35 Years of Giant Deer: ‘North American Whitetail’ Reflects on History

DENVER (October 10, 2017) – What has changed in the last 35 years of deer hunting and management? “Almost everything,” North American Whitetail Editor-in-Chief Gordon Whittington claims. To illustrate his point, he just wrote an entire special section about this transformation, featured in the magazine’s 35^th anniversary collector’s issue. The 144-page issue is now on newsstands everywhere.

“Whitetail hunting is still one of the most popular outdoor activities across much of North America,” Whittington notes. “There are at least 10 million whitetail hunters today, along with a rising number of people managing land for deer. But younger whitetail enthusiasts might not be aware of how dramatic some of the changes of the past 35 years have been. Through this special section, we’ve tried to fill in some of the most important gaps for them.”

Hunting tactics have evolved in that span, due in part to new technologies that allowed for the development of such products as digital scouting cameras, laser rangefinders and carbon arrows. But according to the editor-in-chief, private-land deer management has seen some of the biggest changes of all.

“In 1982, when North American Whitetail published its first issue, very few hunters were focused on harvesting older bucks,” Whittington explains. “Today we have much more of an emphasis on quality over quantity. That’s led to a huge amount of time, money and effort being put into growing healthy deer in healthy habitats.”

Among the other key changes of the past 35 years, he points out, is the encouraging growth in the number of female hunters. Whereas the deer woods once were almost exclusively the domain of men and boys, today women and girls are proudly joining them in the pursuit of whitetails.

In this special section, Whittington also touches upon many of the greatest trophy bucks since 1982, including such legendary deer as Milo Hanson’s world-record typical from Saskatchewan and Mike Beatty’s world-record archery non-typical from Ohio. These are two of the enormous bucks whose stories were broken by the magazine over the years. The most recent of these giants was the huge non-typical Tennessee muzzleloader that Stephen Tucker took in November 2016. That incredible buck tallies 312 0/8 points on the Boone & Crockett scoring system, making him the world’s highest-scoring whitetail ever taken by a hunter. The deer and hunter were featured on the cover of North American Whitetail’s Spring 2017 issue.

There also is plenty of timely seasonal content in the magazine’s anniversary issue. Dr. James Kroll, widely known as “Dr. Deer,” looks at how the moon and rainfall affect the rut, and veteran hunter Travis Faulkner shares his tips on proper food plot placement. The issue also contains four real-life examples of using scouting camera images to pattern big bucks. And finally, game chef Derek St. Romain reveals his own favorite recipe for venison roast. It’s all part of a special package celebrating North America’s favorite big-game animal.

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