The 2009-10 deer season is the best of times and the worst of times for Alabama's many whitetail hunters.

The tough part of being an Alabama deer hunter is that there are always factors outside the sportsman's control that seem to dominate how the season turns out. It can be warm weather, wet weather, drought, too much mast, not enough mast, and the list goes on. On top of that, the best hunting areas always seem to be locked up by exclusive, expensive hunting clubs.

But then there's the great part of being a Bama deer hunter. Our deer herd continues to thrive. Whitetails can be found virtually everywhere. If you live in the suburbs and have three or four acres of woods, chances are you've got deer on your place. Our season starts Oct. 15 and runs to Jan. 31. We're allowed three bucks and an unlimited number of does. And we've got hundreds of thousands of acres of public land just sitting there for the adventurous sportsman to access.

Overall, the pros outweigh the cons when it comes to chasing whitetails in the Cotton State.

Perhaps the best place to start in picking a place to hunt is to look at last season and the season before. Last year was an "average" season for Alabama's deer hunters, the biologists for the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Division of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries said. But that's a blessing when you consider how hard the hunting was the season before that.

In 2007-08, the woods in the northern half of the state suffered a late freeze that wiped out a great deal of the mast crop. Then in late summer, temperatures hit the 100s during a drought and that caused an outbreak of EHD in lots of places around the state, with widespread reports of deer deaths.

The hunting consequently was very difficult and the harvest was off all around the state.

"Hunters took about 342,000 deer that year," said Chris Cook, one of the DWFF deer studies leaders. "It was as low a harvest as we'd had since 1994-95."

The harvest typically runs between 400,000 and 450,000 deer in Alabama, and Cook said the numbers were closer to that for 2008-09. Final statistics on the statewide harvest estimate were still being compiled as this went to press, but Cook said it was a lot stronger last year.

Just from judging by the harvest on the state's network of wildlife management areas, the increase could be seen.

"The man-days of hunting effort weren't much different from the previous year, but the harvest was up," Cook said.

At least one wildlife manager looks for that rebound to continue this season. That's Ron Eakes, the district biologist for the northwestern corner of the state.

"I believe we had a lot of deer sneak through last year," he said. "We had an unbelievable mast crop and the deer didn't have to move much to feed. In our district, we had some rainy weather on weekends that kept some hunters from getting out. I believe those factors together caused a few more deer to make it through the season and the plentiful food meant they came through in great shape."

Tips From The Pros
The DWFF district biologists spend a great deal of time in the field every year in their work and most of them hunt. They are in every sense of the word professional outdoorsmen.

They also work the check-in stations on the various WMA hunts and see the traits of successful hunters. They've got plenty of tips to help you be a more successful whitetail hunter, if you'll take their advice.