"It doesn't matter if you're talking about the flatlands of north-central Iowa, or the hills and ridges of northeast Iowa, the biggest bucks come out of areas where the terrain or restricted hunting access gives them time to grow trophy racks," Suchy said. "Hunters who make the effort to hunt remote areas, or get access to areas off-limits to other hunters, are the ones who see the most trophy-caliber racks."

While shotgun hunters have taken the most trophies in Iowa because of their sheer numbers, trophies taken by bowhunters tend to average slightly larger simply because those hunters are famously selective.

"I still shotgun hunt, because I just plain love to hunt deer, but bowhunting is my passion," said 37-year-old Brant Fox of Colfax. Fox and several friends established RealHunting (www.realhunting.us.org), a Web-based company that produces videos of Iowa deer hunts. Collecting and editing videos of deer hunts from across Iowa underlined Brant's suspicions about the tactics and strategies of fellow bowhunters.

"I'd say that bowhunters bring fewer deer out of the woods than shotgun hunters, but the deer that bowhunters bring out are significantly larger, on the average," Fox said.

Fox used to travel to southern Iowa in search of bigger bucks, but in recent years has found enough tantalizing bucks in central Iowa to reduce his travel expenditures.

"I'm not going to say exactly where they are, but there are a couple of bucks in central Iowa that are going to draw a lot of attention if somebody gets them," Fox said. "One is east of Des Moines, and the other one is southwest of Des Moines. Those are just two of the biggest I've seen or heard of. There are quite a few more in this area that are big enough that no self-respecting bowhunter would pass up a shot, if he got a chance. I've been hunting around here since I was 9 years old, and I'm convinced our hunters are slowly improving the overall size of our bucks by simply passing up shots at smaller bucks, and letting them get some age on them.

"RealHunting is involved with the annual Whitetail Classic held every spring in Des Moines," Fox added. "The size of the deer mounts that we saw at last spring's Classic was almost mind-boggling. We may be down on total deer numbers in Iowa in the past year or so, but you'd never know it by the size of the racks that the guys were bringing in."

PUBLIC POSSIBILITIES
The search for trophy racks leads many hunters in Iowa to forego public-hunting areas. Their thinking is that public areas are overhunted, and that few trophy bucks come from those oft-hunted tracts.

"Most of our public areas do get hit pretty hard during the shotgun seasons," said Hainfield, the wildlife biologist from northeast Iowa. "But up here, some of our areas are thousands of acres, with pretty rough ground, so there are places in the middle that don't see a lot of hunters."

Munkel, the wildlife biologist from west-central Iowa, noted that smaller public hunting areas actually favor early-season trophy hunters.

"Those areas have the habitat and food sources that attract deer through the winter, after the hunting seasons are over," he said. "They live there through the spring and summer, and they're often still associated with those areas when bowhunting season opens just before the rut begins. That's why bowhunters should never overlook public areas -- those places have the habitat, so they hold a lot of good deer during most of the year."

Munkel's mention of how Iowa's bowhunting season parallels the rut highlights the special advantage bowhunters have in the Hawkeye State. Bowhunting is the only hunting season open during the peak of the rut.

"That's good, but it can create a challenge if you don't understand deer behavior," Munkel said. "Everybody understands that bucks get a little crazy during the rut, so it gives hunters a chance to take bucks that are so preoccupied with sex that they do things that make them easier to hunt.