Determining the Best Times to Bowhunt During Gun Season

Editor's Note: Many bowhunters think of themselves as two-season hunters who hunt with bows and arrows during bow season and then become gun hunters as soon as gun season arrives. However, in the states that have bow season and gun season occurring simultaneously, a sportsman may have a greater chance of taking a trophy buck with a bow during gun season than he does with a gun.

Getting in your stand before the first gun hunter arrives in an area may pay buck dividends for you. However, if you don't take a buck during the first hours following daylight, you still may have the opportunity to arrow a buck between 10:30 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. Generally, a gun hunter will remain on his stand or make a stalk for deer until about 10:00 a.m. Then usually his brain will give him one of two messages...

* "Well, because I haven't seen anything standing or stalking, I think I'll try and jump a deer up and shoot him."

* Or, "Since I'm hungry, and the deer aren't moving anyway, I'll go back to the car and return to this stand after lunch." When hunters start trying to jump deer and/or return to their vehicles for lunch, they will spook deer. The big bucks will head automatically to the thick cover where they'll encounter you set up waiting.

Older, smarter bucks that already may have reached the thick cover even before you do usually will stay bedded-down until the middle of the day when most hunters leave the woods to eat their lunches, and little or no hunting pressure exists. These wise, more mature bucks have learned they can eat, breed does and stretch in thick cover during this time without detection. At about 1:30 or 2:00 p.m., when gun hunters re-enter the woods after lunch, they once again will spook deer back into thick cover where you'll wait with your bow.

You'll next have an opportunity to bag deer while bowhunting in thick cover during gun season the last 15 minutes before dark. Because most gun hunters prefer not to come out of the woods after dark, they'll start moving toward their vehicles 30 to 45 minutes before dark. They lose that last bit of hunting time, which means hunting pressure will decrease as night falls. Then bucks will stand up and move in heavy cover and head toward the more open areas, knowing the darkness will cover their movements. If you remain in your tree stand, bucks will head automatically to the thick cover where they'll encounter you set up and waiting.