South Dakota East River Deer Info

[Maitai11]

Hey Everyone,

First-time poster here, second-time hunter. I am well equipped with a Browning X-Bolt .300 Win Mag with a Nikon BDC scope, as well as a range finder, spotting scope, and all other necessary gear.

My first kill was an antelope in Nevada.

I want a whitetail buck.

I live in Vermillion, SD and am a resident. I would like to know which units are good to hunt in the East River area. I am partial to areas that have good (up to) 30-mile (per hour) dirt roads.

I am aware I have missed the first and second draws.

Any help would be appreciated. Many thanks.

Maitai

 

[sconnieVLP]

Check out 2, 3, and 4 under the “General Etiquette Regarding Sharing of Information” section at the link below.

https://rokslide.com/forums/threads/rokslide-forum-rules-etiquette.277022/

 

[spur60]

East river resident here. You've got a few options for third draw yet. You could pick a county that still has WT buck tags available, but those are going to be counties with little public land. There are also many counties with a handful of WT doe tags available yet. Some of those counties have decent public land, some don't. If you don't have any current access to private land, it makes east river hunting harder, but it still can be done. My advice - start buying preference points for as many deer seasons as you're interested in hunting. And apply for a doe tag for a county with decent public land so you can hopefully have a hunt this fall, and get a feel for an area to see if you'd be interested in hunting that county in the future. Then, start talking to friends & co-workers about deer hunting, get out scouting, and knocking on some doors. Getting on private land can seem hard, then all of the sudden out of nowhere you might get access to 5000 acres. You never know. Once you've started to get your foot in the door for private access, then you can start working on a draw strategy. Some counties to draw a rifle "buck" tag, you might need 2 or 3 preference points. But, you can supplement your draws by applying for special buck, or muzzleloader. It just all depends on where you want to hunt. Some counties you can draw an Any WT tag with zero preference. SD GFP has draw statistics and harvest statistics available to assist you along with maps showing public lands. Just remember, many public lands are popular for upland and waterfowl hunting, along with archery hunting as well, so you won't always be the only truck in the parking lot at zero dark thirty on a saturday morning.

 

[sniper20]

I'm in the same area as you guys are. I'm trying to get started hunting deer here in SD. Been living here for about 5 years, been busy enough I haven't gotten around to trying. I live next to, and work in IA, so everyone I know is in IA. Of course, their response for hunting is "get an IA tag, or move to IA", not happening...

I'm working on trying to get some land to hunt, but I do it all; archery, ML, rifle, shoot I would even try spear if I could...haha.

Would it be possible for one of you guys to shoot me a message so I can ask some questions about deer tags and such? The system in SD is way different than what I was used to in KS. I sure don't want to meet a warden on the wrong side of the line...

 

[spur60]

@sniper20, feel free to message me. I'm by no means a die hard SD deer hunter; mostly a "does for the freezer" kind of guy, but I know and understand the seasons and draw structures well.

 

[Maitai11]

@sniper20, feel free to message me. I'm by no means a die hard SD deer hunter; mostly a "does for the freezer" kind of guy, but I know and understand the seasons and draw structures well.

Thanks to both of you. If you could both contact me, I would really appreciate it. I am brand new, so don't have the cred to DM on this site as of yet.

Spur, would like to talk sectors and Sniper, I don't know if you'd be interested, but I'm looking for a solid hunting buddy.

If you type in "maitaioneone" and then at the end a Yahoo and then a dot com, that would get to me.

Also, sorry for the late reply. I swore in a a new attorney this week and it got hectic. Hope to hear from one or both of you.

Maitai