Too Many Oaks?
09-18-2008, 08:40 AM
#1
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location:
Posts: 92
Too Many Oaks?
On the farm that I hunt most of the time, the last 3 years there has been absolutely no mast crop at all. The deer spent most of the year in my food plots as far as there main source of food, with this being the case they had to spend more time moving between bed and food. This year there is a bumper crop and half the trees on this farm are oaks.(slight exaggeration) How do you begin to pattern deer that can walk 20 yards from any place on the farm and find food? They practically have lunch falling into their bedrooms.
09-18-2008, 09:35 AM
#2
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: PA
Posts: 9,085
RE: Too Many Oaks?
very tough situation im all too familiar with....hard to hunt sometimes....
look for funnels...hunt the transitional edges of thicket/hard woods...setting up in the middle of an oak stand might get you seeing deer, but often too far for the bowhunter. gotta find where the stnad gotta go, which can be tough...alot of my areas like that are in saddles and close to the edge of where the thicket meets the hardwoods...find deer coming out somewhat around me and using the saddles to travel...even small saddles...
but you gotta becareful with entry, wind, noise etc being close to that thick edge...if in doubt, stay farther away from it....i just find thats usually where i need to be...if i cant catch the deer coming out of the thicket, i find often times that they travle the edge of it...
look for funnels...hunt the transitional edges of thicket/hard woods...setting up in the middle of an oak stand might get you seeing deer, but often too far for the bowhunter. gotta find where the stnad gotta go, which can be tough...alot of my areas like that are in saddles and close to the edge of where the thicket meets the hardwoods...find deer coming out somewhat around me and using the saddles to travel...even small saddles...
but you gotta becareful with entry, wind, noise etc being close to that thick edge...if in doubt, stay farther away from it....i just find thats usually where i need to be...if i cant catch the deer coming out of the thicket, i find often times that they travle the edge of it...
09-18-2008, 09:37 AM
#3
Dominant Buck
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location:
Posts: 21,043
RE: Too Many Oaks?
How do you begin to pattern deer that can walk 20 yards from any place on the farm and find food?
I'll probably catch crap for this.....but I'm not above walking into the woods a little early (for an evening hunt) and listening to the acorns fall. Where I hear the most falling......I climb.
09-18-2008, 09:42 AM
#4
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Manassas, VA
Posts: 3,612
RE: Too Many Oaks?
TN--I went through the same issue as you last year except the place I hunt really has no crop fields. It was just that we had so many dang oak trees dropping...the forest floor is still covered in them this year. I saw less deer last year than in the previous 14 years of hunting. I could barely pattern anything deep in the woods.
The one thing that I did feel helped me was trying to pattern which oaks they were using based on their bedding areas. It was very hot last year and the deer barely moved in the early season, hence they mostly ate right close to their bedding areas (50-100 yards). As the season progressed, they began to move a little better because they had eaten up their primary food source close to their beds....and I just tried to adjust each hunt. Eventually it paid off in a deer that was feeding on a secondary site that was around 200 yards from their beds on an oak flat. It took me 3.5 weeks to get on a deer last year and loose an arrow. He was eating close to security cover.
The one thing that I did feel helped me was trying to pattern which oaks they were using based on their bedding areas. It was very hot last year and the deer barely moved in the early season, hence they mostly ate right close to their bedding areas (50-100 yards). As the season progressed, they began to move a little better because they had eaten up their primary food source close to their beds....and I just tried to adjust each hunt. Eventually it paid off in a deer that was feeding on a secondary site that was around 200 yards from their beds on an oak flat. It took me 3.5 weeks to get on a deer last year and loose an arrow. He was eating close to security cover.
