BSK, please give your opinion

[Spurhunter]

I am in a 700 acre club. Preseason we had pics of 5 or 6 legitimate shooters (130+)at our feeders. Bow season was pretty good for deer sightings. Opening weekend of muzzleloader was ok. That weekend my son killed a small 8 point (kids can shoot whatever they want) and a couple guys killed a doe a piece. After that weekend our deer vanished. We haven't been seeing anything. It is rare for us to even see a deer. We have hardwoods with acorns everywhere. Food plots with clover, greens, and tall tine tubers. Plenty of thick CRP. We have killed one buck and 2 does off 700 acres. We hear plenty shooting around us. What would cause the deer to leave an area with plenty food, very little pressure, and lots of thick "sanctuaries" to go to areas with pressure and lots of shooting? We feel like we have everything a deer could want but they have just disappeared. Unfortunately most of the guys pulled their cameras due to lack of pics and the ones still out aren't taking many pics. Any ideas?

 

[deerhunter10]

not bsk but i think pressure is your biggest problem. running cameras causes pressure and bow hunting causes a whole lot more pressure then people realize. then you ass ml season now to rifle season that is a whole lot of hours added up educating the deer to what is happing. i don't know how many people are on the lease but times how ever many hours you have by how ever many hunters there is and that's a whole lot of pressure even though it may not even seem like it. also if you're hearing a lot of shots around you that's just more added pressure i think that's your biggest problem. also deer changing after they loose their velvet. just my two cents.

 

[ROUGH COUNTRY HUNTER]

how many are on the lease

 

[Spurhunter]

Any opinions are welcome. I don't really think it's pressure because the other guys doing all the shooting are putting more pressure on them, right? We have 3 guys that hunt a couple times a week and 2 other guys that hunt occasionally. Maybe once every 2-3 weeks. When I say hunt I mean 3 or 4 hours in the morning or 3 hours in the evening. Spread out over 700 acres it just doesn't seem like much. I could buy the pressure running mature bucks off but we aren't even seeing does.

 

[catman529]

I have no idea but deer movement has seemed a bit messed up this year for a lot of people, myself included

 

[Spurhunter]

I agree Catman. It's been a strange year, but when I say vanished, I'm not exaggerating. Judging by the shooting across the road from us and our complete lack of deer, I wonder if baiting could be the culprit. I have no reason to think so, but it seems very odd.

 

[deerhunter10]

i would check around your farm you may have some kind of disease also. i would do some major scouting trying to figure out whats going on. your not the first person ive heard of this happing to this year. and that's coming from people that have great farms and always kill good deer. im curious to hear more of what people are finding out when season starts all over again jan 6th. it could be so many different things im just curious to see what people start finding out if anything.

 

[CamoGator]

Scent control, scent control, scent control.

If you or the other members are being careless in scenting down or playing the wind that will kill your hunt every time.

Another could be if everyone is using the exact same route to each stand to hunt on a consistently frequent basis, and they are as simply grabbing sapplings with their hands and leaving skin cells on them for deer to smell that will cross that path.

Here is what we do- we wash all our camo and orange in scent free detergent the day before we hunt and store them in plastic totes. we take scent free showers immediately before each hunt. we wear street clothes in the truck and get dressed in our camo when we arrive to the woods and liberally apply Dead Down Wind spray to everything (inner and outer layers and especially our boots). we then choose what stand to hunt and what path to take according to the wind (in hollers it can be different than on ridge tops so don't trust the weather man or app too much).


If y'all already do all that then I don't know what to tell you, but if you don't then give it a try, you'll be pleasantly surprised at the results.

 

[catman529]

I agree Catman. It's been a strange year, but when I say vanished, I'm not exaggerating. Judging by the shooting across the road from us and our complete lack of deer, I wonder if baiting could be the culprit. I have no reason to think so, but it seems very odd.

