Missouri hunters came close to harvesting 300,000 deer during the 2022-2023 hunting seasons.
The deer-hunting season wrapped up Jan. 15 with preliminary reporting from Missouri Department of Conservation showing a total of 299,721 deer killed. Of those, 140,736 were antlered bucks, 27,029 were button bucks and 131,956 were does.
Top harvest counties for the overall deer season were Franklin with 6,471 deer harvested, Callaway with 5,438 and Jefferson with 4,966.
The numbers show a slight increase overall compared to the 2021-2022 hunting season, when hunters harvested 295,143 deer. Of those, 143,815 were antlered bucks, 26,750 button bucks and 124,578 does, according to MDC.