A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to attend a Southeast Pennsylvania Branch Quality Deer Management Association (QDMA) event. Neil Dougherty gave two presentations on the topic of habitat and property management. Neil has a wealth of knowledge in this area, has written a couple of books, is the owner of North Country Whitetails (Neil’s whitetail property consulting company) and actively manages over 350,000 acres. Plainly put, the man is one of the leading whitetail habitat experts in the country. I thought I’d share what I learned during this event, and hope you find it as interesting and informative as I did. Below is part one of the two part blog series.

As information is more and more available on the web and through groups like the QDMA, there is a shift in who today’s deer hunter is. Deer hunters today are now, more than ever, engaged as land managers. The byproduct of this is the development of a new hunter called the “modern deer hunter.” The modern deer hunter is part-time biologist, and maybe even a full-time biologist in managing their property with the skill levels attained through resources like the QDMA. One of the most substantial challenges a land manager faces is trying to get the most out of a piece of property. Being able to identify a property’s strengths and weaknesses is critical in optimizing the land.

Not All Deer Properties Are Created Equal

This seems like an elementary statement given that certain states clearly have what many would consider to be better deer hunting than others. But this concept strictly considers the property’s natural ability to hunt, flow and provide opportunities for hunter success, not in what part of the country it’s located. In order to set a property up for success, you need to have a full understanding of your property’s attributes. The first step is to get an aerial understanding of your property. Google maps or Google Earth is a great free tool to familiarize yourself with a property’s features from the air. I know I get lost in reviewing aerial images in the offseason as I comb over different terrain features of the properties I hunt. Even if you’ve hunted a particular piece of land all of your life, it’s worth reviewing the aerial imagery to gain new perspective on the potential reasons deer are using the land the way they do.

Property Purpose

If you’re reading this, it’s pretty clear one of your primary focuses for your piece of land is to have great deer hunting , or better deer hunting than you currently do. With that said, it’s important to consider what other assets the land has beyond hunting. Whether you’re buying a piece of land or enhancing land you already own, it’s important to define what other variables may need to be considered as you develop your overall land management plan. Is the land a timber piece? Does the land have potential for wind leases or gas and oil leases? Do you plan to farm row crops? Owning land is an investment or a sort of 401k for many, and that’s perfectly fine. However, it’s important to define how the land will be used so your land management plan can account for all uses and still provide great deer habitat with a plan to keep the land profitable and enjoyable for years to come.

Assessing The Neighborhood

Just like buying a home, or evaluating your own home’s value, it’s all about location. Buying hunting property or assessing your current hunting property is no different. Ideally what you’d like to see around your property are larger tracts of land ownership (each landowner owning a couple hundred acres each). For example, if you have a 100 acre piece of property surrounded by 20 acre lots owned by neighbors, you’re likely going to experience increased hunting pressure. You could guess that each of those lots may have an owner who hunts, along with their kids, and maybe a relative or two all with deer tags to fill. This can impact everything from how pressured the deer herd is to the age structure of the deer on your property. If you have a piece of land in this environment, you can still create good hunting and enjoy the land—it just may take a little more work. In this scenario you’d want to be more defensive with your property layout, particularly decreasing visibility across your property line. Also, wooded lots are easier to work with than broken up farmland in these types of neighborhoods.

Most hunters’ intent in managing their property is to grow bigger deer and to manage their overall deer herd health while increasing age structure.There is a lot of discussion about “herd management” in the world of land management. The reality is, unless you own or control 1,000-1,500 acres, you will not be able to significantly impact a full herd worth of deer. However, creating a quality deer management (QDM) co-op could help string together enough neighboring properties to impact herd dynamics. Enticing neighbors to work together in harvesting animals ethically and only those within a certain age class could also help to diminish the negatives of a small parcel neighborhood. Over time, everyone could experience the benefit of the QDM co-op and enjoy hunting more mature deer. Building a QDM co-op is something I’m laying the groundwork for in the neighborhood I hunt most often.

Say you can’t create a QDM co-op—neighbors won’t buy in. You can still create good hunting on your property; you just need to recalibrate for attracting and holding deer versus growing mature deer. If you have 75-150 acres, can you grow and hold a 3 1/2 year old  buck? Answer is, maybe not. In Pennsylvania, statistics show that if you have good deer habitat that is thick and diverse on 75-100 acres, you will hold maybe one 3-year-old buck or older. This number could decrease depending on the quality of the neighborhood. This doesn’t mean you can’t grow good deer, but you may need to set realistic goals for the quality of deer that can be produced in your area. A great way to determine your goals is to look at the top 10% of bucks harvested in your county. If you’re producing deer that fall within the top 10% of your county, you are doing well by most standards.

