You can get a tag for a lot of areas. You will need to define good quality buck, but most likely need to lace up the boots and hoof it into a wilderness area to find a real good buck on public land.
wow guys thats depressing.............we have lots of public land units with bucks like that here in colorado. I just thought hunting in some new country might be nice for a change!
thanks for the input
I hate to say it, but I agree. You have to be almight lucky to score on a 25" or wider buck on public land here in NM, not to mention meet the 170 point range!!! You might try the White Mountain Wilderness near Carrizozo. You sure have to be in super shape to hike that steep country, AND, the public pressure is pretty high there. You just might get lucky.
Hey horn addiction, my cousin purchased a NM over the counter deer tag a couple of years ago & killed a buck that grossed 200. The guy he was with also killed a nice four point. I believe if you know what you're doing you can be successful.
Some of the better deer, at least that I'm aware of, are in the sandhills and farm/plains country along the eastern 1/4 of the state. Lots of open, rolling country that looks like it wouldn't hold any deer.
There are some great deer out there but when you look at the numbers of hunters that pound that country compared to the low number of deer the odds are not very good. We lease over 100 sections of prvate land in the sandhills in eastern NM and its hard to find a good deer anymore. I hear that next year this area will be a draw area and if that happens it will be a great place to hunt big mule deer.