It’s official. My 2015 deer season has finally come to a close. The post season blues will no doubt begin to set in. All year I look forward to archery season, but once it arrives I’d like to be able slow down time and make those days and weeks last just a little longer. Whether it’s watching the forest unfold as the sun rises on a cold, brisk morning or returning to camp in the evening to share stories of the day’s events over a good glass of bourbon, I embrace every aspect of the season. With the end of my season, I’ll quickly turn my attention to the off season and making shed traps, shed hunting and developing habitat enhancements needed at the farm.

As it is now officially 2016, I’ve begun to reflect on this past season. The hope is to find a few things to improve upon next season, helping me continue growing as a hunter.

The Good

Let’s face it; even if the season was awful, I was still able to spend time in the outdoors, which alone is cause for celebration. This year I was able to spend a total of 21 days on stand. This is a lot of time for me, considering I have to travel a few hours to get to our farm. This summer I also set a goal for myself to try patterning a target buck for the first time. I did pattern a nice 8 point. He was bumped by another hunter on the day I was planning to hunt his bedding area; however, I was successful in locating this particular buck’s bedding area and identifying the wind he’d use to access this bedding on the correct day. I just didn’t seal the deal by allowing a friend to hunt the area instead (hoping for deer god points for this). I was able to fill my doe tag though and put some meat in the freezer.

The Bad

This past spring a new clover food plot was planted on the farm, which would provide the only consistent food source in the area through October and November. Typically the corn comes off on our farm in late September and those fields that have been harvested are sewn with winter wheat and clover for a spring harvest and hay cut. Under normal circumstances these fields lay dormant until the spring thaw. However, this was not the case this year. With a warmer and more wet fall than usual, all fields sewn for the spring sprouted by late October providing the deer herd an abundance of food in three additional locations. The distinct trails leading to the planned clover food plot, along with well defined staging areas, were now seeing much less activity than usual. The additional food sources impacted the overall deer herd’s fall travel patterns we had grown accustom to historically. This resulted in significantly less deer movement than in years past as food was overly abundant in multiple locations around the farm throughout the season.

 The Ugly

Simply put, the weather was ugly this season. I’m ok with wet weather or windy weather, but the heat during the beginning of November was less than ideal. Unfortunately I took a week’s vacation during the first week of November where temperatures here in Pennsylvania reached the 70’s. Needless to say, deer movement came to a screeching halt and buck sightings were few until the weather broke the last week of the season. This made for some long hours in the stand without any deer sightings and at one point I went three days without seeing a single deer.

Conclusion

With this season clearly in the rearview mirror, my hope is that I’m a better hunter because of this season’s experiences. Most of my negative experiences this year were weather related and I certainly can’t control the weather. On bad weather days, I simply should have stayed out of the stand. I know quality hunts are better than the quantity of hunts, and I need to do a better job of following this rule in the future. I’d be lying if I said I kept my cool through all of this season’s challenges. At moments I did allow the combination of slow days on stand and the warm temperatures get the better of my emotions. In many cases, success in the whitetail woods is a matter of a positive outlook, especially on those long sets with no action. Your fortunes can change in a matter of seconds during the season and a lapse in focus can be what stands between you and your moment of truth from the stand.

It’s late December and I’m several weeks removed from what I thought was the end of my 2015 archery deer season. Truth be told, I did spend the opening day of rifle season in the stand. Rifle season for me now, has more to do with tradition than the actual hunt. Not to discredit those who enjoy rifle hunting, but archery hunting just appeals to me more at this point in my life.

 With that being said, I’ll have some time off during the late season allowing me to hit the timber to make one final attempt at filling my tag with a nice buck. I’ve hunted late season sparingly in the past, typically considering this period of the season a lost cause with little to no deer movement. I’ve never had success during late season, and never knew anyone who had either. As I’ve dedicated this year to learning as much as possible about whitetail strategy, I realized that my approach, understanding and tactics used during the late season had been wrong. In past years I didn’t pay much attention to how deer behavior would change during late season—with the exception of the extreme hunting pressure during rifle season here in Pennsylvania. I think it’s safe to say I’ve consistently been in the wrong place at the wrong time when it comes to late season archery hunting.