I doubt baiting can possibly pull all the deer off 700 acres of prime habitat. They like corn piles, but not that much. Especially with everyone supposedly shooting at them.

 

[redblood]

i would say the presence of bowhunters and people checking trail cameras put a lil too much pressure on the mature deer

 

[Spurhunter]

Camogator, 2 of the 3 guys that hunt the most are my son and I. We could probably be more diligent in our scent control, but we do wash our clothes in Scent Away detergent, store them in tubs with earth scent wafers, wear rubber boots, and spray down with Scent Away before leaving the truck. We don't smoke. Nobody unloads a 4 wheeler unless it is to retrieve a deer. Although there is always room for improvement, we are probably better than most. Heck, I am amazed at how many deer hunters I see gassing up the truck on the way to hunt. I try to always hunt a stand I can approach with the wind in my face also. Even if scent control was an issue, we should be seeing deer tracks from the middle of the week when no one is there.

 

[Spurhunter]

BTW, I appreciate everyone's input. I hope you can help me figure it out.

 

[Spurhunter]

i would say the presence of bowhunters and people checking trail cameras put a lil too much pressure on the mature deer

I have often thought about BSK's club where nobody bowhunts so the deer don't have any pressure until muzzleloader when you have a good chance to kill them. It's a good idea if you don't have bowhunters.

 

[redblood]

i would say the presence of bowhunters and people checking trail cameras put a lil too much pressure on the mature deer

I have often thought about BSK's club where nobody bowhunts so the deer don't have any pressure until muzzleloader when you have a good chance to kill them. It's a good idea if you don't have bowhunters.

yep. i got off a great lease in ky because a couple fellers started bowhunting. i prefer to let them be until time to burn some powder. more harm than good is done in september and october, if mature deer is what u seek- IMO

 

[moondawg]

700 acres, and the deer vanished? That's a lot of area to cover.

How many people are on the lease? From your earlier post, it looked like 5, not including you and Hunter. 7 people total? If that's so, it shouldn't be that much pressure, unless all of you hunted a lot.

You said it's hardwoods with acorns and foodplots. Is there a water source, like a lake or stream? I can't imagine 700 acres not having some type of water source.

Are people hunting the fields/land surrounding the lease? Maybe that might account for some pressure.

I don't know. Maybe the deer have gone nocturnal or something.

 

[catman529]

Camogator, 2 of the 3 guys that hunt the most are my son and I. We could probably be more diligent in our scent control, but we do wash our clothes in Scent Away detergent, store them in tubs with earth scent wafers, wear rubber boots, and spray down with Scent Away before leaving the truck. We don't smoke. Nobody unloads a 4 wheeler unless it is to retrieve a deer. Although there is always room for improvement, we are probably better than most. Heck, I am amazed at how many deer hunters I see gassing up the truck on the way to hunt. I try to always hunt a stand I can approach with the wind in my face also. Even if scent control was an issue, we should be seeing deer tracks from the middle of the week when no one is there.

scent control sure helps but I really don't think it makes the difference between seeing and not seeing any deer, even on trail cams. I pretty much quit on scent control half way thru the season because I got tired of it. It didn't make my season better or worse, and I kept killing deer. They may get downwind and smell you or they may smell you where you walked but I can't see all the deer leaving 700 acres because a few humans left some scent.

 

[Vermin93]

we wear street clothes in the truck and get dressed in our camo when we arrive to the woods and liberally apply Dead Down Wind spray to everything (inner and outer layers and especially our boots).

Wet inner layers? This sounds like a recipe for misery if it's really cold outside.

 

[catman529]

we wear street clothes in the truck and get dressed in our camo when we arrive to the woods and liberally apply Dead Down Wind spray to everything (inner and outer layers and especially our boots).

