zubba

I'm in my eleventh year of gun hunting and nineth of bowhunting and I've seen and dealt with a lot of things, but not this one. This weekend is the opening day of shotgun season in Iowa and I have the opportunity to hunt two different properties. One of the properties has betterstructure for deer vs. the other piece of property but I wonder about 'the dogs'. When I walked around the property with the landowner, he brought his six dogs. They aren't poodles, these are 1/2 pitbull dogs and the run crazy through the land chasing everything. I seen them chase squirrels on the ground up a tree, the chased coon, they actually caught a coon and killed it. The landowner said he walkes the dogs around the woods 3-4 times a week.

So my question is: how do you think this affects the deer? Do you think they are used to it? Avoid the property? Do you think it is worth hunting opening morning?

I have to add that I gained access to this land a week before opening day, so other than walking around with the landowner, I didn't get a chance to scout and look for sign myself.

So what do you think?

passthrough24

Not too long ago a friend andI Were hunting and the neighbors black lab followed his tracks to his stand and was barking at him in his tree.....he got out and took the dog back home....he also had a trail camera on a scrape 30 yards from his stand....20 minutes after he took the dog out a GIANT buck was at the scrape....that being said I would take time to scout the area first...if there is deer sign then hunt it....the sign will tell u if the deer are avoiding or not....

The_1_That_Got_Away

I had a situation somewhat like this. It's a small plot I hunt, 20 acres, only about 10 of it is huntable.

The landowner runs his bird dogs thru there daily, for training. It doesn't seem to affect deer movement at all. I saw my two best bucks of the year out there.

But there are variables. These are well-behaved, well-trained birddogs that do not chase deer. If your landowner's dogs are running wild thru the property and chasing deer, that's a diferent story.

In my example, the deer do not perceive the dogs/human as a threat. It could be very different in your case.

isatarak

One place I hunt has a creek that runs all the way through it. Usually sometime during deer season the coon hunters will run their dogs through there and it just kills the deer hunting for a few days.

In your case, since he walks the dogs 3 or 4 times a week, the deer may have that activity patterned and just get out of the way when the dogs come through.

Killer_Primate

My father has 98 acres of property that is used as a major bedding area for deer. The land used to have fields, as well as mature woods, but about 15 years ago most of it burned to the ground. My dad let the land pretty much grow natural with the exception of cutting walking paths with a bush-hog. So it is now really, really thick. He walks his little dog around the property at least twice a day, and the dog wears a little cow bell on its collar. The deer now know this dog and let it get pretty close even though she sometimes barks and chases them. I've found the most effective way to get into this area is to walk with my dad and the dog, pause at the tree stand for me to ascend, and then they continue. I don't think the deer are capable of noticing that two men and a dog walked in and only one man and a dog walked out. It truly works better than any other way of getting into the woods that I've found. I would recomend giving it a try if the land owner is willing to walk you there, and if the dogs are walked in that area often.
Good luck, I hope it works out for you.

Jimimac

Hard to say since you don't know how much sign is there. If the dogs are running freea good bit of the time,chasing deer andharassing them, then the deer will probably findsomewhere else where they don't have to deal with that. If on the other hand the dogs aren't running the deer then you might beokay. Tough call. A pack of loose dogs usually isn't a good thing in my experience.

zubba

The little I walked around the property, I didn't see too much sign. Just a few tracks and a couple small rubs. I think I will take the safe way out and not hunt it until I get a bettter chance to scout it out.