 Many standard tactics hold true during late season. Access and exit routes to a stand or blind are essential, playing the wind will be critical and all movement should be low impact. All these may be even more important than usual due to the skittish nature of most deer herds, given the pressure they’ve experienced all season. I’ve decided to focus on three areas to improve upon this season.

When To Hunt

If you’re like me, between work and family I have precious little time to spend in the stand, and I’d like to hunt every free day I can. But just like any other time of the season, quality sits are better than quantity sits. This time of year morning hunts should be out, and the focus should be on evening hunts, as deer this time of year will likely be in bed long before you hit your stand. Morning hunts will also increase your odds of bumping a buck enroute to the stand. As always, follow the weather closely. Allow the weather to help you decide when to take that extra day off from work to be in the timber. The usual cold fronts are choice, but this time of year also look for days when precipitation is forecasted. The day after a light snow should be particularly good.

Where To Hunt

This time of year food is king and evening hunts should include a field or food plot stand location—as food sources in the timber should be getting scarce. A deer’s body during late season is pretty worn down. With the intensity of the rut, and the pressure of gun season, deer are looking to replenish their bodies and increase fat storage in preparation for the winter months to come. Again, pay attention to the weather, as not all food source are created equal during this time. Green food sources are in play if the temperature is trending warmer than usual for the time of year and crops like clover and winter wheat are a good option.  If temperatures are on the colder side, focus on higher energy foods like corn, beans and turnips.

How To Hunt

Simply put, you need to know where the deer are at. Avoid barreling into a stand location without good information—patience is key during the late season. If the conditions aren’t right, the high risk with a low reward opportunity isn’t worth potentially blowing up what might otherwise be a good location. Steer clear of bedding areas and try to hunt property edges to avoid bumping deer. Rely on game camera intelligence now more than ever. And if you have a piece of property that has been relatively untouched this season, this might be where that mature buck you’ve been looking for is living.

 Below are a few videos from Drury Outdoors that are definitely worth watching. These videos share some tips for the final phases of the deer hunting season.

Rut-cation is over. No more 4 am alarms, no more long hikes with heavy gear in the morning darkness, and no more long sits with no deer movement. By most people’s standards this is the description of a miserable vacation. To us whitetail addicts, it’s simply the cost of doing business and we love it.

My official rut-cation began the first week of November and I had 10 days in the timber in early November to take one of the target bucks on our property.  I was also looking to take a doe helping to reduce our overall doe population—and put meat in the freezer. I identified four bucks as my targets during the course of the summer, fall and earlier season hunts. Below are a few pictures of the identified.

Target Bucks

The two on the right were our shooters and were identified during the summer months. Both of these guys stuck around our property throughout the season. The one in the middle is Jeff Reed, named after the fiery former Steelers kicker, due to the kicker on his left G2 making him an 11-point. The buck on the right was just simply named 8. They both are younger than I had hoped, but are certainly nice deer for this area of Pennsylvania, particularly Jeff Reed. Unless he presented a “can’t resist” shot, he would get a pass this year. I aged him at 2.5, and he could be a really nice buck if he could make it one more year.

Below are a few pictures of Jeff Reed throughout the fall. He disappeared for a while, but we did have an “on the hoof” sighting the first week of November and one additional camera image of him that month. Our live sighting was on the opposite side of the property from where we had been seeing him during the summer and early fall.

 I had only one additional picture of my targeted 8 point in the image above. He was also sighted “on the hoof” on 2 occasions during the season. These sightings and this additional image, gave me a pretty good idea of where he may be living. The time on the photo below is incorrect, it should be 7:15 am.

 Later in the season I had a late addition 8 point added to my target list. I had multiple daylight pictures of this guy running this same trail between two micro food plots.

 And finally, Dirty Harry. This guy’s rack may not be all that impressive, as he’s a big 6, but his body is huge for a Pennsylvania deer. He is the oldest deer I had on camera, I’m thinking he’s about 3.5 years old, but the latest picture I had of him made me think he may be a 4.5. We had no pictures or sightings of him until he showed up tending a mock-scrape I made in late October.

