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Virginia group chat/possible meet up?

Random thought as the rut kicks my butt this year. Do you guys blind call, and if so when, how often, and do you rattle, grunt, doe bleet, or all of the above?
 
The only time I do is rut and on a farm I hunt with open space where I can see. I sometimes will towards the end of a hunt if I haven’t seen any action. I’ll do a series of doe bleats for a couple minutes and then wait 15-20 minutes and try again for a series of 3-4.
 
I have grunted many deer in. I always just use the normal year round communication grunt. Tone not too deep. Somewhere between a mature doe and a young buck.

If I'm clueless if a deer is around or not, no more than 1 session of 3 grunts every 30 minutes.

If I think deer are close or around, I do 1 session of 1 or 2 soft grunts every 15 minutes.

My experience is the more sessions from the same tree or spot the less likely a deer will appear, so in any scenario I use grunting sparingly.

My experience is if a grunt is going to bring them in it will be with one or two sessions.

I always felt like if they hear it and don't come in, then standing in the same area just grunting is very un-deer like, so they figure that out pretty quick.

One other note. I do not under any circumstance grunt in heavily preasurred areas. I think too many unwitting hunters have educated them. You can be on a piece of high traffic public but be in a low pressure area.
 
Good info, I appreciate it. 99% of my time in the woods is alone. But in the last two weeks I've hunted twice with a friend. Both times my buddy and I were about 60-70 yards from each other, maybe a little further, but definitely less than 100 yards. I always wondered how far the sound from a grunt and rattle traveled in the mountains. Well I got my answer. The grunt was not loud at all even from that distance. The rattle was much much louder, which was to be expected. We were set up on the edge of thick cover, with open timber in front of us. winds at about 7-8 mph with 10-12 mph gusts. With that being said, when I do blind call, I have been opting to rattle simply because I feel like the sound travels further. But now I'm all in my head that I haven't seen much of anything since Halloween because I've been blind calling. I'm hunting fresh sign, spots that make sense, known travel corridors earlier in the season. I swear, the rut has kicked my butt the last three years. I just can't get on'em.
 
Try grunting instead of rattling. I haven't had much success around my area with rattling. I think because there is not a big concentration of bucks to warrant territorial disputes, or the doe concentration is high enough the bucks don't waste precious energy on risky skirmishes.

For this reason is why I choose a non threatening tone. And I'm not loud at all. Hard to describe the volume but I think a human at 50yds would miss it unless the conditions were absolutely perfect.
 
Try grunting instead of rattling. I haven't had much success around my area with rattling. I think because there is not a big concentration of bucks to warrant territorial disputes, or the doe concentration is high enough the bucks don't waste precious energy on risky skirmishes.

For this reason is why I choose a non threatening tone. And I'm not loud at all. Hard to describe the volume but I think a human at 50yds would miss it unless the conditions were absolutely perfect.
I like to use rattling after the rut is over. It doesn’t work everytime but when it does it is usually pretty quick. These two were both rattled in this year in Appomattox County. One at daylight on Nov 21st in a pouring rain, the other on Nov 29th with about 3 minutes of legal shooting light remaining. Both times there was smaller bucks in the field and I’m sure that helps with bringing out the larger bucks.
 
I like to use rattling after the rut is over. It doesn’t work everytime but when it does it is usually pretty quick. These two were both rattled in this year in Appomattox County. One at daylight on Nov 21st in a pouring rain, the other on Nov 29th with about 3 minutes of legal shooting light remaining. Both times there was smaller bucks in the field and I’m sure that helps with bringing out the larger bucks.
Not sure why pics didn’t post
 
Happy post season depression, VA folk. What’s the shed hunting calendar lookin like in our neck of the woods? I’ll start by saying, I’m terrible at finding them. More specifically, I’m terrible at staying focused and not turning it into a scouting mission. But anyway, I’ve been told that smaller / younger bucks tend to drop first. If that’s even true, when would be a good time to go? Like when 90% of bucks have shed.
 
Honestly start walking anytime. I had deer on the Eastern Shore missing one side the last week of season. I also saw a couple bucks with both sides during last spring gobbler season. They were not new growth in velvet, they had not dropped from the previous season.
 
Happy post season depression, VA folk. What’s the shed hunting calendar lookin like in our neck of the woods? I’ll start by saying, I’m terrible at finding them. More specifically, I’m terrible at staying focused and not turning it into a scouting mission. But anyway, I’ve been told that smaller / younger bucks tend to drop first. If that’s even true, when would be a good time to go? Like when 90% of bucks have shed.
I’m certainly no shed hunting expert, but logically I would think success wold primarily hinge on deer density and mathematical probability. Either your your buck to acre ratio is high or you are looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. Since I’m not an expert, I’m not sure how much things such as knowledge of areas where deer are more likely to shed (bedding, feeding areas, etc.), eye training ie, knowing what to look for and being able to recognize a shed easily, and other factors play into successful shed hunting. I would think focusing on likely shed areas would be key, but again I don’t really know. I think I would be more like you, a scouting mission that might produce a shed if I step on it and drive one of the antlers into my foot lol.
 
Not sure about everyone else's area, but all the gates around Botetourt, Montgomery and Craig seem to be closed until Spring Gobbler.

I'm no shed hunter, nor am I a Spring Gobbler hunter. I do both but it always ends in a scouting session for me too.
 
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