How to Detect Deer Movement
Day 5: Pay Strict Attention to Detail to Bag an End-of-Season Buck
At the end of the season, strict attention must be paid to every detail. The deer are alerted and looking for danger. Although the wind is a key factor for keeping the hunter's scent out of his hunting area, equally as important is the sportsman's approach to the stand. When gun season is on, I take a rake into the woods with me and rake a path from my treestand back 150-yards toward where I enter the woods. Then on the day I hunt I can walk to my stand without making any noise on the morning I plan to hunt. Whereas I normally take 15 minutes to get to my stand during the first part of the season, I may spend an hour covering the same distance to reach my stand in the late part of the season to keep from spooking the deer.
I also try and use permanent stands or ladder stands in the late season. Then I make little or no noise when I climb into my tree stand. The most-difficult deer to pattern and to hunt is a deer that has spent all season long learning what hunters do and when they do it. By investing more time scouting and studying deer and their movement patterns and learning where they feed, where they wait to feed, and where they hold when hunting pressure is on, you will be better able to predict at what point in the woods to place your treestand or ground blind for an effective ambush. If you spend more time learning about deer than you do hunting, then you will take more deer than even those who hunt the most.
|