The thundering crash of the huge boulder echoed through the canyons. The dust billowed in the still air as the rock dislodged numerous small stones and crunched through hillsides of scrub oak. The violence of the moment had barely subsided when two deer burst from the cover some 300 yards below us. They scrambled up a small ridge and stopped, breathless and confused, wondering what all the uproar was about. It was difficult to determine with the naked eye anything other than that they were Arizona Coues deer with antlers. A quick check through binoculars showed that one of them was an exceptional trophy. The Husqvarna .243 cracked, the buck's knees buckled, and he slowly toppled over and rolled down the hill. My partner, Steve, pounded me on the back and exclaimed, "That one will go in the book for sure!" 
Many minutes later, when we finally arrived at the buck - following a harrowing slide down the 60 degree slope - we had a chance to examine my trophy more closely. The mouse-gray buck had a beautifully perfect rack, one that eventually ranked No. 28 in the Safari Club Record Book. The antlers had four perfectly matched tines on a side. That buck was 91 of the heaviest pounds I've ever had to wrestle out of a nearly inaccessible canyon. 

A trophy in the record book! A magnificent animal on the wall! All of us have dreams of someday getting a bragging size trophy. Each year, this dream is realized by a few lucky hunters. But how about the other guys who go home skunked? Some of them have tales of the one that got away, but most go home having seen just small bucks and does or nothing at all. Could it be that the majority of these hunters are hunting in the wrong places? 
Since October 1974 when I shot that Coues buck, I have killed or guided others to killing a number of trophy and record book animals. Luck? Part of it is. There is an element of luck in all hunting. But the one element common to all of these trophy kills is that we were hunting in an area that qualified as a trophy producing area. 
The one thing all hunters must do when after trophy-class animals is to hunt where they are. "You'll find 'em where you find 'em," as someone not so rich and not so famous (and slightly balding) once told me. So where do you find 'em? To kill a real trophy, you must first qualify your hunting area. Take the following checklist and go shopping for an area with wall-hangers. 
1. A trophy area must have a short hunting season. It is a biological fact that for a buck or a bull elk to develop full antler growth, he must be at least 5 years old. He is really in his prime at age 6 or 7 for bucks, 10 or 11 for bulls. (Beyond that, he tends to go downhill, much like an older man tends to lose some of his muscle tone.) If a hunting season is long sooner or later a buck or bull is going to run out of luck and bump into a hunter. An area with a long season doesn't give many animals a chance to age. 
How do you define a long season? Well, that is up to you, but I would think it depends somewhat on hunting pressure, ruggedness of terrain to be hunted, etc. Generally, I would say that you can take the state in which you are going to hunt and immediately eliminate 90 percent of the areas, using as a criterion the length of the hunting season. Be careful in doing this, however, because some areas may have had their season length shortened recently because of previous overhunting. Take a five-year average just to be safe. 
2. Your trophy area should have some restriction on the size animal that can be harvested. Look for an area that has a four-point-or-larger hunting restriction, or in the case of elk, a brow-tine restriction. I know there has been a lot of controversy over this subject, but I contend that to get big a buck or bull has to get old. They don't grow to trophy size by getting killed as a yearling. There is nothing dumber than a forkhorn buck or a spike elk. They will bounce out there and turn around and look at the hunter and become meat in the pot. If regulations protect that yearling this helps them get older and in the process they get smarter. Smarter animals live longer and grow bigger racks. 
3. Soil with good mineral content, particularly calcium and phosphorus, makes for big racks. antler growth in elk, deer, and moose depends to a great extent on the amount of calcium their bodies assimilate. Phosphorus acts as a catalyst to react with calcium and make it available in a usable form to the animal, much as enzymes help in the digestion of food. The US Geological Survey can help you determine which areas are high in calcium and phosphorus. 

