'd be safer with a guide. To me a trophy is any mature deer with a bow or a gun. Wall worthy for me would be in the 140's if he had a lot of character or a cool story...as a minimum. Otherwise, a deer needs to really break 150 for me to consider a shoulder mount.
I think some people need to get off their horse. To each their own. That's final! A guy who pays a guide to take him to a pre scouted spot is nothing wrong. Not everyone ha the time to live in the woods and scout like some of you. Or has a property to call their own. I am very much like some of you and scout and hunt 365 days a year. But I know lots of guys who don't. Because they either work a lot or just don't have the circumstances to do so. So to say a guy who just shows up to a guided hunt is no trophy is such a anti hunter statement it's not even funny. As hunters we should be proud of any hunters success. No matter how they killed it or where. This brings back the arguement that was previously on the forum of why hunting buddies are always jealous of your buck. Either you have a "really good property" , you use bait, you have lots of time off work to hunt I can't, I only shoot deer bigger then a certain size, I only shoot deer over a certain age. The list goes on all day. Hunters always have a reason to discredit everyone else. Just be happy for everyone and their own success or trophy. The new ontario white tail record was last year. It was a old man who shot this deer about 8 years ago. Had the euro mount sitting on his fireplace. A big deer enthusiast saw the rack and nearly crapped himself. He told the owner you need to get this measured its a potential record. The old man said to him. Oh that guys nothing you should see the one in the garage. He took him to the garage where the rack was actually smaller then the one in side. He was confused and said this one is smaller. The old man said no it wasn't this guy was about 40lbs heavier then the one inside. Point of the story this old mans trophy was the amount of meat he got. He shot with a rifle during gun season. Never gave a **** about records. I'm going to discredit this 190+" deer cause it was shot with a rifle by a guy who probably shows up to a farm with zero scouting and shoots this beast???? Hell no! Good for him. I don't care if he can't spell white tail deer. He shot it legally and now all the best to him for harvesting something like that.
View attachment 54860 so the first ones are the deer I shot with guides, and the next one is a buck I shot saturday (my first with a bow).
Shane congrats on those deer. Enjoy hunting, whatever that means to you. Don't worry about what others think. Your very young and over the years will start to realize the world is full of people who have an opinion, and if you oppose their opinion. Well your just wrong. Cause they said so. Looks like you and your father had a blast together. Put that buck on the wall. And anyone who tells you your trophy is not a trophy because you didn't hang the stand yourself, check the cameras etc. my response to them would be to remove all your clothes and go F off. Because you didn't shave the sheep, sew the shirt etc.
95% of my hunts are self guided archery hunts in an area I've never stepped foot in again. Anything less than that is cheating IMO. (Disclaimer, I've cheated via the following methods before: Dogs, Bait, Guides, Rifles, Scents, Boats, Muzzleloaders, Camo, Treestands, Private Land, Airplanes) My definition of a trophy is whatever puts a smile on the successful hunter's face. My definition of fair chase is so situational I can't give a cookie cutter answer. I guarantee if you if I had a $10k bet on the line and had to choose between bowhunting a 5k acre high fence ranch vs a long range rifle on public land... I'd be wearing orange every day of the week and twice on Sunday.
I've been on two guided whitetail hunts now and I can tell you from my own experiences that I have never hunted harder. For me personally, when I was looking to go out of state, I wanted to find a person who had very good property to hunt with good bucks on them. I didn't want this guide to hold my hand, just point me in the right direction. Once i'm in the tree, I'm on my own. I live in PA, where 150+ class animals are few and far between. To have the opportunity to hunt deer like that, I need to go out of state. To give myself a fighting chance on a 5 to 7 day hunt, I need an outfitter. I have no idea what the property he owns is like, deer patterns, etc. I do not have the time or resources to spend the off season patterning and learning the deer in a place 1000 miles away. Going to an outfitter for a week to hunt free range animals is far from cheating. My first out of state hunt I struck out on, even though the outfitters' trailcams proved I had big bucks in the area during daylight. My second hunt I was successful. I hardly think thats cheating. Cheating, IMO, is high fence, drugged animals, shooting out of the windows of a truck, etc. Spending 7 days in a treestand in unfamiliar woods that is known to hold big deer is not. If 95% of your hunts are self guided in places you've never been to before, and you're consistently successful at trophy class animals, you're probably the best hunter I know and should have your own TV show.
