Wisconsin State Big Game Records

While Wisconsin has plenty of game to hunt like turkey, upland birds—and even elk and wolves—it’s the whitetail deer and black bears that make the record book. In fact, their black bears are consistently in the top 100, and they have been since 2000. To hunt one of the state’s 24,000 estimated bruins, hunters have to apply for roughly 11,500 permits. More than 129,000 hunters applied in 2021. As for deer, Wisconsin is home to the Jordan buck, the number three typical whitetail of all time. The state has plenty of typical deer entries in the 180-inch range, and there are a number of non-typicals over 220 as well.