When it comes to the best deer hunting states, few hold the fascination quite like Iowa — to those whitetail hunters who don’t live in Iowa.
I’ve been doing this a long time (26 years to be exact), and I’m continually amazed by the grandiose illusions that Hawkeye State deer hunting evokes among nonresidents. In fact, I could set my watch by the comments that will show up on social media every year when deer seasons are winding down. I just ran across one last night, in fact. It went something like this:
A Facebook user posted a chart detailing Iowa’s deer season framework:
He then followed up with some commentary:
“If Kentucky, Missouri, Wisconsin, Indiana, Nebraska followed a similar model as IOWA, you’d see more and bigger bucks come out of those states every year.”
I don’t know this particular hunter, but he certainly has his heart in the right place. My guess is that he (like a lot of others) is obviously frustrated with his own hunting spots and wants bigger and better things for the land he hunts. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, especially considering the fact that he probably hunts in a high-pressure area on relatively small acreage (compared to what’s common in most parts of Iowa).
If you don’t read any further, let me be clear: The notion of somehow switching around season dates will do nothing to improve the overall number of bucks — or age thereof — for any state’s brethren to hunt next year (or the year after that, and so on).
There are myriad factors involved, but for the sake of time (and space), I’ll address the simplest reason in today’s blog post:
It’s a simple supply-and-demand numbers game.
First, let’s look at a few facts and supporting numbers from our Deer Hunters’ Almanac. Number 1: Iowa IS the Heartland. Secondly, more than 700,000 acres of crops are planted annually there. Add in the native foods, plus wildlife-specific foods (plots), and Iowa has more deer food, pound for pound, than any other state. Next, the state is home to 3 million acres of forestland. But that’s just background info for the real reasons why Iowa is a deer hunting fantasy land.
OK, now let’s look at the simple facts surrounding deer and deer hunting in Iowa compared to some other big deer hunting states:
IOWA:
Gun Hunters: 217,070
Bowhunters: 78,128
Deer population: 450,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 107,857
MISSOURI:
Gun Hunters: 487,533
Bowhunters: 177,061
Deer Population: 1.1 million
Deer Harvest Ave: 274,312
KANSAS:
Gun Hunters: 200,000
Bowhunters: 100,000
Deer Population: 600,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 143,170
NEBRASKA:
Gun Hunters: 113,000
Bowhunters: 16,400
Deer population: 325,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 46,238
ILLINOIS:
Gun Hunters: 223,000
Bowhunters: 163,000
Deer Population: 700,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 148,885
MINNESOTA:
Gun Hunters: 499,088
Bowhunters: 102,276
Deer Population: 1 million
Deer Harvest Ave: 171,724
WISCONSIN:
Gun Hunters: 619,938
Bowhunters: 253,924
Deer population: 1.3 million
Deer Harvest Ave: 336,464
MICHIGAN:
Gun Hunters: 579,000
Bowhunters: 322,000
Deer population: 1.6 million
Deer Harvest Ave: 360,666
OHIO:
Gun Hunters: 240,000
Bowhunters: 205,000
Deer Population: 700,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 172,040
INDIANA:
Gun Hunters: 215,554
Bowhunters: 60,844
Deer Population: 500,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 117,612
KENTUCKY:
Gun Hunters: 200,000
Bowhunters: 100,000
Deer Population: 650,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 143,170
PENNSYLVANIA:
Gun Hunters: 689,000
Bowhunters: 265,841
Deer population: 1.7 million
Deer Harvest Ave: 374,690
NEW YORK:
Gun Hunters: 560,000
Bowhunters: 240,000
Deer Population: 900,000
Deer Harvest Ave: 217,184
Again, digest all of these numbers. It doesn’t matter when you have your season; how that season framework is aligned; etc. Hunters are going to kill the deer if they’re there, and the resulting overall harvest is going to be (for all intents and purposes) roughly 25% of the overall deer population. If you are one of the privileged few to live in a state like Iowa (huge farm tracts, low hunter density, etc), you will have a greater chance of hunting mature bucks. Now, granted, hunters are hunting mature bucks everywhere, but the odds get shifted against you when your state’s hunting population is pushing a half-million to three-quarters-of-a-million or more. Again it’s simple math.
Please note: I did not include the Southern states, because their comparisons are even more complicated. That can be a blog topic for another day.
CONCLUSION
Why is Iowa so revered by deer hunters everywhere? That’s easy. Because Iowa holds the right ingredients, has enormous tracts of private ground, and has a fraction of the hunters that reside in other big deer hunting states.
Pore over the above numbers, and you’ll realize that all of these states are surprisingly similar in the fact that hunters kill off about a quarter of the deer herd every year — and that holds true whether you are one of the near-million-hunter army in Pennsylvania, or one of the just 225,000-ish hunters in Iowa. The key difference in that example is the average guy in Pennsylvania is probably hunting 30 acres surrounded by hunters on every corner of his property, and the guy in Iowa is probably hunting a large farm all by himself. True, bucks grow big when they’re left alone, but I’ll never lobby for fewer hunters in the woods. If you know me at all, my mantra is quite the opposite: More hunters = more fun, and a continuance of our hunting lifestyle for future generations.
For those reasons and more, the big-name deer hunters you see on TV, YouTube and elsewhere on the internet (not so coincidentally) all have bought and/or leased deer hunting land in Iowa. This includes the Kiskys, Lakoskys, Drurys, Lindseys and Cianciarulos, to name just a few. Must be nice? You bet it is — and good for them! But this is not reality for the rest of the whitetail world.
In the final analysis, if you pine to have deer hunting “as good as they have it in Iowa,” I have but one suggestion:
Move to Iowa.
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