4. Along with nutrition, a good gene pool is very important. Just ask a breeder of fine racehorses. If you want speed, get a fast mare and a fast sire. If you want antler growth, get a big buck to breed your does. How do you find out about the gene pool? Go on to #5. 
5. Your area must be a consistent producer of trophies. This is proof the genetic makeup of your herd. Any area can produce an occasional trophy. Also, some area have produced many big racks in the past but are only so-so at this time. A prime example of the latter is the Kaibab Plateau in northern Arizona. Once the place to go for a trophy buck, it is now only mediocre. True, an occasional monster still comes out of there, but not very many as a percentage of the deer herd or compared with what it used to produce. No doubt it will come back in the future, but for now it is not the best place to kill a whopper. In other words, an area must have recent trophies. 
One good way to find out is to call local taxidermists and ask them about the racks coming out of their herds. They will tell you whether the hunting has been excellent as far as trophies go. If the trophy quality has been poor, they will be glad to tell you, as they want less hunting pressure to enable the number of trophies to build back up. If the hunting is great, they want dedicated trophy hunters, not local meat seekers, killing bucks. Trophy hunters become a taxidermist's customers; meat hunters don't. A taxidermist will generally level with you. He has nothing to gain if you come and don't kill a big buck. 
You can also check the record books for recent scores, but there often is a delay of a year or two in getting scores into the books, and some hunters don't bother to score their trophies. This method is not infallible but can be helpful. 6. Your area must have limited hunting pressure, which is usually the result of some kind of "drawing for permit" system. Hunter numbers must be limited or the area gets overhunted. A prime and current example of this is the San Juan National Forest in Colorado. Because of much publicity and unlimited numbers of permits being issued, the numbers of big racks being taken there is declining. I guided there for six years, in the very area where the world record mule deer was killed. During those six years I saw hunting pressure increase to the point at which the quality of the hunting severely declined. About 90 percent of the elk killed in my area were spikes. The game department openly admits it is managing for numbers and not for trophy racks. I cannot speak for all areas of the San Juan, but the mountains northwest of Durango have been over hunted. Both hunters and outfitters must move on to areas that are harder to get permits for but offer better hunting. 
7. A trophy area must have lots of rough, rugged terrain. This eliminates 90 percent of would-be trophy hunters. Deer, elk, and moose must be able to hide. The area must be difficult to hunt; rough, steep, thick, tangled, abrupt, precipitous - all those kinds of adjectives. Find a place that looks like hell stood on end and you will find trophy country. The simple reason for this is less hunting pressure. 

