This weekend marks a big day on the calendar of outdoorsmen everywhere. This morning, thousands of hunters will take to the woods as the first weekend of shotgun deer season opens up here in Illinois.

Those of us that participate in deer hunting know that the weekends before and after Thanksgiving mark the time when we can put the bow down and pick up the shotgun. But for those who are not deer hunters, they may ask, what is the big deal?

I was talking to a couple of guys at work just this week about the upcoming weekend. One of them asked the very question mentioned earlier. He was under the assumption that you could hunt whitetails with a gun in Illinois anytime that you wanted during the season.