The Hunt

I typically take the same period of time off from work each year as my rut-cation at the beginning of November. This year was no different. After work on Friday October 30th, I quickly packed my car and headed west on the Pennsylvania turnpike for my 3 hour drive to our farm. A lot of work had been done at the farm this year to enhance the habitat. I had done more preparation this year than any other season before, and was hoping this work would pay off. As I pulled into the cabin, I could see there was a deer hanging beneath the deck. My father-in-law had taken a doe that evening. It seemed like a good start to the next two weeks.

Saturday’s weather looked good, not as cold as I’d like, but in comparison to what was coming later in the week, it seemed like one of the better days to try to fill my buck tag. I had a camera image of the one 8 point I had targeted and live sightings that told me he was cruising a hollow between a doe bedding area and a clover field. I climbed a tree in this hollow Saturday morning and was shut out on the day–nothing. Not a single doe. This was unusual as this hollow has historically been a heavily used travel corridor. There is no hunting allowed in Pennsylvania on Sundays, so I used this as an opportunity to check game cams, freshen up some mock scrapes, and do some scouting since it had been a few weeks since I had last been to the farm. Based on the the camera image of the 8 point above (10/8 image) and some live sightings, I had an idea where he may be living. I found a few scrapes, and then his rub line that ran the length of a ridge into a pine thicket. Along the mid-point of the ridge and and again 300 yards further to the point, I found 2 classic buck beds. I studied the camera data, and looked back at the dates of the live sightings and realized every time he’s been sighted and traveling this particular area was on a west wind. I looked at the upcoming weather and like most of the deer hunting country, we were set to have some unseasonably warm weather during the next few days. Monday’s wind wasn’t right for me to hunt the point of this ridge, but Tuesday had a west wind coming in, and it was the last morning of “cooler” weather before the temps jumped.

Before I set out on Tuesday, I learned a friend was coming to camp to turkey hunt Tuesday morning. I had a west wind on Wednesday as well, and decided to head to the creek bottom of the property Tuesday morning instead of the ridge point. Hunting the creek bottom as an observation set was an attempt at keeping the pressure to a minimum on the point I had determined was likely my 8 points’ bedroom. Unfortunately, during the turkey hunt that took place, my target buck was jumped from his bed on the ridge point, and was never seen again during the next two weeks. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed in the outcome of that morning. I had spent hours, beginning in the summer, checking trail cameras, planting food plots, moving cameras, making mock scrapes, and scouting, with the hope that I’d have enough information line up to make a good attempt on a nice buck I had specifically targeted. Even with this misfortune, there were still hunts to be had.

 The next few days were warm and deer movement came to a screeching halt. I know anecdotally, warmer temperatures typically will reduce deer movement—even though QDMA studies say temperature has no impact on movement (good podcast discussing this and more rut info here). With that being said, I’ve never been shutout on so many hunts as I had this year. Historical hotspots we’re completely dead. And then it dawned on us what we might be experiencing. We have a 5 acre clover plot that is the green food source on our property, and is really the only source of consistent food once the corn comes off in late September. These cut cornfields are then sewn with winter wheat, and typically never sprout due to the cooler fall weather. This year the winter wheat was put in slightly earlier than usual and the rainy and warmer weather this fall allowed the wheat to actually come up to the point that it provided an additional food source—the deer didn’t need to travel for food and were bedding in brush right off the edges of these fields. Once we adjusted, we began to see deer and my father-in law had two encounters with Jeff Reed—but no shot.

As my rut-cation was coming to an end, I had gotten over the disappointment of my target 8-point being bumped. I hadn’t had any encounters with shooters, and was at this point looking to take a doe just to put meat in the freezer. I set out Saturday morning (my last day) to hunt a brushy hollow near the clover field. There were consistently a few deer feeding at the top of the clover field in the late morning and I had hypothesized that they were using this hollow to get there. It was really a Hail Mary, but this hollow would allow deer to remain under cover as they came off the mountain. I picked out a poplar tree and climbed to about 25 feet. At 7:30 am I heard something approaching from behind me and to my left. I thought it was a couple squirrels but looked over my shoulder to see two deer approaching me. I didn’t have time to turn on my camera as they were close and waited until the lead doe’s head was behind a tree to grab my bow from the hanger. She cleared that tree and gave me a 25 yard broadside shot. I didn’t have time to stand, so I gave her a quick mouth bleat and released the arrow. She made it 40 yards before she expired. It’s pretty amazing how quickly one’s fortune can change in the timber. In 30 seconds I went from thinking I was going home empty to getting a kill.