For example, this past December I made my annual pilgrimage into the Coues deer habitat of southeastern Arizona. I'm hooked on hunting these little deer, and their season is this Wyoming outfitter's off-season, so it satisfies my trophy hunting appetite. I took a couple of friends with me. They claimed they were trophy hunters, but after three hard hours of horse-backing over a genuine mountain, they took one look from the top and decided to look for trophy bucks down in the flatter country. I persuaded them to stay and try the back side of the mountain for a while, but after a couple of hours they'd had enough, even though we saw several nice scrapes and some promising tracks. It's just too tough to hunt for 95% of the hunters. 
Even those hunters who get a good outfitter and have a good horse under them are bucking the odds. But that's where the big ones are! You've got to hunt where they live regardless of the inconvenience to yourself. 8. The area should have few local meat hunters. This goes right along with #7. If the area is so rugged that it is inconvenient for meat hunters to hunt there, they won't accidentally blunder into one of your animals. If the area is easy to hunt, you can bet the meat hunters will overhunt it. I've heard local guys say, "You hunt up there? You're crazy! Those cliffs can kill you! Besides, those big old bucks are tough eating. Give me a fat forkhorn off the hay fields. Now that's fine venison!" Leave the local meat hunters down below. come on up where the hunting is tough but great. 
9. A trophy area should have no rifle hunt during the rut. Big bucks and bulls get stupid during the breeding season. They also get thinned out if they are hunted. 
If you can bugle bulls in and shoot them with a rifle, you are going to kill off a lot of the population. If bucks are looking for mates instead of for an orange-clad hunter, they are going to end up as venison. The result? Fewer bucks and bulls around next year to grow big racks. Incidentally, the animals that are hunted prior to the rut or after the rut are super-smart. They don't come easy, but there are a lot more trophy-class animals in an area like that than there are in a hunt-during-the-rut area. 
The rut in most of the Rocky Mountain region takes place in November for mule deer, and September and early October for elk. Check with local game departments for any possible exceptions to this. 
10. The area you choose to hunt should have no late hunting season when there is the likelihood of deep snow. It is easier to spot animals and hunt them in deep snow, and the migration to winter feeding grounds bunches them up, so the result is fewer record book heads in an area like that. 
11. Last but certainly not least, you need to hunt with an outfitter who specializes in trophy hunting. The do-it-yourself hunter can be successful, but more often he comes home skunked. And it usually takes him three trips to the same area just to adequately learn it so he has a chance at these super-smart old animals. If he doesn't have a horse that is used to the altitude and to climbing mountains, forget it. Trying to get a bull elk out of one of these rugged areas without a good stout horse is next to impossible. 
All reputable outfitters have good horses, the right equipment, and a knowledge of the country, and are familiar with game movements. But an outfitter who specializes in trophies will do his utmost to see that you get that wall-hanger. His reputation is at stake if you kill a minnow. His reputation is enhanced if you kill a mossyhorn. Many outfitters will try to fill their hunter's tag with the first legal animal they see. After all, they have already been paid for the hunt, and if the hunter fills out early and goes home the guide gets some much needed rest. Also, it looks good on the brochure or reference sheet if he can say, "80% of our hunters were successful last year." How do you measure success? Will your guide try and talk you into shooting a "good" buck when what you really want is a great one? Does your guide really know the difference between a good buck and a record book head? Is he a trophy hunter himself, or does he just "take out" trophy hunters. (When you grill him about this last point, be fair. He may be a dedicated trophy hunter and still not have heads in the book that he personally killed. After all, he is usually working all through the hunting season. Rather, ask what specific wall-hangers have been killed by his clients.) Does he bowhunt? An outfitter who loves to trophy hunt often takes up bowhunting to get in more hunting time. During rifle season he is working full time. Is he dedicated to the fact that you are his client, you have paid for the hunt, and your wishes are the reason he is in business? Ask references about this. 

Will your outfitter/guide give you an honest appraisal of the buck you are glassing? The following is the basic idea of what a guide should say in such an instance: "That one is better than 90% of the bucks in this area. It will spread about 28 inches and should score well, but it is not a record book head. If you decide to kill it you will have a nice trophy to hang on the wall. If you pass it up, you may not get another chance at a buck that nice, but there are some bigger bucks out here. It is your decision." That is what a trophy hunting guide is for. 
Make an actual checklist of the above items. Do as much background work as you can before you call the outfitter. When you call the outfitter or one of his references, have a written list of well-thought-out questions to ask him. Realize that not all outfitters in a qualified trophy area are dedicated trophy outfitters. If they don't have the right answers, don't make them feel uncomfortable, but don't string them along and let them think you are going to hunt with them. Level with them, but be tactful about it: "Thank you for your time, but I believe I am looking for a different type of hunt." 
Finally, realize that the trophy outfitter is not Father Nature. He cannot produce a trophy animal at the drop of a hat. He will do his best, work hard, and try to put you in the right place at the right time, but it does take some luck as well as preparation and skill to put a rack in the books. If it rains for 10 days straight during deer season (as happened in 1984), or it is dry as a bone and hot during elk season (as also happened in 1984), or someone puts a tent smack in the middle of the best deer area and you discover it on opening morning after a hard two-hour horseback ride in the dark (as also happened that same year), remember that this is why they call it hunting instead of shooting. 

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