Wallhangers can show up anywhere in the Heart of Dixie, but some areas are in a class by themselves when it comes to big whitetails. Alabama Game & Fish takes an in-depth look at the parts of the state best for encountering trophy bucks.

Bragging-sized bucks show up all across the Cotton State, true. But a few old-reliable regions definitely offer you better chances of bringing down a wallhanger than do others.

The Black Belt -- the granddaddy region of Alabama buck hunting -- yields up nice animals every season, reported Chris Cook, the state's deer studies leader. Large numbers of deer roam quite decent habitat throughout most of that region.

But Cook has noticed that more top-end deer -- those with racks pushing 150 Boone and Crockett Club points or better -- have been taken the last several seasons in the northwestern corner of Alabama. So if a record book buck is your goal, Cook advises you to head for that quadrant of the state.

"There are a couple of reasons why we're seeing better deer taken in this area of the state," he noted. "One is that more land is being leased here nowadays. Ten years ago, there was still a lot of open-permit land there -- you could just go hunt it."

As more of that land is being leased, the leaseholders are increasingly turning to deer management. "They're not as likely to take the first buck they see," Cook said. "They're letting small bucks walk, and that's improving the age structure."

A lot of habitat work continues to be done in the region, most of it in the form of timber thinning and burning, so the whitetails accordingly have plenty of groceries to help them reach their maximum potential. Further, this part of the state has never had the overpopulation problems that have plagued areas of the Black Belt.

"They just haven't had to go through that," Cook stated. "And that's a very positive thing."

Generally, the best part of Alabama for trophies starts in the middle of the state and goes north. The poor, sandy soils of the southernmost counties aren't conducive to producing racks of the same quality as those seen in areas boasting more fertile soils.

"It might take a buck in these poor-soil counties five and a half years to develop the same rack that a 3 1/2-year-old has in the other parts of the state," remarked Cook. "You can still do some management activities that make a difference in the southern counties."

TACTICS FOR TAKING THE BIG BOYS
Just what defines a trophy buck in Alabama?

According to Cook, it's not necessarily the 150-incher that gets a person into the Alabama Whitetail Record book. "In most parts of Alabama, if you kill a 125- to 130-inch buck, you've killed a really, really good deer," he remarked.

In Alabama, 10- and 12-pointers tend to be rare, so here, many career-best bucks are likely to sport 8-point racks with a spread of 15 to 18 inches and main beams ranging between 20 and 24 inches, inclusive. "As he gets more age on him, he won't necessarily get a whole lot wider," Cook offered, "but the height of the rack and the mass improve."

How do you go about putting yourself in position to slay that beast? "You've got to have some luck," Cook suggested. "That's part of it. But there are things you can do to give yourself an advantage, too."