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What am I doing wrong

V

Vthokee

New Member
Joined
Jun 4, 2022
Messages
11
So I’m not new to hunting and have been successful everywhere I’ve lived and hunted except for here in the low country of South Carolina. I grew up hunting whitetails in VA, was stationed in NC had success there, stationed in GA had good success there, stationed in NM (different kinda hunting still had hood success), stationed in AR and had success there. Last duty station and I’m in Charleston SC. For the last 3 years I have tried to make it happen either with bow or rifle. I’ve seen a total of maybe 5 deer in person. Have them on camera, see tracks but no luck when in the field. I’m always playing the wind, keep scent control in my favor as best as I can on these hot humid days, tried adjusting my entrance and exit strategy as well. I’m at a loss, so much that last year I sold off my bow and swore I was done. But now I’m back with a new bow and hopes that this will be the year.
I’m hunting public land but for the life of me I cannot figure these deer out. Anyone have any suggestions or ever experienced a slump like this?
 
Public land is a lot harder to hunt compared to Private. Most states baiting is illegal on public, you are also hunting the same land as others. Just because you are scent free and watch wind direction and how you enter a property doesnt mean the other 10 guys hunting that same piece of land are. My advice to you is to scout hard, not just for deer but for signs of other people. I'm also a fan of getting into my stands early and staying till dark, Ive had a lot of luck guys bumping deer to me when they are walking in or out. Also an app like on X will help when scouting, showing you pinch points, saddles, and you can track all the sign you find, scrapes, rubs, browse, acorns. With enough scouting you should be able to get yourself in a position to harvest a deer.
 
All the other land in other states have been public as well. Definitely not new to hunting public land. Va is the only state where I hunt private and that has pretty much dwindled away so now it’s primarily national forest lands. Been using OnX since it was a chip you had to buy and physically put in your handheld GPS.
I’m going to try and find a few other ways into the public land areas this early summer and see if maybe that helps. Low country public land might be the hardest place I’ve ever hunted.
 
hunt where the deer are. Walk until you bump, see, hear em run off. Then figure out why they were there. all my kills on public (not many, mind you) have been places I had seen deer before.

hunting high pressure+ low density areas sucks. It’s similar down here. just get comfortable ruling off certain tracts/areas if you don't see anything. get aggressive, put yourself where you can at least get encounters. I only had ONE area last year that I saw any deer at all while in the stand, but I saw at least a deer every single time I hunted that area. i skunked everywhere else. partially I had the ol' "hunt when/where I want to see deer". but it's also a result of pressure and numbers. I've resolved to move on if i don't see deer and not get hung up trying to make a certain area work.

try looking up the harvest reports for the areas you hunt. Louisiana has managed hunts (and reports for the whole season) that list the harvests against the # of hunters checking in. If the efforts/deer are high.... cross those off. there's some tracts down here that will literally have 88 efforts per deer. not worth the time to be that ONE guy.

consider traveling further for better hunts, too: https://saddlehunter.com/community/index.php?threads/access-to-quality-whitetail-habitat.29115/
 
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rambotogo said:
In SC we have a four-month rifle season with liberal tags. Deer here are super wired and very hard to kill on public land .
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Yeah it definitely doesn’t help with Rifle season starting on private land 15 August and then like you said the long rifle season on public lands. Plus the dog hunts as well. Definitely a hard area to hunt down here.
 
WISCO said:
My advice to you is to scout hard, not just for deer but for signs of other people.
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My OnX app is littered with black icons. I put one down every place I find a stand, camera, cut shooting lanes, a place where someone cleared leaves by a tree, or any other sign someone hunted there. Since I started avoiding those areas, I see a lot more deer.

And there are some places with no hunter sign that aren't too hard to access.
 
What kinds of features / or sign do you set on? Perhaps there’s something about the types of locations that doesn’t translate well to your new hunting area.
 
Jammintree said:
What kinds of features / or sign do you set on? Perhaps there’s something about the types of locations that doesn’t translate well to your new hunting area.
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Great point. Even in the bottoms, or at least most all of them I have hunted, there are still ridges, hubs, points, etc. Dont overlook them because it seems flat.
 
Vthokee said:
Yeah it definitely doesn’t help with Rifle season starting on private land 15 August and then like you said the long rifle season on public lands. Plus the dog hunts as well. Definitely a hard area to hunt down here.
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Explain your WMA terrain. Like @Weldabeast said, is it pine rows? And palmetto hammocks? Is it more coastal marsh with live oaks? Certain areas of coastal Ga and SC, are somewhat similar to Florida just cooler temps. Knowing a little bit about the woods you are hunting might help some.

