In speaking of the antlerless harvest, Eakes observed that hunters need to be careful about shooting fawns. If you shoot young deer, you inevitably end up killing some button bucks and that has the potential to affect your hunting in the future.

"If you're watching some kind of wildlife opening, the first deer that shows up alone is more than likely a fawn," he cautioned. "Wait until more deer show up before you shoot. Preferably, you'll have at least three deer on the plot so you can shoot the big one."

If you really look closely, Eakes added, fawns have a "puppy-dog" look, with square heads, while mature animals are characterized by long noses and ears.

Public lands in this district that are known for high deer numbers are Sam R. Murphy and Wolf Creek. Eakes said that both have plenty of whitetails.

A tip that Eakes has for hunters targeting the WMAs: Hunt the afternoons. "It has been my observation that a lot of hunters show up, hunt until lunch and then go home," he explained. "I think the afternoon is an overlooked time period on the WMAs, especially on the gun hunts. If a deer has been spooked into the thick in the morning, and then things quiet down, he's going to try to sneak out and grab a mouthful of food late in the afternoon."

The freeze in early April hit much of this district, and, in Eakes' view, it may very well have caused a reduction in this fall's mast crop -- resulting, as mentioned earlier, in more deer movement.

The northeastern corner of the state is made up of Jackson, Marshall, DeKalb, Cherokee, Etowah, Blount, St. Clair, Calhoun, Cleburne, Randolph, Clay and Talladega counties. Randy Liles is acting as supervising biologist following the retirement of Keith McCutcheon last spring.

High-quality private lands here are Jackson County and the counties in the southernmost part of the district such as Cleburne, Clay and Randolph. "All of the WMAs in our district are good," Liles reported. "But the better ones for deer numbers are Choccolocco and Martin-Skyline."

Both of those areas typically rank every year among the top five in the state for numbers of deer harvested. Both have either-sex hunts early in the season that are among the best of the year. "We have a week-long hunt on Choccolocco the week of Thanksgiving that is an excellent hunt," Liles said. "Skyline has an either-sex draw hunt on opening day that is a good one."

And both areas are large: Skyline boasts 40,000-plus acres, while Choccolocco pushes 60,000 acres, affording plenty of room in which to roam in order to find an area that deer are using. "The mistake I see people making is hunting the same old spots they hunt every year," Liles noted. "They would probably be better off finding some new country that is a little rougher."

A good deal of habitat work in the form of timber cutting and controlled burning is taking place at both areas. By opening up the forest canopy and promoting the growth of browse, this work is really helping the herd.

CENTRAL
The central-western portion of the state is composed of Pickens, Sumter, Greene, Marengo, Tuscaloosa, Hale, Jefferson, Bibb, Perry, Shelby, Dallas and Chilton counties. This is the part of the state where Chris Cook works.

Most of the region allows either-sex hunting for the full 70 days of gun season, indicating the high number of deer present there. "Our best hunting is probably in Pickens, Sumter, Green and Tuscaloosa counties," Cook suggested.

Landowners or hunting clubs in any area in this district can eventually make their places outstanding deer venues by shooting does, letting young bucks walk and improving their food situations with plantings.

The district has four wildlife management areas -- all of them good, said Cook. But the best ones for deer numbers are probably Oakmulgee and Demopolis. A substantial amount of habitat work continues to be done on the 45,000 acre Oakmulgee area.

Hunters wanting to tap the best hunting at Demopolis will need a boat, since the area is on the Tombigbee River and much of it is accessible only by water.

East-central Alabama is another region that boasts outstanding hunting for high-grade bucks. The counties in this region are Coosa, Tallapoosa, Chambers, Autauga, Elmore, Macon, Lee, Russell, Bullock, Montgomery and Lowndes. Rick Claybrook is the biologist.

"Our deer hunting continues to be very stable," he said. "We had a pretty good season last year, with some cold weather at the end that really helped."

The late freeze that hit more-northernly areas last spring didn't do as much damage here, he added, but they were still dealing with drought conditions going into the critical summer growing season.

Some of the better counties to hunt in here are Montgomery, Lowndes, Macon and Bulloch, all of which contain highly fertile Black Belt prairie areas. Coosa and Lowndes are among the WMAs with large complements of deer.

SOUTH
The southwestern corner of the state has a big deer population, as is evidenced by the need for 70 days of either-sex hunting. The counties in this region are Choctaw, Washington, Mobile, Clarke, Baldwin, Wilcox, Monroe, Conecuh and Escambia, and Steve Barnett is the biologist. "Washington and Mobile counties are my top picks for deer numbers," he said.

The area WMAs that he likes are Scotch, in Clarke County, and Boykin, in Washington and Mobile counties; the new Perdido WMA is also in this district, and though it too hosts quite a few whitetails, the biologist said, it can be hard to hunt because of the thick vegetation there.

Barnett is working closely with private-land managers in this region of the state to assist in efforts to recover from the ravages of 2005's hurricanes. Lots of timber was lost to the storms, and now the new growth is very thick, so he's writing prescriptions for private-land managers to help them reclaim their woodlands for hunting.

The southeastern corner of the state is made up of the counties of Butler, Covington, Crenshaw, Pike, Coffee, Geneva, Barbour, Dale, Henry and Houston; Bill Gray is the district biologist. Overall, the district has outstanding deer numbers. The best populations are in the more-rural areas of Barbour, Pike and Crenshaw, Gray said. Blue Spring and Barbour WMAs offer the best public deer hunting.

The entire county of Barbour just completed its second season of quality deer management (QDM), under which a buck had to have at least 3 points on one side to be legal. "It's still early to tell what that is doing for us, but the hunting public seems to like it," Gray remarked.

On the management areas, the best hunts are the first ones in November and then the mid-January sessions. "We have a Thursday, Friday, Saturday hunt Jan. 16-18 on Barbour that should be one of our best," Gray said.