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Poll - Distance from parking area you hunt

What choice below best describes the your typical season in regards to walking distance?

  • All of my walks are quarter mile or less.

    Votes: 6 4.0%

  • Most of my walks 1/4mile or less, a handful are up to 1/2 mile, never really get near a mile out.

    Votes: 22 14.7%

  • A few short walks, Many 1/2 mile walks, a few walks approaching a mile or more.

    Votes: 68 45.3%

  • Rarely hunt within 1/2 mile of parking, typically around a mile or more deep.

    Votes: 36 24.0%

  • Almost all of my hunts are 1 mile+ from closet parking/access.

    Votes: 18 12.0%
  • Total voters
    150
kyler1945

kyler1945

Well-Known Member
SH Member
Joined
Dec 4, 2016
Messages
6,920
Location
Willis, TX
This one is a little trickier. I know there's a lot of ways to ask this question, so let's go with it. I understand that distance is not what typically dictates where you hunt. I am simply trying to get an idea of what most folks do. It won't be exact, but which of the poll choices best describes you?

As always, your thoughts and opinions are much appreciated!

I'm typically over 1/2 mile from parking, and usually in the 1mile+ range. However, my biggest deer to date was exactly 150 yards from a parking lot, and 100 yards from the nearest road. I have some success in overlook spots close to access, but I typically prefer outwalking folks.
 
It all depends on the property. On one piece I hunt I am within city limits and have taken several nice bucks with my truck parked still in sight of me and the buck. Others I hike over 2 miles for entry depending on wind direction. I think on most properties the deeper you go the less pressure but there is also something to hunting overlooked spots
 
I spend a good portion of the deer season hunting from a camper parked on state land (termed "Dispersed camping" here in Michigan). Once set up I rarely drive to hunt but rather hike to my spots. Those spots are as close as a couple hundred yards to a mile and a half. My average hike is probably on the order of 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile from camp.
 
All but one of my biggest bucks have been taken within bow distance of a major road or parking area. It started many years ago when we arrived at 3 separate locations on a permit hunt gameland that we had scouted only to find trucks already parked in each spot (all were there before legal time because we were spot on the time). Instead of hunting, we rode the entire property that day and mapped trucks and then drew circles around where we knew or thought they would be setup. We then speed scouted the gaps, found great sign and I took a decent 8pt the next morning that made it into a couple of local publications (@KelvinM12 was hunting the opposite side of the drainage and saw him fall). From then on, pretty much the same recipe for success. I took a nice 12 pt from that exact tree a couple of years later too. Please folks, keep going deep, you all know that's where the big boys hide!
 
kyler1945 said:
This one is a little trickier. I know there's a lot of ways to ask this question, so let's go with it. I understand that distance is not what typically dictates where you hunt. I am simply trying to get an idea of what most folks do. It won't be exact, but which of the poll choices best describes you?

As always, your thoughts and opinions are much appreciated!

I'm typically over 1/2 mile from parking, and usually in the 1mile+ range. However, my biggest deer to date was exactly 150 yards from a parking lot, and 100 yards from the nearest road. I have some success in overlook spots close to access, but I typically prefer outwalking folks.
Click to expand...
Typically in the post season when I map a new state game area I locate all treestands and mark their waypoints...it took me 3 days to map this area. I've been doing this for thirty 30+ years. Think of it as throwing a Pebble in a pond..the farther you get from the parking lot the ripples get smaller and faid away. Most hunters (70%) of hunters are within 50yards of a two track, inside corner, or fields edge. These stand sites are less than a 1/2 mile from the parking lot . Guys like myself during their scouting campaigns find very few stands where access requires crossing water. The thought for most hunters having to get a deer out of those spots is the obstacle definer. I'm hunting a new 1200 acre state game area here near my home that has the same hunter pressure dynamics that I've experienced for years. Heck some guys are so afraid of the dark they might hunt from the truck. That being said the vast majority of hunters use a easy in easy out philosophy. I'm not saying this is bad, because I give alot of credit for those getting out and just enjoying hunting and absorbing the out of doors. Hunting is fun, strategy is fun, higher levels of deer hunting is fun..in other words you begin hunting rabbits then your hunting deer, after several harvest under your belt thoughts begin to reach higher levels of satisfaction. That's what's so exciting about being a member if this site...passion to help others thru the thick and thin of deer hunting and respecting each other like no other hunting site I've ever been a part of...something to appreciate
May The Magic of The Whitetail Forever Enrich Your Life
 
Most of my hunts, on average, are around the 1/2ish mile mark generally. I’ve hunted within sight of truck as well. Most of the places I hunt, it’s hard to find a spot that you could walk more than a mile, without being almost to the next road over, or to a property line. With that said, years ago, when I first discovered the whole ‘go farther than everybody else’ type of mobile hunting, I found a spot that had no real parking access. Parked on the side of the road, in a nasty mud filled ditch where nobody else was gonna park their nice trucks, and I set off to walk as far as possible(thought I was suddenly Dan Infalt or somethingLOL). I wasn’t using gps, just a phone map of the area. I ended being in a little different spot than I thought I was. I walked for what seemed like forever, got climbed up, and was pretty sure I was at least a mile or more back in there. A little while later I could hear a strange noise, then as it got louder and closer, I realized it sounded like a vehicle on a gravel road. Then, through the trees, about 100yds, I saw a truck coming down a road. I was confused so I opened a gps app, and actually realized I had walked waaaay further than I thought. I walked an hour just to end up right by the next road over! I was so mad and embarrassed at the same time. Even though nobody knew what I did but myself LOL! I have since learned that gps is my best friend, and now I just park and hunt in places I usually never see another vehicle or tire tracks at least. Have seen 10x more deer doing that. And I would also say 90% of my hunts are going in blind with never stepping foot on the ground before.
 