Planning

After having a solid grasp of a property’s available resources and the neighborhood liabilities, it’s time to assess the food resources. The primary components of any whitetail management plan are food, cover and huntablity. The goal is to have more food, better cover and hunt more strategically than your neighbors. The downside to land management is the amount of pressure put on a property by the type of work it takes to manage the land. I know I’m hitting the timber every free weekend I have to plant food plots, cut timber and hang game cams. Think about how many deer/human interactions are taking place while this work is being done (an interaction is any time a deer sees/smells/hears a human). Think of this versus your neighbor who lives out of state and visits their property only four weekends out of the year to hunt. Whose property has more pressure? If you’re a deer, what property is safer 99% of the year? Your neighbor’s. You may have better food sources, but your neighbor has no pressure. If I’m a deer, I’m eating your food at night and living on your neighbor’s property during the day. You’re essentially feeding the deer your neighbor will harvest during hunting season. This is where the idea of huntablity comes into play. If you’re a person who is putting increased pressure on your property, you’ll want to show some restraint in some cases so you don’t overuse a piece of property. I typically try to undertake much of my habitat management over the winter and early spring, so I can let the property rest during late spring through hunting season. During hunting season, I try to hunt when I have the right conditions versus hunting every day I have free. This is to help reduce the overall pressure on my hunting property—I’ve not yet mastered this but, I’m working on it.

Food and Food Plots

Deer are slaves to their stomachs. Their entire world revolves around food. Above and beyond all other habitat updates, having adequate food will always trump in status anything else provided in your neighborhood. Food isn’t only referring to row crops and food plots. It’s all about providing the mineral resources deer need in any number of ways—acorn mast, thinning the woods to open up the canopy to encourage undergrowth, etc. Supplemental feeding is an option, however it’s the least desirable way to provide food. It’s expensive and there are plenty of natural ways to provide adequate deer forage particularly in the north and midwest. Contrary to popular belief, there is not a significant increase in antler growth attributed to supplemental feeding and it also contributes to a 200 yard loss of surrounding natural habitat in and around the area where deer are feeding aggressively. The habitat loss is due to large numbers of deer attracted to a small area and destroying all the natural browse in a concentrated area. This loss of habitat is all the more reason for your deer to live on your neighbor’s property and not yours.

Food plots are an increasingly enticing option to enhance a property’s food offering for many land managers, especially given the food plot prevalence in many of today’s Outdoor Channel hunting shows. Before deciding food plots are the right way to go, it’s important to determine if, and why, you need a food plot. On average, every deer consumes about 2,000 pounds of food a year. Roughly 1,400 pounds of that food should be brushy/forby type of food you’d find in pastures. Maybe 40% of a deer’s food intake will come from row crop type foods. According to Neil Dougherty, he has yet to implement food plots onto a property and then document a noticeable increase in antler growth. Body weights have increased, but antlers have not been impacted. A food plot makes sense if you have an over concentration of deer and the habitat is being hammered to a point that it can’t support the deer herd. In this scenario, a property could use an increase in available nutrition. If you would like to create a hunting plot to concentrate deer during hunting season–this is fine too. However, determining how a potential food plot will be used is important to the overall layout of a property and ensures the appropriate type of plot/seed is planted. To have a good property, you don’t need a $3,000 a year agriculture bill and a bunch of equipment to compete with local farms. Quality natural habitat, balanced deer sex ratios and healthy deer are the key. Food plots do have their place, but their place should be defined and be part of your overall land strategy.

Read part two of the blog series here!

Just the thought of food plots gets me excited for the upcoming spring planting season. Often times deer hunters focus their food plots on plants that will yield great summer and fall forage, and give little thought to winter nutrition. After all, the great summer food plots is where we get all those velvet buck pictures. While these types of food plots are great, don’t forget about the importance of providing adequate food during the harsh winter months for your deer herd. Deer spend the late winter months and early spring replenishing their bodies following the rut and the scarce food resources of winter. It stands to reason the sooner deer rebuild their bodies, the sooner bucks can put energy and nutrition toward growing antlers, and the better equipped does will be for birthing and providing sustenance to their fawns.

 Many of my own plots are focused on summer and fall forage with a few small plots dedicated to winter food. This year I will take a step toward remedying this deficiency by dedicating more acreage to a winter food source. In an effort to keep cost down, I’ve also taken to the timber with a chainsaw to put food on the ground in the form of hinge cutting. At the same time the hinge cutting has opened the forest canopy to allow sunlight to hit the ground in an effort to allow the forest to regenerate creating natural winter browse in the future.

