What is the general consensus of what is considered a trophy Axis buck?

What clues/techniques do you use in the field to judge antler size?

Others will be along shortly with a number for a true trophy. I'm guessing at 30" and over. Since I don't see that many, and never in a herd scenario, I seem to have only two classes in my mind - "Young. It's good meat if you want it," and "Oh dam! Shoot!!" They roam a lot, so "give him another year" really doesn't apply like it does with WT.

'Just my opinion.

Generally for us on our ranches it’s 33”+ bucks with good tine length. A 36”+ buck would be considered a top end trophy. But there’s more to the trophy than just beam length. We get a lot of hunters that get to caught up in just beam length. Over the 20+ years of outfitting I’ve seen 36”+ bucks you couldn’t pay me to shoot. We’ve also taken 33-34” bucks that would outscore others with longer beam length.

Biggest piece of advice I can give you is shoot for 32”+ with good length on brows and caudals. But, if you like him shoot him.

A trophy buck is like a trophy wife, it is open to interpretation. One mans junk is another mans treasure!!!!

Agree. IMO a freezer full of axis meat, regardless of what it looked like alive, is the best trophy there is.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

I look at axis like I do pronghorns. Shoot the look you want not score. In the end you will be happier

I like mass and fronts, don’t care about beam length and cottles as much

I haven't seen a good consensus on what constitutes a "trophy" axis deer; does mass come into the equation when scoring an Axis? What about overall width? I know SCI has an axis scoring form but most people don't score axis beyond the length of the main beam.

This is good advice for generally accepted trophy quality IME, although I’ve seen some strong 30” deer that would look nice on a wall.

Been on one axis hunt and went looking for 32". I did see longer but the one harvested was just over 32" but was a great looking rack.

160" score and up

This, right here.

I have killed three Axis bucks now. All of them are trophies for me. The first one was over 30" on one side and had a tip broken off on the other (29.5"). He looks great on the wall. The other two were shorter, but much cooler in my opinion. One is only 28" but has extra points right above his eye-guards, and he was in velvet. The other had a messed up side with super palmation and a really long eye-guard.

Interesting to see how axis hunting has developed. When I first started guiding back in the early 2000’s, anything over 28” was a shooter and 30” was the trophy mark. Now a lot of people pass on 30” deer looking for a 34”+

I’ve seen a lot of big axis, they can be hard to field judge and really any buck over 30 looks good on the wall. Like bobo said shoot for the look not the beam length. I’ve seen short beam bucks have great brows and caudles and long beam bucks be narrow and not look great.

Both of my BEST trophy Axis are 28”. Trophy to me is perfectly symmetrical, bowed from the base uniformly with good mass. One of the two is flat bladed to boot. Love looking at them. The bladed one I shot from a seated position after having crawled into & sat down in a bed of those giant Texas red ants. I hoped they would wait to bite until after I had my quarry. That was a most memorable stalk. That bladed 28” Axis had two +30” buddies with him.

Took the words right out of my mouth.

I always tell folks that anything 28" plus is a quality deer and if you like him, put some lead in him.

A "trophy" is one that I'm going to put on the wall and look at for the rest of my life. Inches mean nothing to me since I'll enter anything in any of the record books. I just want something that is mature and looks like the species is supposed to look like. For an Axis, I want good mass and long middle points. Too many of the really long Axis antlers have very tiny middle points.

After I shot mine, I liked it so much that I had it done full mount.

Nice one sir

This is my first Axis and while I failed to measure him before dropping off apparently he is close to your standards and I plan on getting done in a European mount.

+1 on this comment from a fellow guide and ranch owner. 30”+ is trophy for beam length but we’ve shot some 28” deer with baseball bat mass that are way better than pencil horned 33” deer.

It seems that in the area where I hunt (Roosevelt, TX) the things to look for in a trophy axis is main beam of +30" & the caudal tines should reach close to the tips of the main beams.

BUT...the hide & meat itself is a trophy!

My buddy and I went on an a two day Axis hunt in Rock Springs last Sept. My buddy took a very nice 32" with a lot of mass on the first day. That evening I missed a super buck as big or bigger than my buddies. It was a quick shot jumping out of the truck standing with no rest at 120 yards. They don't pose for long, my bad I totally missed the shot! I really wanted something that was close to his. The next day I kept holding out and holding out passing up on a few nice bucks. In the end I took a 27" the last couple hours of the hunt. I was dang proud of it. The meat is exceptional. Liked him so much he's at the taxidermist being mounted. I'm hoping to be well enough (Covid-19) by this April to go on another Axis hunt but it's not looking promising. If not I'll hold out to late Sept if I'm better as I want to avoid our pleasant 110 degree heat!