When to quit?

[Pharmseller]

Keep learning, it’s how you get better.





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[Radford]

I love being in the woods. I'd just like to SEE something, ya know.

You just aren’t good at hunting. No big deal and nothing wrong with that. If you enjoy it keep going. I’ve hunted in high pressure and low density deer areas my entire life. 10 deer in thirty years is rough. Also. You don’t need all that fancy gear. It won’t help you kill deer. Nothing will help you more than spending more time in the woods. Good luck brother.

 

[EvanG17]

Can’t have no in your heart. I almost gave up on my elk hunt this past year and killed a nice one on my way out. Sometimes things just happen for no reason and god works his way into your mission.

 

[Jpsmith1]

You just aren’t good at hunting. No big deal and nothing wrong with that. If you enjoy it keep going. I’ve hunted in high pressure and low density deer areas my entire life. 10 deer in thirty years is rough. Also. You don’t need all that fancy gear. It won’t help you kill deer. Nothing will help you more than spending more time in the woods. Good luck brother.

I spent some time thinking this past week and tell me if this makes sense.

I started archery hunting in 2010 after a little time off work for a hernia surgery. Got someone to help me throw a stand up on a scrape line and hunted a couple mornings. Nothing serious.

2011, i actually started scouting a little, moved that stand and got my first deer with a bow.

I hunted that little patch of woods until a couple years ago when they timbered it. I know deer love a good thicket and I want to get back in there but complications

Anyway, my point. As far as I know, I was the only person hunting those woods. All the hours I spent hunting, scouting and foraging those woods, I never saw anyone or any real sign of anyone. A mowed walking path a neighbor maintained.

Having recently transitioned to hunting at my club, I'm now hunting deer that are hunted rather than unpressured animals and I need to make further adjustments. Maybe the lower pressure animals were letting me get away with stuff?

Does that make sense?

 

[Huntndog]

Don’t stress over it. Every day you can go out there is a gift.
As far as scouting, one of my favorite tactics is to go after a snow and study tracks. You can easily spot where trails cross and set up there next year.
We are all learning……
Remember, Deer hunting is like sex. You don’t have to be good at it to enjoy it!

 

[roosiebull]

The hunting shows on tv make it look easy..it isn't. Keep on hunting. What else would you do with your time anyways.....whitetails in Pa are one of the toughest animals to hunt since most of the time it's in close quarters.....not like shooting a muley or elk at 500 yards across a canyon or grain field.

That’s the right attitude “hunting is super easy besides where I hunt”

How much time have you spent hunting public land across the country? Everyone has “the toughest animals to hunt” if you ask them, and everyone else has it easy

Seriously, having that attitude is self defeating. To be a consistently successful hunter you need an almost irrational optimism, knowing you are going to fill your tags.

Every hunt, every area, has its own unique difficulty. Everyone wants to think they have the hardest hunting, which is like making an excuse to not fill tags before it ever starts.

If you want to look at things objectively, start looking up success statistics for different areas (including your own) and you will likely find that you don’t have it that bad, and figure out what you need to do to join that smaller percentage of hunters killing critters.

 

[roosiebull]

I spent some time thinking this past week and tell me if this makes sense.

I started archery hunting in 2010 after a little time off work for a hernia surgery. Got someone to help me throw a stand up on a scrape line and hunted a couple mornings. Nothing serious.

2011, i actually started scouting a little, moved that stand and got my first deer with a bow.

I hunted that little patch of woods until a couple years ago when they timbered it. I know deer love a good thicket and I want to get back in there but complications

Anyway, my point. As far as I know, I was the only person hunting those woods. All the hours I spent hunting, scouting and foraging those woods, I never saw anyone or any real sign of anyone. A mowed walking path a neighbor maintained.

Having recently transitioned to hunting at my club, I'm now hunting deer that are hunted rather than unpressured animals and I need to make further adjustments. Maybe the lower pressure animals were letting me get away with stuff?

Does that make sense?

Hunting the same spot over and over is not a great strategy, deer are better at patterning people than people are at patterning deer.