 This was one of the toughest, and most mentally challenging archery seasons I’ve had. I’m thankful for the doe, as she saved my rut-cation. And looking back, my hunt was more successful than I probably realized at the time. I had never patterned a buck before  and all my work leading up to the season did pay off. I was correct about my 8 points’ bedding location, and the wind he’d travel on. And the doe is helping me to continue to build confidence in my shot for when I put all the pieces together for my future moment of truth from the stand.

As luck would have it, my much anticipated opening day on our farm was a soggy monsoon. I don’t mind hunting in the rain. In fact, a little cloud cover and some “light” precipitation can do wonders for deer movement, but this was not one of those times. A hurricane had been sitting off the east coast and it poured for the better part of 3 days. The rain and wind didn’t deter me, though. I went to the timber and hunted the edge of our property with my trusty Lone Wolf climber. Given that the weather was poor at best, I decided to head to an area of our farm that I’ve not hunted all that often to do a recon sit. I have a few camera pictures of deer movement in this area, but my hunt was a bust as I came up completely empty. The only good thing that did come out of the hunt was discovering my rain gear actually worked well, and my makeshift rain shield kept my cameras dry.  While I sat in the rain, my father-in-law stayed dry and had more deer action from the window of our cabin than I did. Sitting in his rocking chair, he saw two nice shooters cross the field into a known bedding area to the west of the cabin—I filed this info away for later use.

With my Saturday hunt a bust, I decided to use the damp conditions to my benefit and make something of the weekend. The wet conditions that continued into Sunday (no hunting on Sunday in Pennsylvania) were ideal for keeping scent to a minimum while in the timber, so a friend and I decided to do some stand maintenance. We moved a stand location to a field edge off of a saddle connecting two cut corn fields—now winter wheat. This location is notorious for deer movement on our property, particularly during the rut. I’ve had several encounters in this area with mature deer the past few years and we’re hoping our decision to relocate the stand pays off.

New stand location 

 With the new stand location in place, I turned my attention to pulling camera cards and moving a few camera locations. My cameras were still in their summer locations, predominantly over food plots and mineral sites. This time of year I like to move my cameras further into the timber along travel corridors and near known scrape locations. This year I’ve also decided to make a few mock scrapes using Smokey’s Preorbital Gland Lure. I’ve heard good things about this lure and wanted to see for myself how well it performs; the photos will tell the tale when I check them the third week of October. I also used the intel of the Saturday buck crossing my father-in-law witnessed and placed a scrape and camera on the edge of a thicket where I believe these bucks are bedding during the day. In this instance, I’m using the mock scrape to hopefully close the distance between my nearby stand locations and bucks who may travel this corridor. QDMA says 85% of natural scrapes are visited after dark. This is why I’ve placed my mock scrape in an area that historically has more daylight action—hoping to intrigue a cruiser. The past few months I’ve had a few camera pictures of a nice 9-point and an 8- point who like to enter this field during the same 8:30 AM time frame they were seen crossing on Saturday. Hopefully my mock scrape will yield some daylight pictures and confirm my assumptions, allowing me to target one of these daylight cruisers.

Here are a few tips on mock scrapes and how I made mine

1. Mock scrapes can help enhance any stand location. I pick out a low hanging branch about 4 feet off the ground within range of any one of my stand locations. I try to make sure the position of the branch will afford me the best shot opportunity, while keeping the eyes of the deer averted. Once I locate an ideal branch, I generally apply some of Smokey’s Preorbital Gland Lure to the licking branch.

2. With my licking branch picked out, I go ahead and scrape up a section of the soil below the branch using a twig or my scent free boot. Some like to place deer scents or urine in the scraped soil. I prefer to relieve myself on the scrape, as studies have shown deer do not react negatively to human urine. (This option is cheaper and can be fully accomplished with the help of a malted beverage—particularly if you’re making multiple scrapes)

3. For those who may not have a branch that is at the right height for a licking branch, or an area (like the middle of a field) where a tree isn’t near, you can make you’re own licking branch tree! Here’s a how-to video:

The opening at our farm is tomorrow. To say my nights have been sleepless is an understatement. Visions of all the offseason work coming together like a movie script keep me awake at night and my anticipation is only matched by a child’s intrinsic joy on Christmas eve. While lying in bed my wife tells me good night before turning off the light, and I respond with, “I love deer season” (true story).

