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The Piled-High Club

SNIPERBBB said:
Getting off cheap at 75 dollars these days.

I process my own deer and I but I'm not gonna shoot small deer if I can help it. I don't want break out my processing gear for 20# of meat.
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I was going to say the same thing, I believe the average regular cut(s) now at local deer processor’s here in WNY is $125-$150 approximately.
 
five said:
For those that are in the “if it’s brown, it’s down” group… I guess you process it your own deer. I always hesitate pulling the trigger wondering if it’s worth $75 processing fee.
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I ran into an old girlfriend a few years back and she told me some of her best memories of me and my family were butchering deer around the table one evening, and everyone was there and no one complained. She said she always hoped when she had a family she had something that pulled everyone together like we did.

Hunting for my family was putting enough meat in the freezer to eat until the next season. I can remember being young enough I had a butter knife in my hand cutting up a chunk of meat. I thought that stuff was normal for every family but am thankful and blessed that I had that upbringing.
 
Definitely process your own.

Look at the price of processors, the first deer you DONT TAKE to a processor will buy you a good grinder. Heck, 3 deer done yourself will set you nicely. Everyone after that is gravy.

I think it was BTaylor above that said it, but never stop learning. 100 deer shouldn’t be a goal, but if it is, it is, no big deal. I’ve been hunting hard, minus a couple of seasons when I was deployed, for 48 years. I was over 100 deer 20 years ago and have no idea what the number is today, but I still love hunting them and part of hunting them is killing them.

I’m not a “brown it’s down” guy, but I’m not a trophy hunter either. If I want a deer to eat I will choose the doe over a young buck every time. With that being said, I will shoot a late born doe fawn before anything else. If I see even a hint of spots after October she had best stay away from my tree, lol.

The late born doe fawn is really the only “rule” I have about killing a deer. The rest of them are game time decisions as to what’s getting shot.
 
Red Beard said:
Good info here guys. Thank you for responding.

My question is do any of you alter your personal diet during the hunting season?
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Sure do, my daily PB&J gets extra P. My morning coffee is taken out of my diet, saved me a lot of biodegradable TP over the years.

Being a relatively healthy eater and active, I still loose weight during the season. I stay away from any junk foods that will slow me down or make me tired. High fats and lots of protein and cheeses to keep things firm and predictable. My water intake goes way up. Heathy bars or vacuum sealed PBJs are a staple in my pack.
 
woodsdog2 said:
1. Shot timing is an oft overlooked critical aspect of shooting a deer, especially with archery tackle. Compared to any firearm, archery gear requires at least 25% more movement (move to position, draw, aim, then release as opposed to move to position, aim, squeeze the trigger) and all while doing this with an implement with its surface area at least 50% squared to the animal compared to perhaps 1% -2% max with a firearm (muzzle and front of scope). The opportunity for prey species’ eye catching ancillary movement goes way up. Couple that with issues like buck fever, shot anticipation, jumping the string, distance judging errors and unseen obstructions, low light, etc. It’s a wonder we get it done at all. That’s why I stress to new archers to shoot a lot of deer to get those nuances all worked out.

It is exponentially more beneficial as a bowhunter to practice this skill than shooting at a target face at known distances. Still do that to get your form and shot process system down but either shoot a lot of game and/or do video leagues or just video shooting practice to understand how to relate to animal movement and mannerisms all the while with the dynamic need to ready for the shot and do all the other possible contortions while in bow range of a super sensed game animal. At a minimum, factors like waiting for a slight turn of the head, or eyes behind a tree or thick brush, then stopping the animal, position of animal for proper access to the vitals and so on all are happening in real time. My best advice is to not let this control you by t you control as much as you can to minimize the other factors that can arise and oftentimes will arise. Cool as a cucumber. Cool as a killer. We all have it in us. It’s ok to be a predator, focus on developing those instincts. Shooting groups is fine but learn to shoot game to be a more effective hunter.

2. Too many people think of game recovery as a chore or boring. To me, this is often the second hunt. And it’s exciting because one typically has a pretty good chance at finding it if the vitals were slIced. A lot of getting number one right pays you dividends when at the recovery stage. My best advice is to embrace the blood trailing process as a necessary part of the hunt. It’s not or it shouldn’t be an afterthought. I do occasionally now but especially when I was first learning to bowhunt, I found it an honor to be able to help someone blood trail. I do now and always have told many friends, family and acquaintances to consider calling me if they would like help with blood trailing. I’m seeing more and more people just not doing it at all and calling in the dogs. I’m not anti dog whatsoever and have used them a couple of times myself in the past. But this trend that I see and sense that this part is “for the dogs” is saddening to me. Understanding what game does when wounded is essential woodsmanship in my experience.
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Great post.
I love to blood trail. I think some of my best memories are blood trailing, following sign and then when the hunter sees the deer he/ she runs to it and that smile when they turn to you. Thats a special moment right there. IMHO.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I'd like to add to / expand on Nutters last post, what's " must hunt" sign. How does this change throughout the season?
 
WHW said:
As far as hunting tips... location is everything. Every hunting area has certain areas that deer desire to be and areas that is of no use to them. Scouting two to four hours every day, that you hunt, with an open mind searching for high percentage hunts has been the most important thing that I feel like helped me the most.
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For me, This is the most important takeaway from everything you’ve written and recorded. It’s responsible for a significant increase in my success. And it has been especially effective for short out of state hunts where the compulsion is to spend as much time in a tree as possible.
 