You need to be hunting fresh sign always, don’t spend time hunting a spot that dried up for sign, that’s a huge important detail.

If you are archery hunting, it’s even more critical to stay mobile, because if you are getting in their zone, you are laying ground scent and disturbing the area, you need to bounce around and keep them guessing

Find current sign, look at the area, form a strategy and believe in your strategy, if you sit it a couple times with no action, move on and start the process over again, and you can always circle back to areas you’ve hunted in the past and keep checking sign

Just during the duration of a deer season, human pressure aside, there are a lot of phases of deer activity and hunting the same spot the whole time isn’t the best strategy

Make a goal of finding more places to hunt, and keep bouncing around, and don’t overcommit on any one spot

 

[Jpsmith1]

Hunting the same spot over and over is not a great strategy, deer are better at patterning people than people are at patterning deer.

You need to be hunting fresh sign always, don’t spend time hunting a spot that dried up for sign, that’s a huge important detail.

If you are archery hunting, it’s even more critical to stay mobile, because if you are getting in their zone, you are laying ground scent and disturbing the area, you need to bounce around and keep them guessing

Find current sign, look at the area, form a strategy and believe in your strategy, if you sit it a couple times with no action, move on and start the process over again, and you can always circle back to areas you’ve hunted in the past and keep checking sign

Just during the duration of a deer season, human pressure aside, there are a lot of phases of deer activity and hunting the same spot the whole time isn’t the best strategy

Make a goal of finding more places to hunt, and keep bouncing around, and don’t overcommit on any one spot

For my understanding

Can you better define a "spot"?

Like how big is a "spot"? I'm assuming that it's more than the specific tree you're hunting from so, like how big of areas are we talking about here?

Obviously, ground conditions will dictate a lot of this so, for clarity, most of what I am hunting is reclaimed strip mine. Super thick cover interspersed with some older growth open areas and some small-ish ag fields.

Is a "spot" an acre? 100 acres? 1000?

 

[Jpsmith1]

Can’t have no in your heart. I almost gave up on my elk hunt this past year and killed a nice one on my way out. Sometimes things just happen for no reason and god works his way into your mission.

Here's what happens. I'm kind of like old Charlie Brown, you know. Right to the mooooon.....

Spend the summer working on scouting. Got good pictures on camera, I've seen some nice deer, got a game plan in place. I'm ready to GO.

Then the season happens, I get kicked in the d**k repeatedly and walk away with my tail tucked

 

[roosiebull]

For my understanding

Can you better define a "spot"?

Like how big is a "spot"? I'm assuming that it's more than the specific tree you're hunting from so, like how big of areas are we talking about here?

Obviously, ground conditions will dictate a lot of this so, for clarity, most of what I am hunting is reclaimed strip mine. Super thick cover interspersed with some older growth open areas and some small-ish ag fields.

Is a "spot" an acre? 100 acres? 1000?

I would consider a spot far enough away that you aren’t impacting deer that you are currently hunting, and most of the time a different spot would be hunting a different population of deer

If there is hunting pressure, a lot of the strategy is other hunters as much as the deer

Also, one person can mess up a pretty large area, you need a good hunt plan, which means seeing what the sign is doing, how you access your spot, and try to be as low impact as possible. If you are hunting pressured deer, you go set up, and the deer have to cross your ground scent to get to you, you are likely not going to have many encounters.

That’s why fresh sign is so important, it tells you there are deer in the area, and how they are using the area… just ignoring what the sign is doing, and then picking a spot that looks good in the area, isn’t the best approach… seeing what the sign is doing, and setting up accordingly is a better approach, even if the setup doesn’t look like the best

Hunting bad wind is usually a waste of time and does more harm than good, the little details can be daunting, but that’s the game, and what makes hunting fun. Doing the same thing over and over with no results is not fun, and would be very discouraging… keep things fresh, bounce around and really pay attention to fresh sign

 

[fatlander]

For my understanding

Can you better define a "spot"?

Like how big is a "spot"? I'm assuming that it's more than the specific tree you're hunting from so, like how big of areas are we talking about here?