 Like any good whitetail addict, during this time of year I typically lie in bed analyzing every facet of the upcoming opening day. I mentally run through the various stand locations on the property, the deer movement I’ve identified on camera (in addition to historical knowledge of the property), and consider how the predicted wind for the weekend may impact my options. I crave as much information and knowledge as I can possibly acquire about the woods I intend to hunt and the characteristics of the whitetail I pursue. The quantity of information that can be gathered with today’s technology is incredible; just game cams alone provide a wealth of information. More often that not, navigating the trash and the treasure leads to more confusion instead of decisive decision making. That being said, this year I’ve decided to employ a tool to help me make sense of all my information and ultimately cut down on the guess work—and hopefully allow for some sleep. I’m a bit of a closet technology nerd and when I can combine technology and hunting, I’m in whitetail heaven. To help me organize my information, this year I’m using a HuntSoft account. HuntSoft is an online software-based platform that takes your game camera pictures and extracts all the data from the day an image was taken. You can also enter information manually like sightings, kill locations, cam and stand locations, etc. This program then takes all the uploaded information and provides reports outlining trends taking place on your property. It’ll let you know if that bruiser you have on camera moves most often during a north wind, which time of day he’s most often on his feet, or if a specific moon phase prompts his movement. This tool really just organizes your information in a digestible and meaningful way that can be most useful in planning a hunt. You can view a tutorial video below here to see how to get started. I’m currently using the free version as a test run.

 I understand this tool may not be for everyone and is not a replacement for a hunter’s woods smarts. This type of tool only provides hunters with additional information and enhances what they already know. If the tool is telling you it’s a good day for a certain stand location based on that day’s wind, you still have to have a truthful approach. There must be an entry and exit plan for that location, knowledge about which direction the deer will move to effectively play the wind, and confidence that deer will pass that stand with that day’s conditions. It’s not a magic elixir, but I’ve certainly found it to be helpful in planning and understanding the dynamics of our farm.

 I’m currently at the beginning stages of using this tool. Below I’ll share with you some screens from my profile.

 I’ve outlined our property and have my camera and stand locations all plotted on the map.

  Once plotted with wind preferences for each stand location, the tool will give you the best stand locations per day based on the data.

 The game log screen is where you upload your camera images or input a deer on hoof sighting, a kill location, etc. To the right you can filter your images using several criteria.

Once uploaded you can tag each image, allowing you to filter later.

Once you have your images and data uploaded, you can begin to pull reports detailing movement by hour, movement by wind direction or movement by moon phase.

There are multiple companies offering similar products, however I find HuntSoft to be the most user friendly and like the level of reporting it provides. Here are a few other options: Deer Lab, and Big Game Logic.

 As hunters, we’re always looking for some type of advantage, and this software is one of mine. This tool may not be for everyone, but can be a helpful tool in planning and organizing your approach this season and could be part of the reason you have your moment of truth from the stand.

If you’ve read my previous articles, you’ve heard me mention our family farm and hunting property. It’s 240 acres of what I consider to be pretty fantastic Pennsylvania whitetail land and with the recent management approach we’ve taken, we should have even better hunting in the years to come. You can read more here (Whitetail Preseason Preparation: Setting Expectation) about our property management.  Although I certainly feel fortunate to have access to this land, our farm resides in the south central portion of the state near the Maryland border and is a three hour drive from my home in the suburbs of Philadelphia. This travel time significantly limits my hunting opportunities during archery season to a few Saturdays and a week’s vacation during the first week of November. This summer I decided that I’d try to find public land nearer my home to hunt when traveling isn’t an option. Another source of motivation was the early season opening in this part of the state and the opportunity to get into the timber sooner. I had little time and no prior experience with any of the land in the eastern part of the state. I had a lot of work to do and still not sure what my efforts may produce, but I was up for the challenge!

 My Approach

With limited knowledge of the area, I did a quick internet search for huntable state parks and  forests near me. I was willing to travel up to an hour for adequate hunting land and was looking for a piece of land, ideally, to the west, as I wanted to get further away from urban areas in hopes of reducing my run-ins with other hunters in the timber. I eventually settled on French Creek State Park as my destination.