Wet inner layers? This sounds like a recipe for misery if it's really cold outside.

sure does. Also has anyone noticed Dead Down Wind and some other sprays like Scent Away have a slight smell of their own? It almost vanishes when it dries but you know the deer can still smell it. It doesn't smell like human, but only hunters use it so you would think the deer would learn pretty quick that scent killing sprays mean danger. Just a theory of mine

 

[Spurhunter]

700 acres, and the deer vanished? That's a lot of area to cover.

How many people are on the lease? From your earlier post, it looked like 5, not including you and Hunter. 7 people total? If that's so, it shouldn't be that much pressure, unless all of you hunted a lot.

You said it's hardwoods with acorns and foodplots. Is there a water source, like a lake or stream? I can't imagine 700 acres not having some type of water source.

Are people hunting the fields/land surrounding the lease? Maybe that might account for some pressure.

I don't know. Maybe the deer have gone nocturnal or something.

We have 5 ponds scattered across the place. Plenty of water sources. We have 6 total members but 1 guy has a jam up deer place and only turkey hunts here. Hunter, myself, and one other guy are the only ones that hunt after Thanksgiving weekend with any frequency. A couple of the other guys hunt once every 2 or 3 weeks.

 

[EastTNHunter]

Are you hunting the same stands over and over, or have you tried shifting spots/tactics. Many people have set stand sites that they use over and over based on past history, and if they don't see deer from these then they believe that there are no deer. Deer can seem like they are gone, but have really just shifted patterns, especially in an odd year like this one. Have you scouted for sign and shifted your tactics, or are you not seeing any sign, either?

 

[SelphLogging]

It's really simple. The deer are not in groves like the years past, greatly because there is food everywhere! Acorns are everywhere! In the past, you more than likely have had the food sources that aren't offered all around you, therefore you pulled a multiplied number of deer to your property. People don't realize how far deer disperse themselves in a food abundant year. Last year, I pulled so many deer to an 8 acre food plot, as many as 30 does in an evening, plus a number of bucks. This year I'm lucky to see 5-7 deer an evening. And that number was 2-4 a month ago. I have great deer numbers in my area, but when food is everywhere, deer spread out. Does travel in a small 5 cluster or so, and if you don't get on those few deer, you won't see deer.

Get out of fields if that's what your in, and get into some oak ridges that haven't seen pressure, and you will likely get on the deer using your property. It's not a serious issue, just think of the year you could possibly have next year! This year is setting up to produce a county record breaking year next year. Anyone that hunts mature deer, big racked deer, this is the best case scenario! Good luck!

 

[moondawg]

East and Selph make some good points. Maybe the deer have "patterned" you and are avoiding your areas...especially if you're hunting the same stands. And that's not hard to do with 700 acres. That's a LOT of ground to cover...compared to the 40 I hunt!

And like Selph said, if there's a bumper crop across the board, then there's no need to disperse to other areas to feed. If you had a buffet in your bedroom, would you leave it to eat something else? Again 700 acres is a lot of area. If there's food all over that acreage, then there's no need to go to some food plots.

Then again, maybe the deer are just being difficult and uncooperative, because that's just what they do sometimes. :)

 

[FARMTOFIELD]

Don't beat yourself up over it, I stay on my property year around and we still kill some good deer. This has been my worst season I have ever had. I had some really great deer on camera and after bow season they simply vanished heck I never laid eyes on a buck until the last two weeks and I've seen 6 or 7. They just have started filtering back into our farm from who knows where they have been.

I'm kinda anxious like selphlogging said, with the deer I had on can and the ones I'm starting to see that have somehow laid low all season. Next year should be an epic antler year unless we have a repeat

 

[BSK]

Spurhunter,

Have you hunted this property in previous years and had this pattern of deer "disappearance" NOT happen? I ask that because this year has been a strange year. For many hunters, they are observing very anomalous deer activity--behavior they have not seen before and may not see again for many years. I certainly wouldn't hold this year up as anything "normal," and I wouldn't be too worried about anything that occurred this year. I don't think deer activity this year is any type of harbinger of things to come or the symptom of any problem.

