"That's because of the needs of deer. They usually use the wetlands for feeding and escape cover. They come up on these flatwoods at night -- these berry and palmetto areas -- which they don't use much during the day. But they use them occasionally during the night. They also use it for bedding areas."

Some of the best deer killed on Osceola are taken on the few remaining oak ridges found in the southern portion of the WMA. Creek bottoms and cypress heads also provide some of the best success.

The most successful hunters on this huge WMA put in enough legwork to penetrate its interior portions.

"It takes a lot of man-hours to learn how to hunt Osceola," Johns adds. "Most of the hunters who take deer get way inside and away from the roads.

"You can imagine on 266,000 acres there are miles and miles of roads. A lot of people just ride, spend a lot of time just riding around. Since that's not the safest way to hunt, we don't recommend that. But that's what a lot of people have started doing because of the low deer population.

"There are some really nice deer -- just not a whole lot of them. But there's a few nice ones killed out of there every year. I don't want to give the impression that it's a place that you should just ignore. There's so much land, and there is a pretty good opportunity to see a deer. But the big deer are pretty rare.

"They are killed by those people who put in the time and put in the effort to do the scouting, and know where to hunt. They figured out those places to hunt, so they do harvest a nice buck from time to time.

"The most successful hunters will scout out an area, especially during archery season, and adjust their stand site during muzzleloading season. A lot of them kind of use archery as a scouting season, fine-tuning the deer's movements and fine-tuning stand locations."

Over the years, Osceola WMA has placed three whitetails on the Florida Buck Registry, the biggest being Jack Tarr's 1974 buck that scored 143 6/8 Boone and Crockett points.

CAMP BLANDING WMA
In terms of its makeup, Camp Blanding's deer population is the total opposite of Osceola's. This 56,197-acre tract in Clay County is home to a good population of whitetails and offers north-central Florida hunters one of their best opportunities for taking home venison.

"It has a lot more carrying capacity," John explains. "It has more of the oak trees, and the soil is in better shape there. It's also a military base, and people can't get onto it at all times of the year. This protects the deer herd from illegal harvest -- unlike Osceola, which has 64 roads, so there is an opportunity for illegal activity to occur.

"There is a very high deer population. There are a lot of bucks over there. It's going to be good on the still-hunt side of Camp Blanding this year."

That's because of another factor that bodes well for hunters. This fall is the first time in five years that the southern portion of Camp Blanding is open to hunters. That part of the military installation was closed immediately after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, so the deer living there have not seen a hunter for half a decade.