@colin.704 arent you in the Carolinas somewhere?
 
Fl Canopy Stalker said:
Explain your WMA terrain. Like @Weldabeast said, is it pine rows? And palmetto hammocks? Is it more coastal marsh with live oaks? Certain areas of coastal Ga and SC, are somewhat similar to Florida just cooler temps. Knowing a little bit about the woods you are hunting might help some.

@colin.704 arent you in the Carolinas somewhere?
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Here are a few pictures of the areas I’m hunting in. I have a few spots near the swamps and a few places that are transitioning from planted pines to the oaks. AA925C91-8343-45D8-AE9D-34C69F964E43.png20824CDD-7750-448A-A670-85F024E9D6F0.pngC7375F04-59B8-43CA-B458-CFB57723356A.png
 
Purty woods and all that but if all the sign i was seeing is tracks I would be moving and not sitting If there are deer there they are feeding somewhere and i would not stop until i thought i had found THE PLACE and not just A PLACE It is easy to just hunt pretty spots thinking there is supposed to be one here Good Luck man Stay after it You will figure something out
 
yeah, i have never hunted SC and don't know exactly that terrain, but for bowhunting I'd be looking for even thicker woods. pics can be hard to do justice but compared to the photos you posted you can see this area has a higher stem count, lots of small diameter trees, etc. IMG_3273.jpeg
 
Buckhole75 said:
Purty woods and all that but if all the sign i was seeing is tracks I would be moving and not sitting If there are deer there they are feeding somewhere and i would not stop until i thought i had found THE PLACE and not just A PLACE It is easy to just hunt pretty spots thinking there is supposed to be one here Good Luck man Stay after it You will figure something out
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this is good advice. I hunt an area that is littered with tracks but you will never see a deer during daylight due to all the horse back riding, hiking, dog training,etc that goes on very near to these spots...you need difficult access, food, and cover to increase your sightings. The transitions you mention with the oaks should be money early season unless they're not dropping...

*edit*
I will add that deer density and hunting pressure is probably the difference you're seeing, especially with you being an experienced hunter. Happens to me here too and man it sucks and hurts your morale. Here in the south its incredibly difficult to find deer on the hammered public lands, go a couple hours north and its completely different. You just have to accept that for what it is and adapt the best you can and plan you a couple trips where you know your chances of success are better.
 
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Vthokee said:
Here are a few pictures of the areas I’m hunting in. I have a few spots near the swamps and a few places that are transitioning from planted pines to the oaks. View attachment 102664View attachment 102665View attachment 102666
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I’ll tell you something that was hard for me to learn and that’s hunt where the deer are, not where you want them to be. This area has great shooting lanes. Looks like you created a mock scrape as well? But on public land especially in a pressured area, you’ll have more success putting in miles on the ground and bumping deer to find them. Then circling back, finding better ways to access that area and hunting the area where you bumped the deer a week or two later… than you will just seeing some tracks setting up a a tree in an area close by with great lanes or pretty area. Here in Florida, I rarely find deer in the oak hammocks I think look pretty. Usually I find them in swamps, thick nasty marsh edges, or in palmetto lanes in pine plantations where I barely see any tracks or sign at all.
 
Fl Canopy Stalker said:
I’ll tell you something that was hard for me to learn and that’s hunt where the deer are, not where you want them to be. This area has great shooting lanes. Looks like you created a mock scrape as well? But on public land especially in a pressured area, you’ll have more success putting in miles on the ground and bumping deer to find them. Then circling back, finding better ways to access that area and hunting the area where you bumped the deer a week or two later… than you will just seeing some tracks setting up a a tree in an area close by with great lanes or pretty area. Here in Florida, I rarely find deer in the oak hammocks I think look pretty. Usually I find them in swamps, thick nasty marsh edges, or in palmetto lanes in pine plantations where I barely see any tracks or sign at all.
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Yeah this year I feel like I’m going to have to get into nastier stuff. I’m not bumping them so that tells me they aren’t bedding here or close by. Have them on camera but obviously camera vs in person are two different things. That scrape was one the deer actually made not me. I just found the picture on my phone when looking for some pictures of the areas I hunt.
In these heavily pressured public lands will the deer actually bed closer to the road vs being farther back into the universe woods?
 
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