This has been a really good thread for me, thanks to @Nutterbuster for starting it.

The questions are opening my eyes to a lot of things I never really put a lot of conscious thought into, but that really matter. I don’t really have a “system” I use to hunt, but I know what I like and I know it when I see it. As far as the latest names put to them are concerned the two, upon reflection, I use the most are “feed trees” and “observation sits”.

I’m not one of those “won’t climb if I don’t find hot sign” guys now and never have been. I’ve done it a few times, but not enough to call it something I do. If I were, however, “feed trees” are what I would be looking for. Fresh deer crap has always been the main thing I look for. Basically, I hunt does year ‘round. Does put meat in the freezer early and does will have bucks interest the rest of the season (here, anyway, your mileage may vary on that). If I was to narrow down what makes the best area for me it would be the area with the most edge effect, the thickest undergrowth and the most fresh crap.

Depending on the layout I may go right in or I may climb on the edge and watch what’s going on. If my hunch is correct and the deer are in this area then just one or maybe two sits are all it takes to get in close. I used to explain this to friends are “hunting from the outside in” (observation sits nowadays). They would chuckle because they were big pre season scouters. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with pre season scouting, but most of the info they gathered from it was useless after a few weeks. I scout terrain and vegetation more than deer sign and I look hard at it every time I’m in the woods.

That’s enough for now, Carrie Underwood just started singing the football song……lost my train of thought, lol.
 
WHW said:
Every hunting area has certain areas that deer desire to be and areas that is of no use to them.
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Would you please describe areas of no use to deer? I've heard it said before to be on the lookout for saddles, pinch points, etc. when reviewing topo maps and satellite imagery but I've never really thought about negating areas because they'd be of little use to a deer.
 
Red Beard said:
Good info here guys. Thank you for responding.

My question is do any of you alter your personal diet during the hunting season?
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Not really. Never was much of a breakfast guy, a light breakfast is all I usually eat. Especially for hunting or playing/officiating sports tournaments, keeping food intake light keeps the need for bathroom trips to a minimum. Plus, I think your hunting instincts are better when you are hungry.
 
kyler1945 said:
What’s a big mistake you made on a specific hunt that cost you a chance at a big deer that still haunts you?
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I’ve told my pee story before on this forum but for S’s &G’s I’ll type out an abbreviated version. Early November, early 1990’s, API death trap climber, (It actually wasn’t a bad climber until you got into a Summit Viper). I did slide down a hard as a rock, slick as a greased pole almost branchless beech one time in it and it scared the heck out of me. Anyway, I was trying to figure out how to hunt side hill benches then and hiked into a 70 acre private farm that ran perpendicular to an east west escarpment. It had been logged the year before and the skid roads had scrapes up and down them. That’s when I started to realize how often deer sidehill. Everything I read or thought was up and down movement and generally that’s true but they’ll sidehill travel a lot especially as the pressure picks up. Anyway I was learning these benches especially ones with wild grape tangles and brambles and as they say now “high stem count”areas the benches bisected. I climbed the hill in the dark, started seeing scrapes with licking branches on an area where the bench was transitioning to a draw. The deer liked to go up the draws from feed back to bed but will slip around to get the wind right by hitting that transition near where the horizontal bench meets the natural vertical running draw. Especially if it’s the head of the draw. If the bench “kicks out” laterally because of a ridge spur or point, even better. Great place to set up btw for you hill country hunters. Anyway, I’ll get to the point. Many of us then thought it bad to pee around your stand so I used to take a pee bottle. Well I forgot it that day and thinking it was a cardinal sin to pee near my stand. At about 10:15 I was ready to burst and all of a sudden a nice chocolate racked 10 was chasing three does, they came right under my stand on that bench about 30 yards from the draw. Problem was I was lowering my bow down to go pee. Yep they ran under me while I was lowering my bow….. so I pulled the bow back up and when they just got out of sight I grunted a few times. They didn’t come back but that helped me forget about having to pee for about 20minutes or so. By then I was really dying again so I eventually got my bow down and climbed down, jumped off and went about 15 yards downwind to urinate. Yep, my bow was hanging on the pull rope next to my climber at the base of the tree….. and a monster was following that bench up from the draw he stopped at about 6yards and stared at my stand and bow hanging there…. only thing in my hand was… well….. you know….for maybe 15 seconds he was contemplating it and then he just took off. I learned two things that day. Don’t worry about peeing, if you’re out there especially during the rut, anything can happen at any time…. Small stuff like peeing and worrying about it is stupid. Grasp and behold the bigger tasks at hand…. Always be ready! The other thing was the sidehill
Bench meeting a draw. That monster was following the same pattern as the other deer a half hour before him did and it’s a natural travelway especially for deer coming up for the morning or going down for the evening or traveling through for the rut. The buck was a bleached white rack monster probably in the 160 range. That’s a great deer around here! I guess that’s not a very abbreviated version!!!
 
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five said:
For those that are in the “if it’s brown, it’s down” group… I guess you process it your own deer. I always hesitate pulling the trigger wondering if it’s worth $75 processing fee.
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I've always processed 99% of my deer... That being said, there are times when I personally will get "lazy" and opt to pass on a deer knowing what I have going on in the following day or two, or take that deer to a processor. My issue with having someone else handle the deer is that I know what I'm getting when I do it myself lol.
 
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