I have a few spots close to parking that I hunt that would be considered overlooked. However once the bird hunters and their dogs start hunting for pheasants and grouse I move to my setups that are further back.
 
Typically similar to what the OP said, 1/2 to 1+ mile. Place I hunt is hard to get much more than that without being similar distance from another access point.

Hunting deep has got popular, a lot more guys do it that used to. Seems like everyone goes at least 1/4 mile or so. I’ve been noticing more and more of that overlooked sign right near the access areas, lots of deer are paralleling the main roads crossing access points within 100 yards of the gate.

I have some great spots far back but will be focusing a bit more time in looking closer at what’s right by the road.


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I, like most of you folks have learned over time, that it's not always necessarily go farther than the other guys, it's more to hunt where the other guys aren't. I've found some of my best ambush spots are actually closer to the roads, trails, and parking areas. My public land spot is riddled with foot trails, and if you went more than a half mile you'd come out to the next road. I would have to say that hunting the escape routes and overlooked thicker areas that the other hunters are walking by has been my most productive strategy the last 10 years or so. It seems bow hunting has gained in popularity in the last 10 years. I see more bow hunters than ever before. I know they are finding the deer sign that's left behind, but over and over I talk to those hunters in the parking areas next to my house and some of those guys have never had a bow kill in my woods and some haven't killed deer in 5-10 years or more, gun included. I take multiple deer out every year and more in the 3.5 yr class ( which is old for around here). Here's to hunting smarter not harder. That's why I'm loving the saddle so much. I don't leave my stand sets in the woods for other hunters to key in on, and it's an ambush hunters dream set up. Small, lite weight, quiet and easy to get into thicker spots, and set up quiet in trees that would be marginal if using a climber or fixed position stand.
 
That’s a tough one to answer. I hunt public and private. 75 percent of my hunts were 1/4 mile to a half mile. The two deer I killed last year were a little over a mile and the farthest I hunted was a little over two miles. I’ll agree with @shwacker on a lot of deer being overlooked closer to the roads. The biggest public land buck I’ve seen was maybe 150 yards off the main road. I had an awesome hunt a couple years ago with a parade of bucks 1/4 mile from the sign in board on a wma. Just because you can get two miles off the road doesn’t mean you should. Hunt where you find the best sign. Sometimes that sign may be subtle and overlooked by others. There are times when an absence of human sign is better than a lot of sign left be deer. The average hunter is hunting farther from the road now than they used to in my area. They may be a half mile in but are rarely more than a hundred yards of easy walking. A guy will walk a half mile down a fire break but most won’t push through head high brush for a couple hundred yards. Most won’t wade across a creek either.
 
Rarely hunt within 1/2 mile of parking, typically around a mile or more deep (sometimes approaches 2 miles, but rarely further. I can normally find another access point if that distance comes into play)

This is when I'm hunting public, which last seasons was 99% of the time.

I will say, that the majority of the time this is dictated on getting away from other hunters, and I find going deeper helps me accomplish this goal (and do NOT walk this far because I want to loo). The tricky part is you might walk 1+ mile from the parking lot, and end up being only 1/4 mile from a river/creek where boat access comes into play. So distance doesn't always mean you are getting away from the primary access points (people) ...at least where I hunt. And yes ...I know this was probably obvious :tearsofjoy:

I do have a few ideas that I'm hopeful will put more of the 1/4 - 1/2 mile walks into my playbook...
 
Most of the public I hunt is smaller parcels, hiking a mile usually put you at the next access or road. Like someone mentioned above, I'm finding that guy's in my area will walk a long ways on an old logging road but won't walk a hundred yards up or down a steep hill or through thick brush.

First day of Maryland rifle this past year I convinced my dad to hike in with me about a mile. I told him we wouldn't see anybody else back there. The mile hike put us right next to the PA line. 20 min before daylight we watched five guys walk across the line from PA and set up all around us. One of them did jump up a buck that my father ended up shooting so I guess it worked out.
 
I wanted to revisit this thread. This year, my trend completely reversed. I only walked more than 1/2 mile from motorized access on just a couple of hunts this year.

What prompted me to dig up this thread was fussing over advertised weights of items, and how little it actually matters. Especially given how little distance/time most folks are actually carrying said items.
 
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kyler1945 said:
1/2 mile from parking, and usually in the 1mile+ range. However, my biggest deer to date was exactly 150 yards from a parking lot, and 100 yards from the nearest road. I have some success in overlook spots close to access, but I typically prefer outwalking folks.
Click to expand...
I'm pretty much spot on the same as you. One of my favorite properties is only a few hundred acres but I've killed 3 bucks off it. The buck I shot this year was over 1 mile back. This year I did spend some more time scouting some overlooked spots though. With the new baby coming in the next month I figured I wanted to add some more spots that I can be in and out of fairly quickly. I will say that I did find some killer sign in some of these and am excited to hunt them come fall.
 
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