Oregon Expectations

[BlacktailTracker]

This is way cooler to me than a younger 4 point.

How many people have a 28” wide fork? Plenty of people have 160 4 points. Shit deer are cool to me.

Dang that's sweet.

 

[Oregon]

Everyone has a different expectation. I can’t bring back the good old days. I live in reality. If you’re mad at them. You will find a good one. Got a guy in camp still mad at them. He kills 170-180 every time he has a tag. He leaving camp at 0400 coming back at 1900. Sleeping on the hill at lunch. Putting 14-16 miles a day on his feet. Us older guys, who have plenty of good bucks are putting 3-4 miles a day and content with 22” bucks anymore.
I’ve said before, and I’ll say it again. If you aren’t mad at them, you won’t consistently kill good bucks. Mulies or Blacktails.

 

[BRTreedogs]

This is way cooler to me than a younger 4 point.

How many people have a 28” wide fork? Plenty of people have 160 4 points. Shit deer are cool to me.

I’m not trying to say anything bad about your deer.
I just think a hunt where the top end is 160 is a major regression in Oregon
It should be better than that.

We used to be a B&C contender.

If you want to shoot another big fork you can do it from my sliding door while sipping hot coco tho.

 

[BRTreedogs]

Here’s another.

 

[WRO]

I’m not trying to say anything bad about your deer.
I just think a hunt where the top end is 160 is a major regression in Oregon
It should be better than that.

We used to be a B&C contender.

If you want to shoot another big fork you can do it from my sliding door while sipping hot coco tho.
View attachment 1015322

Fact is most of the nation is 160/170 top end hunt, there’s very few places left where there’s truly big deer, none have easy tags on public land.

 

[BRTreedogs]

Fact is most of the nation is 160/170 top end hunt, there’s very few places left where there’s truly big deer, none have easy tags on public land.

Just because that’s all that’s left doesn’t make it good.

 

[WRO]

Just because that’s all that’s left doesn’t make it good.

Agreed..

But through that lens’s it puts it in perspective, it seemed like I’d find a 200+ deer every couple years in the early 2000s, besides the pauns, in haven’t seen 5 in the last decade even on the winter range.

 

[Bramblehart]

There are certainly good mule deer to be had if you hunt hard, but the population numbers are a shadow of what they once were.

 

[Jaden Bales]

Fact is most of the nation is 160/170 top end hunt, there’s very few places left where there’s truly big deer, none have easy tags on public land.

I think this is probably the best perspective in the thread. Giants seem to come from dang near anywhere, but the average hunt that I've been on or guided across the west mirrors this. Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, etc. We've got a good podcast planned to dive in deeper into why this is coming up!

 

[WRO]

I think this is probably the best perspective in the thread. Giants seem to come from dang near anywhere, but the average hunt that I've been on or guided across the west mirrors this. Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, etc. We've got a good podcast planned to dive in deeper into why this is coming up!

Its a sad state, but honestly everyone wants to look at the old glory days, but honestly how many of those deer were 180+ even with higher populations and rut general season hunts? The old guys talk about 30" deer, yet a lot of them were just pinched off 150/160 deer. 180+ is a big deer, most guys see deer with fish eye lense pictures on social media and have a misguided judgement of what we should expect.

Because of the if its not a 4 point, its not a trophy mentality we have absolutely hammered the genetics in many places leaving big 2 and 3 point genes to fight it out during the rut.

I have enough guys who do Mexico that I know, the glory days of LF deer down there are over as well.

 

[BRTreedogs]

All you have to do is look thru the records books and see the plenty of big deer used to get killed.

Just because there is almost a non existent amount of big deer left.

Doesn’t mean that hunting 150 bucks is good.
It may be good for you, there may be lots of other things that make the hunt good.

And even at that you’re implying that the 150-160 bucks are practically ghosts.

The landscape should be covered in those and you should have to keep picking thru them in hopes of finding a next level buck.

You shouldn’t have to be Mr fitness king, long range mule deer backpacking specialist to find the single 160 buck in a unit.
You’re talking yourself into that what’s left is good.
Is the old haggard bar fly that’s left at closing time good?

No, you mite be happy to take her at the time but it’s not good.

 

[david2duck]

I’m a guy that’s happy to kill a mature buck no matter the score but also agree our deer herds are in bad shape compared to even 10 years ago. There are still big deer out there but you have to work much harder for them. We need some major changes and we need them sooner than later.

 

[MicahHof1925]

Just got back from a trip to the east side of OR. We saw 250+ mule deer, all on public land, and all concentrated in one 7 mile ish stretch of what I presume is their winter range. Quite a few young small 2x3 - 4x4 bucks. There was one group of 4 bucks that were all 20”+ 4x4 types with the best one being around 25” wide and 155” class.

We only saw one old mature buck with a group of 7 does. 28” ish very heavy 2x3. Very impressive looking buck. We covered about 1/4 of the very large unit, only that one spot held deer, the rest we covered was completely barren of deer with little to no sign. We were there at first and last light, mid day you would not see but a few.

A different E OR unit I’ve hunted on and off since the mid 90’s used to give out up to 1,200 tags at its peak, most years 600-750. In 2025 under 300 tags. I used to see 50+ deer a day there in the areas I frequented, now single digits in the same areas.

If you want to start hunting the east side my advice is to pick a unit you can draw often, every 2-5 years, scout it well and go hunting. If you go in cold, you will likely be frustrated. Our mule deer are struggling vs the recent past, but good fun hunting is still out there.

This is what an actual helpful post to this thread looks like. With the new units, are you seeing the unit layouts to be pretty accurate to the deer herds?

 

[Tmac]

This is what an actual helpful post to this thread looks like. With the new units, are you seeing the unit layouts to be pretty accurate to the deer herds?

I have not spent enough time in the new units to say for sure. But the collar studies I’ve looked at suggest they match up better with herds than the old unit boundaries.

I did call the biologist after I returned, the concentration I saw in that one 7 mile ish stretch was in fact winter range and he said those deer migrate to summer in another state. In that case not much one can do from OR during hunting season. So go figure. I’ll just keep poking around and figure out a couple new units to focus on over the next year or two.