It has often been said that history is the best predictor of the future. And when it comes to hunting whitetails in Mississippi, no statement could be truer.

Hunters who spend the extra time acquiring a thorough knowledge of where whitetails most often have been taken in the Magnolia State are destined to dramatically improve their chances of putting fresh venison in the freezer this fall.

By examining the data collected from the last couple of seasons, we can get a good indication of what awaits us in the 2009-2010 deer woods. And based upon the "Deer Program Report" put out by the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, the outlook couldn't be much brighter for the state's whitetail hunters.

The opportunity to harvest multiple white-tailed deer is readily available throughout the Magnolia State. According to the Quality Deer Management Association's 2008 Deer Density Map, Mississippi has more deer per square mile than any other state in the nation. However, that deer population estimated at more 1.75 million animals is both a curse and a blessing. While hunters may favor the increased odds of seeing and shooting deer, severe overpopulation is a concern for biologists and deer managers statewide.

"We would like to see the state's deer population greatly reduced," said Chad Dacus, the MDWFP Deer Program coordinator. "Our liberal antlerless season framework is necessary for landowners and deer managers to meet their management goals and reduce the overpopulation problem that exploded in the late 1980s."

In all, over 150,000 hunters are expected to hit the Mississippi deer woods during the 2009-10 season. With such high numbers, you might expect the competition to be fierce for stand sites, especially on public lands. However, there is little need to worry. Deer hunters in Mississippi have a total of 138 days to hunt between Oct. 1, 2009 and Feb. 15, 2010. That's assuming they take advantage of the all the various hunting methods and deer zones that are available.

With extremely liberal hunting seasons and bag limits, excessive deer densities, and more than 20 million acres of prime deer habitat, you might expect hunter success rates to be through the roof. However, the average harvest rate for the 2008-09 season was estimated at two deer per hunter. Even more amazingly, these same statistics revealed that only 76 percent of hunters in the Magnolia State successfully harvested one deer last season.

It is obvious that hunter opportunity alone does not guarantee you'll take home a deer. There are a number of factors that come into play in determining whether the season will be a boom or a bust. Many of those factors are beyond our control, like winter temperatures, mast production, and precipitation.

Cold winters result in increased deer movement. Mast crop failures can also increase deer movement as the animals search for food. Such movement makes the whitetails more susceptible to walking in front of hunters.

On the other hand, in years of abundant mast crops, deer stay in the woods more and decrease their movement. Thus they are harder to hunt. Similarly, food plots are heavily dependent upon adequate rainfall. If they don't get it, don't expect the deer to hang around those sites.