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Baiting For Deer, Do you do Bait?

Not my cup of tea. Don't really care what anyone else does. As long as it's not legal on public land, that's just ridiculous as a premise. Of course Jersey would allow that. I don't see many illegal bait piles in the woods but I do see a lot of mineral usage. More for trail cameras than hunting purposes I posit, but it still annoys the crap out of me when I find it.

To that end however, I don't view shooting deer over a food plot as anything materially different than a bait pile. If you go to the stand expecting to kill something because you have it that patterned, it's all different variants of the same deal.

It's really just the farmer vs. hunter mentality we've been working out for like 15,000 years. I'm just an old soul I guess.
 
Baiting is super effective. When I read/hear people saying it scares off bucks, etc....I think they might be noticing seasonal shifts, something else is happening, they are going to check the bait/cams way too much, or they are leaving scent everywhere due to not being careful enough. Or it just could be a mental cope (want to think baiting is similar to hunting down a buck on 1,000 acres of public).

Almost all mature bucks taken with archery equipment in WV are taken over bait.

I have hunted over bait, but once you've done it without bait enough (and been successful at times), then, for me, hunting over bait is kind of boring. Folks that have only hunted archery over bait might not always know the difference (here, baiting is hunting and hunting is life...so corn is life I think).


This gets into the process- vs results-orientation split I see among hunters. I'm more process-oriented (I'd rather kill a 6 point on public than a nice 8 over bait).

I'd rank the following from easiest to hardest to harvest deer as a hunting technique:

bait
food plot placed for deer hunting
food plot that is meant for human nourishment (because you have more constraints on crop and placement)
prominent natural food sources (like that killer white oak)
hunting terrain and other features (pinch points, topo saddles, game trails, etc)

I think our internal feel and rankings (at least mine) might be somewhat innate/common sensical and come down to energy return on energy invested.

Just to put legs under that using the baiting example and assuming that our instincts better match an ancient context instead of our modern civilization:

If you hunted for food only, would it make any sense to dump 200 lbs of corn on the ground over the course of a year to maybe harvest 100 lbs of deer meat? Whether you look at it regarding calories, time, or money....it's a tradeoff that only a modern and well fed person would consider. I suppose that would change if folks only used refuse food items that they could not eat directly. Otherwise, you're better off making 200 lbs of corn chowder and then kill 100 lbs worth of doe meat while sitting over a trail.
 
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raisins said:
Baiting is super effective. When I read/hear people saying it scares off bucks, etc....I think they might be noticing seasonal shifts, something else is happening, they are going to check the bait/cams way too much, or they are leaving scent everywhere due to not being careful enough. Or it just could be a mental cope (want to think baiting is similar to hunting down a buck on 1,000 acres of public).

Almost all mature bucks taken with archery equipment in WV are taken over bait.

I have hunted over bait, but once you've done it without bait enough (and been successful at times), then, for me, hunting over bait is kind of boring. Folks that have only hunted archery over bait might not always know the difference (here, baiting is hunting and hunting is life...so corn is life I think).


This gets into the process- vs results-orientation split I see among hunters. I'm more process-oriented (I'd rather kill a 6 point on public than a nice 8 over bait).

I'd rank the following from easiest to hardest to harvest deer as a hunting technique:

bait
food plot placed for deer hunting
food plot that is meant for human nourishment (because you have more constraints on crop and placement)
prominent natural food sources (like that killer white oak)
hunting terrain and other features (pinch points, topo saddles, game trails, etc)

I think our internal feel and rankings (at least mine) might be somewhat innate/common sensical and come down to energy return on energy invested.

Just to put legs under that using the baiting example and assuming that our instincts better match an ancient context instead of our modern civilization:

If you hunted for food only, would it make any sense to dump 200 lbs of corn on the ground over the course of a year to maybe harvest 100 lbs of deer meat? Whether you look at it regarding calories, time, or money....it's a tradeoff that only a modern and well fed person would consider. I suppose that would change if folks only used refuse food items that they could not eat directly. Otherwise, you're better off making 200 lbs of corn chowder and then kill 100 lbs worth of doe meat while sitting over a trail.
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When you think about how much potential shine gets fed to the durned deer every year, it's no wonder this country is in the shape it is.
 
Here here!!!

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Robert loper said:
agreed 100% but they are supposedly seriously talking about doing away with baiting in 2025 they have already gave a lot of farmers a heads up on this because farmers make a ton of money on bait during the season in Jersey
where do you hunt at? I am in Cape May and would be cool to meet up with some people and go scouting some areas.
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Robert loper said:
agreed 100% but they are supposedly seriously talking about doing away with baiting in 2025 they have already gave a lot of farmers a heads up on this because farmers make a ton of money on bait during the season in Jersey
where do you hunt at? I am in Cape May and would be cool to meet up with some people and go scouting some areas.
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I would love to scout someone, as I hunt alone because the 2 people I know that hunt are typical NJ hunters. Scouting to them is dumping a bag of corn 1 week before opening day. Unfortunately we are at polar opposite ends of the state. I need to learn though, so PM me if you have a large window on a Sunday.
 
Robert Loper, I also live in Cape May Co. Although I do most of my hunting in Salem Co. Baiting is so prevalent here that I don't think I know anyone that doesn't bait. My hunting partner and I hunt over about 10 set stands. Where I hunt, Zone 27, you can hunt with bow from around September 10 straight through January 31. As the season progresses, I find we'll see less and less mature deer. Early season you will have some visit the bait, during the rut you'll have some bucks checking out the bait scent checking for does, and winter bow mature deer come in because natural food availability is dwindling down.. Our deer have become so educated, some walk through the woods looking up into the trees. At the end of last season I decided to become more mobile and try to go where the deer are instead of luring them to me. This year Ill be sitting more in unbaited spots in my saddle. I typically take a doe or three and if lucky a buck for the season. Nj has been doing their best to eradicate the deer population over the years. Probably from the urging from insurance companies and farmers. We have longer gun seasons now with liberal bag limits. In Zone 27, a bow hunter can take 5 does and one buck in each of the 3 archery seasons. If you wanted to, you could kill 18 deer a year with your bow. I don't like that during the 6 day shotgun week every hunter can shoot 2 bucks. And then there are the deer drives. I think it was about 25 years ago NJ starting allowing hunting over bait. I believe it was to knock the population down and they have been successful. Now I have heard rumor the state is considering rescinding the baiting law because of the deer diseases going around. Down here in zone 34 (cmc), the population is so down a bow hunter can take just one deer per season. On a positive note, Nj has so much public land to deer hunt, I don't think we'll ever run out of new spot to try
 
Arrowhead1 said:
Robert Loper, I also live in Cape May Co. Although I do most of my hunting in Salem Co. Baiting is so prevalent here that I don't think I know anyone that doesn't bait. My hunting partner and I hunt over about 10 set stands. Where I hunt, Zone 27, you can hunt with bow from around September 10 straight through January 31. As the season progresses, I find we'll see less and less mature deer. Early season you will have some visit the bait, during the rut you'll have some bucks checking out the bait scent checking for does, and winter bow mature deer come in because natural food availability is dwindling down.. Our deer have become so educated, some walk through the woods looking up into the trees. At the end of last season I decided to become more mobile and try to go where the deer are instead of luring them to me. This year Ill be sitting more in unbaited spots in my saddle. I typically take a doe or three and if lucky a buck for the season. Nj has been doing their best to eradicate the deer population over the years. Probably from the urging from insurance companies and farmers. We have longer gun seasons now with liberal bag limits. In Zone 27, a bow hunter can take 5 does and one buck in each of the 3 archery seasons. If you wanted to, you could kill 18 deer a year with your bow. I don't like that during the 6 day shotgun week every hunter can shoot 2 bucks. And then there are the deer drives. I think it was about 25 years ago NJ starting allowing hunting over bait. I believe it was to knock the population down and they have been successful. Now I have heard rumor the state is considering rescinding the baiting law because of the deer diseases going around. Down here in zone 34 (cmc), the population is so down a bow hunter can take just one deer per season. On a positive note, Nj has so much public land to deer hunt, I don't think we'll ever run out of new spot to try
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I agree 100%.
I've been hunting zone 34-31 for 30 years and its really sad how car insurance companies really do have a big influence in a-lot of things in our seasons
Deer drives and bait piles have and are jjst the way down here.
i will say I am a huge anti deer drive guy and I pray they one day the state outlaws this practice.
deer clubs have just ravaged the young buck numbers then add in ehd and no wonder NJ is one of the worse states for trophy whitetails.
the shame about it all is we have some great diverse habitat fir deer especially the sw and nw parts.
we could be a great trophy whitetail spot but the state would never allow this.
i hunt zone 34 but, it has become just ridiculous expensive to kill one deer per season and on top of the gun clubs controlling the southern Jersey bag limits for everything but shotgun its just unrwal.
gun clubs obviously have a huge influence on gun season bag limits snd its so obvious, i can kill 2 bucks in one week but one buck per season in zone 34. Lol.
I think a lot of people that don't hunt such pressured properties like we do, just never realize what severe hunting pressure really is.
It is really a cash flush to hunt zone 34 but i love to hunt and have limited travel time so i bite the bullet and buy tags fit seasons.
The buck psych
 
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Also, not to kick-start politics. NJ game laws/management are currently politically based, and sound game management practices are applied inside those boundaries. When F&W management was shifted to the DEP, instead of it's own department, things took a header and so did funding...
 
kbetts said:
There are other ways to bait without dumping piles. Fertilizing/relocating natural browse flies waaay under the radar. If you haven't thought about it, consider this a pro tip.....lol.
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definitely
Alot of things can be changed on private.
You can barely take a leak on public anymore.
Its nice when you can dictate what goes on and minimize intrusion. It’s definitely a better situation for consistency of patterning bucks snd actually dictating food, travel , and security.
Thats just not possible on public.
 
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