It really is. I've shot deer that were out to their ears and they be 15" deer and shot mgmt bucks that were out to their ears and <13".

I've never heard a GW say they would intentionally give ANY wiggle room. But what I have observed is that obviously mature bucks, especially those with higher scoring racks, just don't get measured by the GW. Young pencil horned bucks that are marginal will always get measured.

BIL shot his first buck, a very tall 8 point, last year at our place that was right at 13. Using a check it stick from my bass boat, it was very hard to tell if it was 13 or 12 3/4.

He wanted to take it to the processor and then do a Euro on it.

Called the GW. He told me.

"If it's under 12.5 and I come out, I'll hafta write him and confiscate. If it's 12.5 or better, and it's a mature deer, I'll probably let it slide. Do you want me to come out or not?

He came out, took one look and said, "No problem, take it to the processor, tell em I checked it".

If it's a questionable deer, shoot him between the eyes, he'll measure over 13" easy then.

give people in an inch, they'll take a mile. 13 is 13. if its close let it walk. if we were on a point restriction people would complain about that.

The warden said that if he had answered something along the lines of....the deer was quartering away, it was a pretty long shot, still early in the morning, and it all happened very quickly because the deer was on the move and only gave me small window to shoot, then he MAY not have given the guy a ticket.

But instead, the guy said that the deer was only about 75 yrds away, and was looking straight at him for a long time, and he had plenty of time to judge.

Obviously that was not what the warden was looking for, so he got cited.

Obviously you have not had the pleasure of trying to decide a legal vs illegal deer in the woods under not so perfect conditions. Until you personally do this you will not understand. We try our best to stay legal therefore there are alot of deer that we dont get to shoot at because we spend what little time you do have to shoot trying to make sure he is legal. So to answer you question yes it can be very difficult to determine legal or not. One example I can give you, low light say 50 yds out in the woods where there is always something to be looking around, no scope or binoculars, can you tell if that deer is a spike or does he have brow tines or maybe its 4 point. Try that one in real life then you can understand. I fully understand that I choose to hunt in an AR county so I am not complaining just simply trying to help you understand.

I did not CHOOSE to hunt in a AR County. I was hunting the same County for 30 years before AR's were imposed on me.