 If you’re interested in learning more about providing your deer herd nutrition through the winter, check out the video below from the guys at Deer and Deer Hunting.

Here in Pennsylvania, Punxsutawney Phil (a famous groundhog weatherman, for those not from PA) predicted an early spring. It’s hard to believe spring may be just around the corner, considering the recent 8 degree temperatures. Regardless of how soon or late spring may arrive, it’s never too early to start putting out mineral stations.

Hunters and land managers use minerals stations and attractants for many reasons. As most know, the majority of mineral and attractants contain salt, which is highly attractive to deer. This makes mineral stations a great place to hang game cameras to help inventory your deer herd. Camera surveys are also a great way to determine your buck to doe ratio, fawn recruitment and overall herd health. Mineral for many is an important part of the QDM (Quality Deer Management) plan, as a way to support the overall health of the deer herd—particularly in the harsh winter months. I can’t say whether mineral stations help increase antler size, however it would stand to reason that healthy deer/bucks would at minimum have a better opportunity to reach their full potential.

Creating Mineral Station

Fortunately, creating and maintaining a few mineral stations is relatively easy work and is one of the more wallet-friendly projects to undertake. There are many companies making quality mineral blends. I’ve personally found success with Whitetail Institute and Ani-logic mineral. Or you can head to your local feed and farm supply store, or co-op, and create your own mix. This year I’ve decided to make my own whitetail mineral blend to get more bang for my buck (Whitetail Mineral Recipe). With this recipe, I can make 6 times as much of my own blend for the cost of brand mineral. Either way, once you’ve selected a mineral, you’re own your way to promoting herd health and filling camera cards.

 First, you’ll need to select a location. Your mineral station location should be strategically located. Just like hanging a tree stand, you’ll want to place your mineral station in heavily traveled areas, near bedding, in thick brush where deer will feel safe, and near food plots and water sources. These are surefire areas to get quality game camera pictures and insure heavy usage of the mineral station.

 Now that you’ve selected your location, it’s time to break ground through a simple process. Using a shovel, you’ll want to dig a hole no more than a few inches deep and about 6-12 inches in diameter. To make it even easier, you can take a rake and just loosen the topsoil. Once you’ve broken ground, apply your mineral (I’ll usually use about 10-20 lbs. per station). You can add extra attractants if you’d like, but I find it’s not necessary. Once you have the mineral on the ground, dump a  little water from a water bottle onto the mineral. It’s not necessary, but it will help the mineral begin to leech into the ground, expediting the establishment of the station.

 This time of year is a great time to begin your mineral stations, as whitetail food is often scarce during the winter months. This can have a great impact on the health of your deer herd and is  also a great way to attract neighboring deer, giving them a reason call your property home if they’re finding the nutrition and safety they seek while visiting.

 Here’s a video showing how to quickly you can make an effective mineral station.

Now that you’ve established your mineral stations, you should begin to see deer activity pretty quickly. If you’ve selected the right location you could see activity within the first 24 hours. This quick effectiveness is great, but you’ll need to follow a few steps to keep the attraction high and hopefully peak the interest of the mature bucks on your property.

 For starters, you’ll need to keep the site fresh. Letting the mineral station sit too long without replenishing the mineral will decrease attraction. Some of the mineral and salt will leach into the ground and deer will paw at the dirt, but for full whitetail allure, you’ll want to perform regular site maintenance. I typically try to freshen my sites once every month. To freshen the site, follow the same basic steps outlined above for creating the site; dump the mineral in the existing site and rake it in with the soil.

 When checking and maintaining mineral stations, be sure to follow the same low impact and scent control tactics you employ during hunting season. There is nothing worse than educating whitetail of your presence in areas they deem safe. This may be of less consequence now during the winter months with hunting many months away, however, I suggest visiting your mineral stations at midday to avoid unwanted human/whitetail contact. Wear rubber boots and scent controlled clothing and spray down with the scent eliminator of your choice.

 Final Thoughts

With your mineral stations firmly established in great locations, you’ll be able to gather an abundance of camera information about the whitetail herd using your property. This information is helpful for hunters who take an active role in stewarding their land and enhancing the health of their deer herd. Not to mention, you should find your camera cards filled with velvet bucks come summer.