Honestly, I would need to see the property in question and the surrounding properties before I could make any suggestion as to why deer sightings (and pictures) are way down. From your description, hunting pressure sounds fairly normal (certainly not excessive). Perhaps a neighboring property has something your property doesn't, which could be drawing deer. But in most situations, during hunting season, deer will spend their daylight hours in or near the best sanctuary cover, and will travel at night to the best food sources. Even if your property doesn't have the best cover, cameras will still catch the deer moving across the property at night to feed (unless you don't have attractive food sources either).

Anything is theoretically possible, so I suppose deer really could have abandoned a 700 acre property, but those type of situations are exceedingly rare. I put far more emphasis on what cameras are photographing than what hunters see, as hunters generally don't see many of the deer using an area, but considering your cameras aren't photographing many deer, perhaps the population really is very low. However, I would need to review camera locations before I fully trusted the camera data. Placing cameras in the best locations for herd monitoring is an art that takes years to master. Do you have camera data from previous years?

 

[dr]

Trail cams won't necessarily tell you how many, and where the good bucks are. I believe they learn to avoid certain areas, and the smarter ones like to travel parallel to heavily traveled trails that might be out of camera range. The property owners adjoining mine run quite a few cameras, and have told me that they are not getting many pics of bucks. But, I killed one, and saw huge rubs made after I had killed mine. I've come to the conclusion that you can have several good bucks, but may never get a pic, and seldom see them. I've also seen the least sign on my property in years. Then, last week saw 9 in one day.

 

[Bullfrog]

The same thing happens on one of our farms, that only 3 of us hunt. It's roughly 800 acres and there is a period of the year that most deer seem to disappear, until you find them at the back of the property where they aren't being bothered much

 

[BSK]

Trail cams won't necessarily tell you how many, and where the good bucks are...

I've come to the conclusion that you can have several good bucks, but may never get a pic, and seldom see them.

And that's why I say learning to place cameras well enough to get a good census of the local deer population is a real art form. It takes years of practice to perfect that skill.

I started playing around with trail-cameras when the first one hit the market in the late '80s. 25 years (and more cameras than I can count) later, and I'm still experimenting with the process.

 

[BigSatt]

I could buy the pressure running mature bucks off but we aren't even seeing does.

One point I might add is that ALL deer can become "educated" from pressure....not just mature bucks. As stated earlier, hunting the same stands using the same approach can/will put deer on guard, so to speak. As close as it is to the end of season, I would suggest spending a few days scouting "new to you" areas of your property in late Jan to see where the deer have been using. Might pick up some handy info there for future reference. Maybe you have a Locust thicket full of pods(beans) that you have never paid attention too? I don't know for sure obviously, but I would suspect the deer are still there on your farm. They have just located a "honey" hole for themselves that you haven't came across yet. Hang in there man, and good luck to you!

 

[CamoGator]

Well then I have no clue what to tell you lol. maybe the real cold weather has the predators on high movement cycles and the surrounding hunters have applied a lot of pressure... but 700 and no deer? That baffles me.

If you are seeing or hearing turkeys and lots of squirrels then predatory pressure would not be the issue. and if it's not the issue then it could be environmental problems like disease.

Or maybe one last thing: road hunters and tresspasers. I hate saying it but could it be a possibility of trespassers getting away with taking a large amount of deer out unnoticed?

 

[BSK]

What BigSatt said. It's within the range of possibility that deer have "vacated' the property, but highly unlikely. The most likely scenario is that deer have found a previously unknown food source or sanctuary. And in MOST situations, the #1 cause for reduced sightings or reduced trail-cam picture counts is hunting/camera-monitoring the same spot too frequently. Nothing reduces deer sightings more than hunting the same stand locations over and over.

Deer are not "smart" animals by our standards. However, their ability to notice predatory pressure--especially by humans--and then avoid it, is beyond our comprehension.