Mike Versland
Posted By
Myndi Clements
at
8/9/2010 12:00:00 AM
Mike Versland grew up archery and rifle hunting with his family in northeastern Wisconsin. Mike now lives with his wife and one year-old daughter in Minnesota. Living just minutes from the Wisconsin border, he takes full advantage of hunting in both states on both private and public land. On private land, Mike uses shed antlers, trail cameras and velvet sightings to key in on and hunt specific deer. Using this strategy, Mike has accumulated up to six years of history on certain deer including the 200 inch buck he killed in 2009. When hunting public land, Mike seeks out areas of big buck potential before traversing rugged terrain in order to get on some awesome bucks. Sometimes this means walking several hours through unthinkable conditions.
While Mike enjoys his job as a high school biology teacher, his favorite classroom and playground are the outdoors. Mike loves to share his knowledge of hunting with others and enjoys serving as a mentor for youth hunters. Several of Mike’s friends will be behind the scenes running the camera this year in hopes of filming some extraordinary hunts. Hopefully they will get an opportunity to step in front of the camera at some point throughout the season as well.
Mike's 2011 Hit List
"Mr. Photogenic"
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"The Contender"
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"Pitch Fork" and "Mega-Mass"
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After a year of many sightings in 2009 I was unable to locate Mega-Mass and Pitch-Fork again in 2010. Again we’ll have to wait and see if these two bucks are still in the area, but I am not too hopeful at this point.
Mike's 2010 Hit List
"Mr. Photogenic"
My friend named this buck when he started getting loads of photos of him in 2009. This is the fourth year we've been watching this deer and each year he disappears when he sheds his velvet. Hopefully now that we removed two mature bucks from the
area in 2009, he will stick around. I think this buck will score well over 150 inches.
http://midwest2.digitaloffice.com/2010Live/HitListVideoLive/Contender.mp4
/images/gallery/47/Contender.jpg
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"The Contender"
While out attempting to capture velvet footage of Mr. Photogenic this guy showed up. Just as big as or bigger than Mr. Photogenic he will contend for the number one position on my hit list.
"Mega-Mass"
This buck is from private land in Wisconsin. He has overwhelming mass on his left antler. We got photos of him just prior to the 2009 season, but then he moved off to the neighbors. Now that there are food plots in place he should stick to a smaller core area. This buck should score above 140 inches.
"Pitch-Fork"
Named after the appearance of his left antler, this buck is also from Wisconsin. We have pics dating back to 2006, but last year he showed up on trail cameras sporadically all season but we never saw him while hunting. We are sure he is still in the area and hopefully this year will have a better idea of where he likes to travel. We believe this buck will outscore Mega Mass.
"Milo"(a.k.a "Mineral Lover") 
This tall Wisconsin ten point just showed up mid-August. He looks like several of the bucks we have been getting photos of over the past few years, but I am not totally convinced we know this deer yet. Either way he is a great choice for a hitlist buck, we are crossing our fingers that he sticks around. The recent pictures we got of him are on a mineral lick in our food plot, directly under the stand we are hoping to hunt opening weekend of the Wisconsin season.
