by Dave Hurteau

First, in case you missed it during the flurry of Shot Show posts last week, we want your opinion on the State of the Whitetail Union . Click here to tell us what you think are the best and worst aspects of today’s deer hunting. Now to the caption contest.

This time to choose the finalists I wrote all 356 captions on individual slips of paper, stuffed them into the pockets of my dirtiest pants, and did a laundry. Here are the ones that came out intact and still legible:

"New from Summit! The worlds most effective treestand anti theft device! Never loose another treestand to theft! (Summit is not responsible for accidental maulings)" –oki515

“Burp....” –Happy Miles

“Excuse me sir, do you have your hunting license? Umm, on second thought, you look legal.” –Booner Chaser

"Crouching Bruin, hidden ladder." –harrison

"Yea, and you thought you'd never see me again after missing me yesterday!" –WATCHINGDEER247365

“This might be your stand but its my tree!” –Walt Smith

Turnabout is "bear" play. –backlash

“Why don’t you go lick that bait barrel....just forget I'm here....” –bj264 The newest camo pattern in Mossy Oak's "Become the Quarry" line. –db270

"And Goldilocks said, 'Someone has been sitting in my tree stand and they are still there!!!'" --tkreit

“I know they guaranteed that I would see a bear at this stand, but this is ridiculous.” –usaerag4

“I'll be down in a second, just wanted to see where your blind spot was.” –jvf

“They always said he couldn’t kill a bear even if it climbed up in the stand with him.” –gman3186

“That's ok. You go ahead. I'm just gonna hunt from the ground today, bud. Good luck....” –campbell85

“Come on guys save me some doughnuts; its somebody else’s turn for lookout duty.” –hogbuck23

And the winner of a new Knight & Hale Pack Rack Rattling System (shown above) is Happy Miles, whose “Burp….” is right up there among the funniest captions; plus there’s this: Last week, I noted off-the-cuff that brevity is the soul of wit. Happy Miles gets extra credit for really, really paying attention.

Congrats, Happy. I’ll be in touch soon.