Obviously, ground conditions will dictate a lot of this so, for clarity, most of what I am hunting is reclaimed strip mine. Super thick cover interspersed with some older growth open areas and some small-ish ag fields.

Is a "spot" an acre? 100 acres? 1000?

A “spot” is hunting any area thats all the same deer. We already went over this a while back in the thread. As a general rule, if you’re not 1-1.5 miles away on the east coast, you’re not hunting different deer. If you’re hunting the same deer, day after day, it’s going to suck.

You’re way overthinking this. In this thread alone, you’ve “thought” more about whitetail strategy than I have in the past 15 years. Go hunting with someone that kills a lot of deer. Learn.


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[Jpsmith1]

You’re way overthinking this. In this thread alone, you’ve “thought” more about whitetail strategy than I have in the past 15 years. Go hunting with someone that kills a lot of deer. Learn.

Overthinking and over-analyzing are what I do.

I've divided my club into 2 "spots" north and south. While not completely bisected by a lake, a lake is a rough 'boundary' between these areas. Maybe a third somewhat remote from the other two by 3/4 mile or so but I need to put boots there. and yes, I know deer can swim and that a lake isn't a 'boundary', it's just a line for me to use to use.

As scouting progresses, I'll divide the spots into smaller zones and ultimately choose stand sites based on activity and wind. I already have a couple chosen.

I'm joining another club so that I can hunt with my "killer" buddy who never fails to fill his freezer and put up a couple nice bucks for him, his family and his friends. Got to setup a legal weapon for that zone, though but I have a year.

I'm 'e scouting' some public land within an hour or so drive and I'm going to get boots on there as winter and spring progress.

Indoor 3D will give me time to work on my shot process.

Firearms deer season ends Saturday so I've got 1 more shot to fill another tag with a gun, and I have a plan in place for that. Archery will come back in for a bit after Christmas, too.

 

[south man]

Hunting the same spot over and over is not a great strategy, deer are better at patterning people than people are at patterning deer.

You need to be hunting fresh sign always, don’t spend time hunting a spot that dried up for sign, that’s a huge important detail.

If you are archery hunting, it’s even more critical to stay mobile, because if you are getting in their zone, you are laying ground scent and disturbing the area, you need to bounce around and keep them guessing

Find current sign, look at the area, form a strategy and believe in your strategy, if you sit it a couple times with no action, move on and start the process over again, and you can always circle back to areas you’ve hunted in the past and keep checking sign

Just during the duration of a deer season, human pressure aside, there are a lot of phases of deer activity and hunting the same spot the whole time isn’t the best strategy

Make a goal of finding more places to hunt, and keep bouncing around, and don’t overcommit on any one spot

good advice

 

[MNGrouser]

I'll admit I haven't read this entire thread. I missed it when it first posted as I was too busy hunting. I came across it last week and was about 6-pages into the most depressing Eeyore-BS I've read. When I was about to post that I saw that you had updated with shooting a deer. I decided I didn't want to be the turd in the punch bowl. Congratulations on shooting your doe. That is awesome and killing more deer is going to lead to killing more deer.

The guys who tell you the importance of a positive attitude are right on the money. I felt like the pages of this that I did read were mostly an explanation for why things would NOT work for you. ANytime someone made a suggestion trying to be helpful, you responded with why not. Do your scouting. Hut hard. Pay attention to the wind.

I have never hunted hunt clubs or large group leases. You may need to reconsider that approach. If you have other people (perhaps a lot of other people) hunting the same deer and using the same ground, you might be screwed from the start. Not all of us can afford to own our own private hunting paradise, but if YOU are hunting the same ground that I have ALREADY come in and spooked all the deer out of, how much success do you expect?

 

[Yoder]

Nice job killing that doe with a handgun. Just a quick PSA for wearing hearing protection when hunting but especially with a magnum revolver. I shot three times with my 44 at two different does about an hour apart. I didn't even think about wearing ear pro. I had tinnitus before but now it's about 3x louder. It's been over a week so I'm pretty sure the damage is permanent. It REALLY sucks. Don't be a dumbass like me.

 

[birdhunter17]

Never quit it keeps you young.