A trophy cannot be defined with definitive terms or adjectives as hard as some try to do so. A businessman I know pays high dollar to go to outfitters of varying levels of guided (some just point in directions, others basically hunt with you 100% of the time and say yes or no) because he doesn't like not having the chance at a Booner here in Indiana around every tree (exaggeration I know). Now some of his out of state kills are no doubt trophies to him, to someone else nope. Some would state that my bucks I've taken heading to a food plot isn't a trophy, others yes. Trophy is a term determined by the person doing the distinguishing and no one else. I personally hold bow kills in higher regard than gun kills...doesn't make the gun kills I see any less of an accomplishment at all I personally just love bow hunting more and understand it usually isn't as easy to accomplish as with a gun. I think a similar mindset can be said for many different things from receiving guide services, using bait, food plots and any other debated thing. Bottom line to me though it is only for the hunter who accomplishes the harvest to know whether it is a trophy or not. Can the hunter look at it and be proud of how it was harvested, and if so it's a trophy to them and that's all that matters. If it is legally taken and fair chase than for me label it a trophy whether it was a booner killed at 700 yards or a 60 inch yearling killed at 20 yards with a crossbow. Fair chase was nailed by muzzyman...see his response for a clear definition of what that is.
Lmao.... So your the guy I've always wanted to meet. Your the guy in all the movies. Bends over and finds deer crap as soon as you get out of the truck. You stick your finger in it, taste it. Then point and say 168" buck that way, 80 yards. Give me a break. If I'm hunting out of province I'm hunting with someone I know who knows the area, or a guide. I'm not gonna pretend I'm Rambo. Jim shockey travels the world with guides. Let me guess is not a real hunter right? You guys make me laugh. I too would choose long range rifle over fence hunt any day. But fence hunt and guided hunt are not even in the same universe so I can't believe they are being compared.
To me trophy just would be something I'm happy with or whoever is happy with for them. Whether it's a big rack, small, doe, shed, rub, picture, memory or whatever. I don't think it should have to measure up to anyone else's standard if it's for yourself. If you're part of a group and decided inches or points or something was the measuring stick, then go with that. I'm not competitively hunting so I'm really not doing it for anyone else. Too many variables to rank possibilities. Fair chase, I just leave it at legal. Too many variables there too and seems like state to state zone to zone is all different so I don't feel I'm a high enough power to tell people they're right or wrong beyond that. I think there's definitely different degrees of it, but not worth me devaluing someone's happiness or my own Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Either you chose to overlook my sarcasm, or you simply don't possess a sarcasm meter. I openly admitted I have hunted with a rifle, guided, over bait, among a slew of other methods many consider not fair chase. Why? Because I enjoyed them. It's funny how everyone must compare their method to others, or justify why they use easier methods. Why? Who cares? Hunt however makes you happy, shoot whatever makes you happy, and enjoy life. I come up empty handed on over half of my hunts because of a slew of reasons. One of the top being that I'm not the great white hunter. I just enjoy being out in the backcountry.
I hunt for myself, my wife, and my family only. I'm not the star of a hunting show and don't have quotas to make for a network. I get to hunt for enjoyment only! I've never hunted anything with a bow besides kansas whitetail deer. Our family has thousands of acres of prime private farm ground and creek bottom timber. To some that may be considered an unfair advantage already. But, to me, harvesting 150" class mature bucks, that I have years of history accumulated on and with bow and arrow are what I consider trophies. I could shoot a 130" every year. I could probably kill a 140" every year. But, I have no interest in that as a land manager and steward of our ground. But when they make that jump to 4.5 and older and have the headgear to match and I scout, plan, setup, and kill them that is a trophy to me. If I We're to go hunt elk, or moose, or bear hunting in an unfamiliar territory it is likely I'll use a guide and have no problem doing so. I'd want to learn their wisdom of the game I'm pursuing and also stay safe in foreign woods. If I harvested an animal with my bow it'd still be a trophy in my book. Where I draw the line is caged high fence hunts. I have no desire to ever do one, and could not regard the animal as a trophy. These are just my thoughts, and that's how I feel on the subject of what defines a trophy.
"canned hunts". I think thats the term we're searching for here. You know, the high dollar hunt in high fences where you get to choose the size of the animal you want and pay in advance for an animal like that. The type of hunts where the guide holds your hand every step of the way, all but squeezing the trigger. I read about a "hunt" you could basically browse bucks on a web site, pick the one you wanted and show up. The deer was "prepared" by being drugged. Whatever drug it was, made the deer crave water upon coming to. It just so happens that a stand is setup next to the only watering hole on the 5 acre preserve where the "hunter" would wait for his trophy. Pretty sick isn't it?