 With my destination determined, it was time to assess the land for a suitable stand location. The park is over 7,500 acres with approximately half of it designated as huntable land. It would be impossible for me to scout over 3,000 acres in the one afternoon I had to find a stand location. So I made a plan and began with a virtual scout to focus my efforts once on site. Google Maps proved to be a great tool for this. Using Google’s satellite image, I could see the park layout and the neighboring land. I was looking for anything located remotely close to agriculture, but this feature was not an option. I then turned my attention toward the handful of what appeared to be thick brushy areas and decided this would be the area where I’d focus. With this small amount of information filed away, I made the hour drive to the park and paid a visit to the park office to grab a topography map. While sitting in my car, I did a quick review of the map and quickly ignored all areas with designated park hiking trails as huntable areas, with the goal of reducing the impact of human pressure. I then looked for topographic features, changes in elevation, pinch points, or creek bottoms. The northern portion of the park seemed the most remote and offered some elevation change with deep ravines and steep ridges and also included a stream. This would ultimately be the general area where I’d focus my scout.

 Once inside the timber, I knew I needed to hike in further than most people would be willing to with a stand and gear on their back to give myself the best chance of seeing natural deer movement. My goal was to hike a mile into the timber, knowing most public land hunters don’t typically travel much further than a half mile from their vehicle and entrance site. I looked for sign along the way and it was limited. After about 30 minutes, I began seeing sign that showed more promise–deer trails, scat and a significant amount of brush. I could hear a stream and started working my way toward the sound. The sound lead me through thick brush and to the edge of a deep ravine with the ridge lined in alder thicket. I found deer trails and bedding areas in the alder thicket and once I hiked down the ravine, there was a noticeable deer trail hugging the ridge line with the creek bottom supplying plenty of oak trees dropping acorns. I picked out a few climbable trees and had found my spot. This area provided plenty of cover, water, a food source, a topography change, clear bedding area, a natural pinch point between the ridge and the creek, and was relatively deep in the timber. In total, I spent two hours with boots on the ground scouting. Next was to hunt the location and see if my strategy and approach would pay off.

 The Test

Pennsylvania opening day had arrived. I was excited to get in my stand to say the least. Based on a few new strategies I’d implemented for this year, I previously decided to hunt only the evening set. The new (new to me) strategies were to hunt fewer mornings in October, unless camera, intel, etc.. tells me otherwise, and to use the Moon Phase Guide for the first time. According to the guide, I had a red moon for that evening beginning at 5:30 EST. I had thought if I was going to get any action out of this location, it would likely come from the thicket directly to my south. And for that to work I really needed any type of south wind. I arrived that afternoon, packed in my climber and gear, and climbed a tree about 50 yards below the pinch point between the ridge and the stream with the south wind I was hoping for. I honestly didn’t care if I saw a single deer, archery season was here and I was stoked just to be in the timber. A few  hours had passed with only seeing a hawk and one chipmunk. The moon time had arrived and I was hoping things would pick up. At 6 o’clock I heard some movement and spotted a deer coming from the thicket to the south. It was headed toward the ridge line just out of range. Two more deer followed the same path, all bucks–two 6-points and a nice 8-point! The two six points weren’t shooters but the 8-point was certainly a shooter, particularly for a Pennsylvania public land hunt.

 I’m not sure what was more exciting, seeing the first deer of the season from the stand or the fact that my strategy and limited scouting had worked! I’ll definitely be back to this location on weekends I can’t make it back to the farm. And I’ll make a slight stand tweak and move a little further up the ridge line to better cover the flat coming out of the thicket. I’ll also continue to use the Moon Phase Guide and will report back on the season-long outcome of this new strategy. Some may say that my hunt wasn’t a success since I didn’t get a shot or I didn’t kill, but I disagree. I implemented new strategies and put myself in position to see natural deer movement using a truthful approach and executing sound strategy. It dawned on me while climbing from my stand that this experience may mean more to my growth as a hunter than any buck or doe I may harvest this year. Why? Because I moved outside of my comfort zone and challenged myself to think differently about my approach in unfamiliar territory. These are the moments I seek most of all, as this day was clearly a moment of truth from the stand.