In short, I saw over fourteen deer yesterday. That's an astronomical figure in my book, and the hope is that seeing that many deer would actually equate to taking at least one of them. But no. Didn't even manage a shot.
Here's what happened:
- Winded by about ten deer that were feeding in a field and working their way towards me. No big surprise here. The wind and my scent were blowing right in their face. See what I learned for further explanation.
- Busted by four deer due to movement, sort of. The first three deer literally busted out of some cover. By the time I noticed them, they were five yards from me. That's too late when you're on the ground, and I was never able to turn for a shot. They got nervous but never winded me or spotted me. They were at five yards for about ten minutes.
- Once they busted, I decided to re-position myself in the stand. Apparently, another deer had moved in on my other side when the three deer were five yards from me. As soon as I moved, it busted me and took off.
Here's my thoughts (i.e. lame excuses) on those shortcomings:
- Some shortcomings are inevitable when you switch to a spot mid-season where you have not previously scouted or set stands. That's just the reality of the situation. It's a situation that is still better than hunting public land, but it takes a while to figure a place out.
- It is infinitely harder to take a deer with a longbow than it is to take one with a compound. At this point, I'm willing to admit that I grossly underestimated just how much more difficult using a longbow would make it. If nothing falls this year, I have to consider switching to a compound. Ugh. It hurts to write that. Forget that thought.
- Hunting from the ground is exponentially harder than hunting from a treestand. Hunting from a treestand negates (for the most part) wind and movement. Make no mistakes about it, something would have hit the ground yesterday if I was hunting from a tree stand. No matter what happens this year, I will seriously consider hunting from a tree stand next year.
What I Learned:
Yesterday did afford me some valuable insights into how the deer move through that property, and I pretty much have them patterned. There is essentially two groups of deer on the property. One utilizes a bedding area that lies in the middle of the property. My hunch is that they utilize a food source that is off the property, meaning they arrive to the bedding area late in the day (it seems midday). They also just mill around the bedding area and eat from the fields that surround it. But for whatever reason, they don't seem to be there until midday. But I could be wrong on that.
The second group beds off the property and only visits to feed. This group dwells in the far Southwest corner and utilizes a different area than the first (although I'm sure there's some overlap). This is the group of ten that winded me yesterday. I originally thought they were coming from the Southeast, so I set my stand for a Northwest wind. That means when they approached from the Southwest, my scent was directly in their path. I readjusted the stand, but I need a rare eastern, southern, or northeast wind for the set to work. Good thing the wind is predicted to blow from the East this Thursday. I know where I'll be.
Also, I forgot my camera again. So no pictures. But I'll try to post a aerial of the site as soon as I get the landowners' permission.
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