Click Here to Enlarge Photo and view the winners of the Boone and Crockett Club Big Game Awards.

After a day in the deer woods, your friends gather back at camp to swap stories about the events that unfolded before their stands. One of them is trembling with excitement as he recounts a huge buck that slipped through the trees without offering a shot. "He was a Booner, for sure!" your buddy exclaims. A "Booner," of course, is any animal that qualifies for the Boone & Crockett Club's Records of North American Big Game, a dictionary-thick tome that has become the benchmark for gauging trophy-class animals. The book also serves as a way to track trends in the quality of big game animals and conservation. Based on the 26th annual Boone & Crockett Big Game Awards held last June near Ft. Worth, our wildlife is thriving.

"We are seeing an increase in the number of animals qualifying for the record book, which is a reflection of successful conservation efforts and wildlife management policies," says Keith Balfourd, B&C director of marketing.

The Boone & Crockett Club was founded in 1887 by Theodore Roosevelt. It recognizes thirty-eight categories of North American big game animals, including four species of sheep, two types of whitetails, three elk, six bears and big cats. The animals can be taken with any legal implement under a fair-chase situation.

Val Olenski was worried about trying elk hunting, fearing that he might like it. On his first hunt, he scored on this 3414⁄8 inch, 9x10 Tule elk.

More than 100 trophies were on display at the Cabela's retail store in Ft. Worth, an incredible testament to the quality hunting opportunities throughout North America. Whether it's whitetails, sheep, moose or elk, trophy-class animals are still abundant for anyone who loves to hunt.

If you think the road to the B&C record book is fueled by high-dollar hunts on exclusive, private land off-limits to all but the super-rich, you'd be dead wrong. Some hunts are expensive, no doubt. By there very nature animals like desert and Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep are rare and live in some of the most inhospitable, inaccessible country on Earth. In some cases, the only way to reach them is through the assistance of a qualified outfitter.

Many, even most hunters who earned top honors at this year's B&C awards ceremony are average guys with one thing in common: A deep respect for the outdoors and a shared passion for hunting. They live it, often saving hard-earned money and burning limited vacation time in pursuit of their favorite big game animal. They are skilled shooters, knowledgeable about their quarry and ready to hunt at a moment's notice under any condition. In many cases, they will be the first to admit they were simply in the right place at the right time.

That's exactly how Doug Degelbeck described his turn of events on September 28, 2006. He, his father and six-year-old son were hunting Bureau of Land Management land in Utah's Wasatch Mountains during the early muzzleloader season. Degelbeck, a building contractor from Pleasant Grove, Utah, was carrying a tag he bought at a Mule Deer Foundation banquet and a rifle his son won at that same banquet.