AKbouhunter

Hi all. New to the board here.

Just wanting to start gathering some intel. Work has me traveling to the Huntsville AL area in mid Oct or early November. I am an experience hunter but beings that I live in AK I don't hunt whitetail. I would like to get some opinions or directions to head to stalk hunt whitetail with a bow during my visit. Any information would be greatly appreciated!

gjersy

Hey your not going to ethically stalk a white-tail with a bow on the 1st try lol, My advice is respectfully, hunt them with a gun 1st, one shot kill

Topgun 3006

Welcome, but I think the guys in AL will be able to help you more if you are talking about chasing four legged whitetail deer and not two legged dear! Actually maybe they can help you combine your trip and chase both!

gjersy

Never saw a 2 legged deer or as you say "dear"?

AKbouhunter

Whoops. Lol. Didnt notice the typo.

Im pretty experienced hunter with bow and rifle. This forum won't allow me to post a pic but I assure you I can kill any 4 legged critter placed in front of me. If I wasn't confident I wouldn't attempt it. Caribou and Moose are much bigger in the body and far tougher to drop and they fall with a properly placed stick just fine. My major concern is private land obviously not being super familiar with the area. I did some scouting mostly from the car as it was near 95 degrees last time I was down there and the spiders were pretty intense (thats a problem we don't have here).

super_hunt54

AK, first, welcome to the site. Second, gjersy kinda touched on something that I will expand on a bit. Having hunted Alaska for many moons now, I know the hunting up there and how most of the species act while still hunting. Whitetail deer are a whole other animal than what you are used to hunting. Most of the areas in Alaska have mostly unpressured animals while Alabama deer are most definitely experienced in hunting pressure and equate human scent with danger much more quickly. Stalking whitetail is much different than sneaking up on caribou and moose, especially into bow range.

AKbouhunter

Im not sure where you were hunting unpressured caribou and moose up here. Maybe you can help me out with some of those areas! I hunt primarily unit 13 here due to proximity of my living area and let me tell you those are some of the most highly pressured animals in any state. I have personally watched a group of 20 hunters unload on a herd of caribou. Granted they typically are less sketchy than dear but they still get pressure. Bear here are probably our toughest quarry along with moose and I've got within bow range of both. I can handle a whitetail.

super_hunt54

Trust me, AK. In comparison to probably 95% of Alaskan big game, the whitetail deer, especially in the Southern states such as Alabama, are 100 times more skiddish. I've had Moose practically run over me more times than I care to remember. I've shared my fishing holes with Brownies a LOT more than people. Caribou, while one of the absolute best tasting of the deer family, are pretty much the easiest to take. I'm not trying to cast doubt on your skill set as I know nothing about you. But I AM saying that your inexperience with whitetail will make things much more difficult than you might imagine. Your best bet will be to team up with someone you know around there and hang stands. Spot and stalk archery whitetail, while it is done successfully, isn't as easy as some may think.

AKbouhunter

I guess I should re-phrase. I dont intend to "stalk" like I would a caribou or moose. More or less find an area and hide and wait. I typically don't "stalk" game I find an area where they frequent and wait for them to pass.

Oldtimr

AK, there is a very good reason that most hunters that hunt whitetails hunt from an elevated stand. As has been stated whitetail deer in the woods do not act like other species. I have several friends that have hunted and taken several Caribou in both Alaska and Canada, the one think they had in common was they all said the hardest part of the hunt was deciding which bull to take. If you believe you can stalk close enough to make an ethical shot on a whitetail, go for it, but it will not be as easy as you think.