Defining deer bedding on your property in many cases isn’t difficult. However, understanding how and when deer are using particular bedding areas is easier said than done in many cases—particularly in the case of mature bucks.

 In Today’s video tip Jeff Sturgis dives into the details of what makes great buck bedding and what an the old monarch on your property seeks in defining his bedding area. This video was particularly appealing to me as I attempt to understand the bedding areas the mountain portion of our property provides our deer herd, and hunt it successfully this year.

Winter is a great time to begin planning your spring property updates that will positively impact next year’s deer hunting season. Food plots are often a great way to move toward achieving your habitat and whitetail hunting goals. Today’s video tip shares an approach for implementing successful food plots without using big equipment or breaking the bank.

 Implementing a food plot on your property doesn’t guarantee that you’ll now be growing booners on your property. However, a well planned and strategically located food plot can absolutely enhance your odds of growing and holding better deer. If you’re interested in how to create food plots without big equipment and on a budget, I highly recommend watching the video below.

I’m typically not much of a New Year’s resolution guy. Most resolutions are ill-fated and rarely last beyond the end of January. However, resolutions related to hunting that get me outdoors more  and thinking of whitetails…now those are the type of resolutions I can commit to. It’s easy to fall victim to hunting the same places and the same way year after year, making for a stale hunting season.This year I’m committing myself to explore more. Whether it’s exploring new states and land to hunt or learning and utilizing new tactics, the goal is to push beyond my comfort zone. With that, here are a few resolutions to consider for your 2016 season to help you avoid the whitetail rut (pun intended).

1. Become A Better Shot

 

As archery hunters, our shot placement is critical and is often the difference between retrieving a kill and not. It’s our responsibility as archers to insure we’ve done everything possible to make a clean and ethical kill. My typical practice regiment in the offseason is a combination of range time and shooting from elevation–either from a stand or elevated deck at a range of 30 to 40 yards. This year I’m challenging myself to move my distance out to become comfortable at 40 to 50 yards consistently. Not that I’m looking to take a 50 yard shot in the timber, but the idea is to build consistency at 50 yards, making anything closer seem like a chip shot. Time on the range or practicing in your backyard will turn into success in the stand.

2. Get Into Shape

I know, this feels like a non hunting related resolution, but not so. As hunters we know the kind of toll those early mornings and long hikes up and down ridges can take on our bodies. The type of animals being hunted and terrain type will dictate what level of shape needed to hunt successfully. Increasing your level of fitness will also increase your overall shooting accuracy, which is a nice incentive and ties into becoming a better shot. No need to train like an Olympic athlete, just commit to being in a little better shape next season than you were this season and you’ll be on the right path.

3. Find New Land To Hunt

 If you’re hunting the same land year after year and not seeing the types of bucks you’d like to hunt, consider looking for new hunting locations. Doing the same thing over and over expecting different results is widely touted as the definition of insanity. You may only need to change your stand location on the current property you hunt. Or you may want to look for land that supports the kind of opportunity you’re looking for. Take it one step further and look at hunting in different states to gain those experiences you’d like to have. 2016 for me represents the year I begin to look for access in additional states. Don’t let the land you hunt dictate your experiences–get out there and knock on doors. You can never have too much land hunt to chase those mature bucks.

4. Scout More

This resolution perfectly compliments the resolution of finding new land, as scouting your current hunting location for additional spots may allow you to find that hotbed of deer activity that has been overlooked. Archery hunting is one of those pursuits where one’s level of success is a direct result of effort put in. For many, the offseason is just that–time to put the bow away until next fall. If you’re like me, hunting whitetails is a 365 day a year obsession. Scouting for next year actually begins during the present season, but be sure to take the time once late season ends to look for sign that can be used as intel for next season. Are there new trail systems popping up? Are there new bedding areas developing as the timber changes year after year. Be sure to utilize game cameras year round to keep tabs on the ebb and flow of your herd and to see what bucks made it through the season. Shed hunting is a great way to get out to do some scouting in the late/early spring. This is also a great way to spend time in the outdoors and stay connected to your passion year round.

5. Try A New Tactic

Maybe you want a new experience, but you don’t have time to find new land or travel to a new state. Try changing up how you hunt to add some excitement to next season. If you typically sit on field edges, maybe try setting up on a travel corridor or near a known bedding area in the timber. If you only do morning and evening sits, try sitting all day. Or break out a new call or try rattling antlers for the first time. There are no shortage of tactics to use adding some excitement to next season.

 Here’s to an exciting 2016 season! And who knows, maybe one of your resolutions will be the reason for your moment of truth from the stand.

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: