I kinda disagree. Hear me out.I think a great idea for a new hunter is to do a lot of research before even setting foot into the woods.
I've hunted that way for years. I've shot decent bucks but with no real consistancy. I realized something needed to change. I've hunted smarter and harder than I have in years past and have seen more deer than in years past. There is always room to learn and new ideas. There are things in books I would've never even thought to try until I've read or seen them done. Granted I agree nothing beats pure woodsmanship but shortening the learning curve with some suggestions from others and/or books, DVDs, forums doesn't seem that crazy either does it? Oh and if you plan on wearing out your boot leather and screwing stuff up, please don't do it where I hunt, I do a good enough job of that on my own.I kinda disagree. Hear me out.
My uncle is a lawyer. Lots of money, not so much time. Super smart guy. Started getting into hunting. Read all the books. Watched all the videos. Joined the forums. The works.
He is not a good deer hunter, despite being a very well-read one.
Every year I go hunt with him on his local public land, I'm on deer. He rarely is. He will show me spots and tell me all about why they'll work and what deer will be doing there. He's usually very wrong. Why? Because Infalt's Wisconsin deer and Eberhart's Michigan deer and the Hunting Publics Dakota deer aren't nutterbuster's uncle's Alabama deer. They're not even Nutterbuster's south Alabama deer. His deer don't do what they are "supposed" to. Not to say they don't act predictably, because as I've hunted and scouted there I've started to pick up on some themes. But he's trying to put a square peg in a round hole.
Deer hunting is very, very, VERY location specific aside from the really basic stuff. Analysis paralysis is a very real thing, and it's easy to get complacent and become an armchair scouter.
I wish I could go back to my college days when I first started to get serious about it, take all of my books and crap away, and force myself to spend more time in the woods, pay better attention, and ask myself more questions about what I saw or didn't see.
Deer hunting is easy. To quote a friend, "hunt where the deer are." Not where the man on the podcast says they should be, not where they map says they should be, and not even where they were 3 years ago when you killed that one.
@kyler1945 is right. Wear out boot leather. Bump deer. Get blown out. Stumble across other guys' stands. Then, once you start getting an idea of what's happening, educate yourself. But always be keenly aware of the differences between your reality and the other guy's reality.
Infalt talks about bumping and dumping. That probably works great in Wisconsin, but not so much on several thousand acre tracts of monoculture piney woods. Eberhart talks about hunting 30ft up. That probably works great in Michigan, but not so much here in Alabama where even if you cut through the insane vegetation to make shooting lanes to see, it'd grow back up over the summer.
Reading can give you a preconceived bias. You think you already know, so you don't actually learn. You assume you're doing something wrong on your end (not reading the wind well enough, not scouting hard enough, not seeing a piece of the puzzle), when you're really just following bad advice.
Get out there. Screw stuff up. Find out what the deer do on your piece of property. Become an expert in your little area.
I was getting burnt out this year, I was thinking "man hunting is just another thing I kinda suck at". I had rifle hunted the last few years and only got one. I was actually lowering my bow one night on a property I had hunted a few times but never had any luck, and wham. I see 5 deer walking my way. One came in close enough to allow me to harvest her for my first bow/saddle kill.
Keep at it and even if you dont see anything, try to learn at least one new thing each hunt.
I agree with most of what's said here, but I think guys like Dan infalt, John Eberhart, the hunting public etc. could get on better than average bucks anywhere in the country. Heck the hunting public boys seem to get on good bucks everywhere they go, including Alabama. They adjust their tactics accordingly and that's what makes them such good hunters.I kinda disagree. Hear me out.
My uncle is a lawyer. Lots of money, not so much time. Super smart guy. Started getting into hunting. Read all the books. Watched all the videos. Joined the forums. The works.
He is not a good deer hunter, despite being a very well-read one.
Every year I go hunt with him on his local public land, I'm on deer. He rarely is. He will show me spots and tell me all about why they'll work and what deer will be doing there. He's usually very wrong. Why? Because Infalt's Wisconsin deer and Eberhart's Michigan deer and the Hunting Publics Dakota deer aren't nutterbuster's uncle's Alabama deer. They're not even Nutterbuster's south Alabama deer. His deer don't do what they are "supposed" to. Not to say they don't act predictably, because as I've hunted and scouted there I've started to pick up on some themes. But he's trying to put a square peg in a round hole.
Deer hunting is very, very, VERY location specific aside from the really basic stuff. Analysis paralysis is a very real thing, and it's easy to get complacent and become an armchair scouter.
I wish I could go back to my college days when I first started to get serious about it, take all of my books and crap away, and force myself to spend more time in the woods, pay better attention, and ask myself more questions about what I saw or didn't see.
Deer hunting is easy. To quote a friend, "hunt where the deer are." Not where the man on the podcast says they should be, not where they map says they should be, and not even where they were 3 years ago when you killed that one.
@kyler1945 is right. Wear out boot leather. Bump deer. Get blown out. Stumble across other guys' stands. Then, once you start getting an idea of what's happening, educate yourself. But always be keenly aware of the differences between your reality and the other guy's reality.
Infalt talks about bumping and dumping. That probably works great in Wisconsin, but not so much on several thousand acre tracts of monoculture piney woods. Eberhart talks about hunting 30ft up. That probably works great in Michigan, but not so much here in Alabama where even if you cut through the insane vegetation to make shooting lanes to see, it'd grow back up over the summer.
Reading can give you a preconceived bias. You think you already know, so you don't actually learn. You assume you're doing something wrong on your end (not reading the wind well enough, not scouting hard enough, not seeing a piece of the puzzle), when you're really just following bad advice.
Get out there. Screw stuff up. Find out what the deer do on your piece of property. Become an expert in your little area.
I was getting burnt out this year, I was thinking "man hunting is just another thing I kinda suck at". I had rifle hunted the last few years and only got one. I was actually lowering my bow one night on a property I had hunted a few times but never had any luck, and wham. I see 5 deer walking my way. One came in close enough to allow me to harvest her for my first bow/saddle kill.
Keep at it and even if you dont see anything, try to learn at least one new thing each hunt.
@kyler1945 hit a lot of really great points, especially if you're new into hunting. My only suggestion that when you go walking / scouting, slow your pace WAY down and move methodically while looking for signs, look for horizontal features, ear flicks, tails, antlers, anything moving. If you see any of that stop and don't move until you confirm what that movement was. I had a great opportunity still hunting a new section of public land and still hunted / slow moved into a Doe at about 50 yards or so, saw it's tail briefly, raised my rifle and couldn't find her again, I thought she slipped down the knoll out of sight, so after about 1 minute I started slow walking and 2 steps I busted her out directly onto private land. The lesson I learned here was that I was NOT patient enough, I knew a deer was nearby and should have just remained next to the tree I was at much longer and I would have likely gotten an easy shot at her.
Agreed. I guess I was assuming most of us already have a little understanding of deer behavior being either a beginner or someone that's hunted for awhile. Some of us dont have the luxury of spending a lot of time scouting due to various reasons so shortening the learning curve through research seems like a viable option. I'm not saying pick one strategy and apply it in your location, I'm saying take your base knowledge and apply the knowledge learned as you see fit to your area. Eliminating "crappy" places to hunt isn't always the smartest either. Deer are constantly adapting and for us that can't travel all over the country, seeing tips and tactics from others can be a good strategy.Here's another piece of advice, or information, and it isn't fully formed.
The real killers are successful for a lot of reasons. I don't think you can pinpoint which one is most important. But there is something to be said for cross training and adaptability.
One way I've gotten better at deciphering deer behavior is by traveling to hunt. Not everyone has this opportunity. But it doesn't necessarily have to be out of state. It can be a different public tract near you with different terrain, pressure, food, etc. When you stop trying to kill a deer in the moment, and begin to play the long game - this will become very valuable. Anyone can luck up and trip into an awesome spot. But deer are rats with hooves. Across subspecies, geography, terrain, food sources, exposure to hunting pressure, etc, they all share certain traits, display certain types of behavior, and fall into certain habits. These become much more obvious when you've seen them in their "different" form, and can pull the common strand from each situation.
If you're watching Infalt's "hill country bedding", and trying to apply deer bedding on leeward ridge points in a swamp in south alabama - well yeh, you're not going to have much luck connecting dots. But generally speaking, if bucks can hide in cover, with wind/noise protection from behind them, while watching where they intend to go that evening, they're gonna do it. When you run across "buck beds" in Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, and Missouri, you start to identify the common theme. When you can extract details like that, you can then apply the general knowledge to where ever you're hunting.
I recommend a change of scenery from where you're currently hunting. Go try to solve the puzzle from a totally different angle.
The advice to read the books and watch the videos and follow the blogs is good - but only if you understand what you're trying to pull from it. You aren't going to get a short cut. They don't exist in deer hunting. You're looking to find concepts, theory, ideas, that you can apply to your specific situation. The broader the spectrum you're learning on, the better off you are for a couple of reasons. Number one - you'll learn more stuff. Number two, you get better at learning, and fast. This is why i recommend going cover a bunch of ground. Not slow. Probably not even with a weapon in your hand, but i'll let that one slide since it is hunting season. But DON'T carry a way up a tree.
Squirrel hunting is an awesome way to scout. If you want a challenge, bring your bow to do it. But just go cover some ground. Cross train. You'll learn some adaptability in the process.
I think you can drop any of the legends in any part of the country and they'll get on deer quick, and get on big ones fairly quick too. This is due to a lot of reasons. But I can promise you, they'll all start with eliminating the crappy places to hunt as fast as possible. And they're covering ground to do that.
Agreed. I guess I was assuming most of us already have a little understanding of deer behavior being either a beginner or someone that's hunted for awhile. Some of us dont have the luxury of spending a lot of time scouting due to various reasons so shortening the learning curve through research seems like a viable option. I'm not saying pick one strategy and apply it in your location, I'm saying take your base knowledge and apply the knowledge learned as you see fit to your area. Eliminating "crappy" places to hunt isn't always the smartest either. Deer are constantly adapting and for us that can't travel all over the country, seeing tips and tactics from others can be a good strategy.
Scouting is 90% of the game. Boots in dirt is the most important part of scouting. I scout year round. Squirrel hunting, duck hunting, turkey hunting, hog hunting...all that is used to scout for deer. Riding my bike down trails early in the morning this past summer gave me some good intel. Canoe trips give me intel. Camping and backpacking trips in the backcountry with the missus give me intel.You thinking that you’re not ‘hunting’ unless you’re in a tree and that ‘scouting’ eats up valuable time is the issue I take.
I have to disagree with you on this. While it is possible to kill by staying in one area, the more areas you learn, the less pressure your putting on any one area. On top of that, 90% of my kills are on that "first sit", as many other have said. Save the learning as much as you can about one area for February or after season winter scouting. Pay attention to wind and try to think about where others are going in and out. You'll start to paint a pretty clear picture. Keep notes or a journal and plot all of you moves on an app like onx or huntstand. You'll get better at it. Keep at it good luck!Finding the sign is something im still learning, im starting to think i need to stick with one area and learn it and quit jumping around.