Glad to hear your ok.
-
ODT Gun Show & Swap Meet - May 4, 2024! - Click here for info
Am I the only one terrible at hunting?
- Thread starter Gigabyte71
- Start date
To newbies.First,cut your I-phone,cell phone OFF.Put it away and leave it there.Concentrate on looking through the bushes and between the trees.Look for movement.If you`re looking at a cell phone or playing games on it,you won`t see deer too often.Stay in the stand long enough.I stay in the stand 4-5 hours in the am,and 3-4 in the pm.Learn to look for sign,so you will learn where to place your stand.Don`t go by all you read in magazines.Ask advice from knowledgeable folks who have hunted for years,and have been successful for years.If you can`t stay in a stand long or do without your cell phone,you will never make a good deer hunter.You may get lucky on occasion.Slip around in the middle of the day with the wind in your face,scouting,looking for fresh sign.I`ve killed many deer this way,also.It takes time.Be patient.I`ve hunted 60 years and still learn and make mistakes.
Being a consistently successful hunter is much more of a skill than a lot of people seem to think. Spend the time between this season and next season doing some serious study about deer and deer hunting. Scouting and knowing what you are looking for makes all the difference, but even then you won't know for sure until you hunt a location a few times.
I have one stand location that has a better than 90% kill rate. If anyone of us want's to just kill a deer, that's the location we go to. I placed another stand about 150 yards away from that location because I suspected that it was an alternative entrance to a major bedding area that large bucks were more likely to use. Oops. That has not proven to be true. That location has been hunted several times and only one deer, just at the limit of visibility, has been seen. The point is that only 150 yards made the difference from a great stand location to a zero stand location. BTW, the terrain and vegetation of the two locations seem almost identical to each other. Other factors surrounding the area is what makes the difference.
Learn what to look for and then learn what is in the area you hunt. You will eventually start really figuring it out. I have been hunting the area I'm in now for several years and have three high quality and steady producing stand locations. As I learn more about the area more are added. Also, I hunt public land, so that makes the whole process a bit more difficult, but I kill deer every year with very limited time to hunt.
Stick with it and learn the skills.
I have one stand location that has a better than 90% kill rate. If anyone of us want's to just kill a deer, that's the location we go to. I placed another stand about 150 yards away from that location because I suspected that it was an alternative entrance to a major bedding area that large bucks were more likely to use. Oops. That has not proven to be true. That location has been hunted several times and only one deer, just at the limit of visibility, has been seen. The point is that only 150 yards made the difference from a great stand location to a zero stand location. BTW, the terrain and vegetation of the two locations seem almost identical to each other. Other factors surrounding the area is what makes the difference.
Learn what to look for and then learn what is in the area you hunt. You will eventually start really figuring it out. I have been hunting the area I'm in now for several years and have three high quality and steady producing stand locations. As I learn more about the area more are added. Also, I hunt public land, so that makes the whole process a bit more difficult, but I kill deer every year with very limited time to hunt.
Stick with it and learn the skills.
Nothing replaces experience, and patience. I'm learning every time.
Oh, and try turkey hunting. A lot of fun and even more frustration!
LMAO! ^^^This^^^. I suck at Turkey hunting.
Gotta tie the lower portion of your climber to the upper every time with a dedicated rope.
I don't let my rope get any longer than a full leg extension in case it kinda gets away from me.
You'll get a feel for it.
You'll find out that some trees are better than others.....stay away from the real hard, bumpy, Teflon coated trees, and the very loose bark ones.
I don't let my rope get any longer than a full leg extension in case it kinda gets away from me.
You'll get a feel for it.
You'll find out that some trees are better than others.....stay away from the real hard, bumpy, Teflon coated trees, and the very loose bark ones.
I used a friend's to see if I liked it. But he is a good bit taller than me, so when it fell, it fell to what he has it set for. It happened on the first 'step' down, guess i didn't have my feet right when i pulled it away from the tree.
I've been out maybe 7 times this year. Each time the deer are in an area to thick to take a shot. I don't count these trips as failures but as lessons learned. Understanding their patterns and learning to adapt to whatever the deer are doing. A lot goes into hunting, like someone said earlier its hunting not killing. Understanding the wind, trails, getting above the scent line, or killing your scent all together, knowing movement times and patterns. Where is the food and water source compared to the bedding. I don't ever consider a no kill trip a failure, just a lesson learned.