 

[E.Shell]

I couldn't stand to read the whole thread. I got through about 7-8 pages in and almost decided to quit hunting myself.

You have had an overwhelming amount of good advice here, and I can only offer a couple points.

First, about this 'buck fever' excitement thing. So what you're excited? If you're not excited, you're clearly wasting your time. Might as well quit hunting and go back to hookers and blow or whatever DOES excite you. When I stop getting excited, I'm done.

Dealing with the excitement takes a little self discipline, but there are things that can help you function through the excitement. As a fairly successful whitetail hunter (150+ mostly bow, but also pistol, rifle, shotgun and muzzleloader) and a hunter education instructor, range officer and independent firearms instructor, I've helped people get through this. I've taken whitetails with all sorts of implements and have a fair idea on how to hunt them in our areas.

Know that the excitement of a chance at a game animal occupies most of your consciousness and in that time, we tend to forget our basics. Anything you have to consciously think about to do WILL get f**ked up under pressure. They call it 'buck fever', but it's actually a simple failure to correctly execute the basics correctly while you're distracted and excited.

Return to the basics and drill them in until they are automatic. There is NO substitute for this, it must be done to achieve competency under pressure.

Using your bow for example, shoot until correct stance and posture are automatically achieved EVERY time you draw. Drill this in from various positions. Standing in a fixed position and going through a quiver full of arrows is NOT effective hunting practice. Stand facing left, face right, face away, sit...whatever it takes to break position. Then get up/turn, face the target and draw and shoot as quickly as you can make a solid shot, being careful to assume the correct position every time. Practice a few arrows per session, a couple short sessions a day, until it becomes 'old hat'. Do it, do it, and do it some more. Whenever you draw your bow, you will automatically come to your correct anchor point and be able to make a competent shot.

The ability to set yourself up unconsciously/automatically frees your mind to think about things like ranging, potential obstructions, getting the shot opportunity...; real-time problems requiring real-time solutions. Don't waste your conscious thought on stuff you could drill in and do automatically. No different than hunting upland birds - a grouse flushes, you automatically place your feet to assume a proper NPOA, swing with the bird and fire...all inside a couple seconds or less. Your bow handling needs the same response.

Then, you MUST hunt where the deer are. It sounds obvious, but I hunted many days without seeing deer because I was hunting marginal sign created by occasional deer passing through. One fact that I learned that totally changed my approach is that deer crap about every 4 hours. If you're not hunting over deer crap, you are clearly not hunting where the deer ARE.

Find bedding areas, find feeding areas, find travel lanes that intersect (indicating more traffic). These will be the areas where the deer ARE. Place yourself between feeding and bedding areas in the morning, between bedding and feeding areas in the evenings. Learn that sign found in fields and open woods is most often left at night. Sign found in/near thickets and other cover is where you want to be to hunt daylight hours. Deer often stage themselves well back from feeding areas, especially open areas, until just before dark. This means it often helps to move more in the direction you expect them to come from.

Being where the deer are helps immensely with trying to sit quietly on a stand. If you KNOW a deer will eventually pass by, it is a lot easier to sit still and pay attention than if you feel like you're not likely to see anything. The way to overcome this is scouting and understanding deer behavior.

As mentioned upstream on this thread, wind is hugely important and deer will completely vacate a desirable area if the wind is wrong. I have stand locations that are great on a west wind but suck on an east wind. You have to learn the difference. Deer tend to travel in/through places where they can watch the more open areas and smell the areas they cannot see. This habit has them walking along the downwind side of thickets, the downwind side of ridges, coming out of the woods on the upwind edge of a field and bedding on the downwind wide of a hill or cover with the valley/open areas visible below/out front and the wind carrying the scent of danger from behind/uphill.

When an opportunity presents itself, you must be prepared to react. Putting your rifle or bow down can and will cost you deer. If your cold hand(s) is an issue, use a chemical handwarmer. They're cheap and work great. Hold it in your shooting hand with you rifle or bow VERY close by. I seldom hang or lean a rifle or bow and prefer to lay it across my lap or at least have it in front of me.

Good luck!!