DNR-GOWA Big Deer Contest Winners

Wade Severson (left) and Jason White attended the DNR-Georgia Outdoor Writers Association Big Deer Contest awards banquet with their amazing bucks.

Georgia DNR, in conjunction with the Georgia Outdoor Writers Association and sponsors The Southern Company and Glock, have announced the winners of the 2022 Georgia Big Deer Contest. The competition is the oldest continuous white-tailed deer contest in the state, with the first awards handed out in 1967. The contest is managed by retired WRD biologist Bill Cooper, along with a host of volunteer deer scorers and with the assistance of GON. The winners were recognized at the Georgia Outdoor Writers Association awards banquet, held at Unicoi Lodge in Helen on May 21.

Awards are presented in four categories based on the racks official Boone and Crockett or Pope and Young scores. Both systems measure antlers in increments of one-eighth of an inch. The winners for the 2022 season are below. Hunt stories for all four bucks are available at GON.com.

Top Typical Bow: 155 4/8, Jason White, taken Sept. 10, DeKalb County. Jason decided when the rain stopped, he was going deer hunting and that decision paid off big time with the buck of a lifetime.

Top Non-Typical Bow: 184 6/8, Bryce Spillers, taken Oct. 10, Upson County. Bryce named this huge buck “Smiley” because of his tendency to look directly at the trail cam over a two-year period, resulting in some great photos.

 Top Typical Gun: 182 6/8, Wade Severson, taken Nov. 18, Wilcox County. Wade Severson, of New Smyrna Beach, Fla., says that deciding to set a few minutes longer in the deer stand can sometimes pay off!

Top Non-Typical Gun: 193 7/8, Lindell Richey, taken: Nov. 7, Greene County. Lindell Richey, of Claxton, is a deer-dog hunter at heart. With 22 canine mouths to feed at home each day, he never imagined he’d kill a 200-inch buck in Greene County—on a piece of property where’d he never been—while sitting in a deer stand.

If you harvest a really big buck, have it officially scored, and the information will be passed on to Bill Cooper for end-of-the-season tabulations.

Congratulations to the 2022 Big Deer Contest winners!