When to quit?

[jtevanMT]

If you don’t enjoy hunting then quit. If you enjoy hunting and the pursuit then keep doing it and learn different areas and tactics that lead to better success or enjoyment. Personally, I hate hunting from a stand. I much prefer still hunting or spot and stalk (whitetail, mule deer, elk or bear). Of course, I am also a Western hunter with lots of public land to chase animals. Might not be as easy to spot and stalk or still hunt in other states.

 

[PMcGee]

It works. I dont TRUST it. For me, that's important.

The archery season is over for all intents and purposes. It ends Friday. If I want to kill something with a bow, I have to pay for it.

I get a short window after Christmas where I might get a sit or two in. Like a 10 day season but the focus is already on October 25 for the most part.

You can hunt with your bow in rifle season just have to wear orange.


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[Jpsmith1]

You can hunt with your bow in rifle season just have to wear orange.


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Given my history as described in this thread, why would I do something to additionally limit my opportunities or abilities to take game?

I'm aware that I can hunt with a bow in gun season. I can also use a gun which is a lot more effective.

 

[PMcGee]

Well the only way you’re going to get better killing animals with your bow is killing animals with your bow. Leave the rifle at home if you truly want to get better with your bow.


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[fatlander]

Given my history as described in this thread, why would I do something to additionally limit my opportunities or abilities to take game?

I'm aware that I can hunt with a bow in gun season. I can also use a gun which is a lot more effective.

If you learn how to consistently kill deer with a bow, especially during rifle season, you’ll be deadlier than CWD with a rifle in your hand.

Bow hunting is a game of inches. Rifle hunting is game of hundreds of yards. I believe it was Fred Bear who said, “Most rifle hunts end where a bow hunt begins.”


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[fatlander]

the focus is already on October 25 for the most part.

FWIW I think October is a really tough time to kill whitetails compared to November, and even December/January if you can leave them alone and you’ve got quality food sources.

During October, there’s still a medley of food sources, making it hard to pin down where they’re going every day. A bumper crop of mast makes that much much harder. During October it’s also hot, and they’ve got their winter clothes on. Deer in general don’t move much before last night, mature bucks even less so. Hunting in the mornings before October 25 is about pointless in my experience, deer are generally already back to bed. Unless you really know what you’re doing and hunt fronts accordingly, hunting before October 25 does more harm than good in my overwhelming experience.

Halloween to Thanksgiving is the time to get after it. Late season with unpressured deer, cold temps, and quality food can make for good afternoon sits.


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[Jpsmith1]

FWIW I think October is a really tough time to kill whitetails compared to November, and even December/January if you can leave them alone and you’ve got quality food sources.

During October, there’s still a medley of food sources, making it hard to pin down where they’re going every day. A bumper crop of mast makes that much much harder. During October it’s also hot, and they’ve got their winter clothes on. Deer in general don’t move much before last night, mature bucks even less so. Hunting in the mornings before October 25 is about pointless in my experience, deer are generally already back to bed. Unless you really know what you’re doing and hunt fronts accordingly, hunting before October 25 does more harm than good in my overwhelming experience.

Halloween to Thanksgiving is the time to get after it. Late season with unpressured deer, cold temps, and quality food can make for good afternoon sits.


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I meant October of 2025, our season starts first Saturday of October.

For does, I've had the most success the first weeks of October, before the young bucks start hassling them, when they're still coming out of cover and hitting acorns. Anecdotally here. I am not logging my sightings with detailed records or anything.

Once mid-later October hits, everything goes to rat$hi!t for me until some love starved buck wanders by. For several years running prior to this year, I take the last week of October and into November off work to hunt and put as many hours as physically possible in a stand but sightings are generally sparse during that time period for me.

I think pressure is much higher on the property I'm hunting during the gun season. I'm trying to figure out how to play off of that pressure and catch one running away.

 

[fatlander]

I meant October of 2025, our season starts first Saturday of October.

For does, I've had the most success the first weeks of October, before the young bucks start hassling them, when they're still coming out of cover and hitting acorns. Anecdotally here. I am not logging my sightings with detailed records or anything.

Once mid-later October hits, everything goes to rat$hi!t for me until some love starved buck wanders by. For several years running prior to this year, I take the last week of October and into November off work to hunt and put as many hours as physically possible in a stand but sightings are generally sparse during that time period for me.

I think pressure is much higher on the property I'm hunting during the gun season. I'm trying to figure out how to play off of that pressure and catch one running away.

I know you meant October of 2025. It’s just coincidence that my experience of hunting before October 25th of any given year is tough. I can go way off to the side somewhere to shoot does with regularity before October 25, but I don’t even bother trying to hunt mature bucks until Halloween.

It’s hard for most of us to accept this, but the guy in the mirror is why you’re not seeing deer. And he’s definitely the reason deer sightings go down with every subsequent hunt in a specific area. We’ll often use the excuse “I’ve got to get in there before someone else does” or “there’s so much pressure” to hunt somewhere we shouldn’t given the conditions. The real reason you’re not seeing deer is you. You’re either hunting the same spots too much with bad entry/exit/wind, and/or you’re hunting places everyone else hunts too.


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[bowkill]

Anecdotally here. I am not logging my sightings with detailed records or anything.

Maybe you should be logging your sightings with detailed records. You've already admitted that you didn't realized the success you've actually had until someone pointed it out. Maybe if you actually put it down on paper, you would gain some confidence and help to get out of your own way!
Also, you've said several times that your not a trophy hunter and complained about lack of opportunities, but then you said you had several does that came by with no mention of trying to get a shot! You can't have it both ways. Either you're a meat hunter looking for opportunities or your a trophy hunter holding out for the big one! Shoot enough of those does and the chance at a buck will come!

 

[Jpsmith1]

I know you meant October of 2025. It’s just coincidence that my experience of hunting before October 25th of any given year is tough. I can go way off to the side somewhere to shoot does with regularity before October 25, but I don’t even bother trying to hunt mature bucks until Halloween.

It’s hard for most of us to accept this, but the guy in the mirror is why you’re not seeing deer. And he’s definitely the reason deer sightings go down with every subsequent hunt in a specific area. We’ll often use the excuse “I’ve got to get in there before someone else does” or “there’s so much pressure” to hunt somewhere we shouldn’t given the conditions. The real reason you’re not seeing deer is you. You’re either hunting the same spots too much with bad entry/exit/wind, and/or you’re hunting places everyone else hunts too.


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It isn't difficult for me at all to accept that I am the problem. I have been working to correct that and, in some ways have made progress. I have taken probably 3 major and a dozen more minor things that I need to work on in the off season and next bow season out of this conversation.

Maybe you should be logging your sightings with detailed records. You've already admitted that you didn't realized the success you've actually had until someone pointed it out. Maybe if you actually put it down on paper, you would gain some confidence and help to get out of your own way!
Also, you've said several times that your not a trophy hunter and complained about lack of opportunities, but then you said you had several does that came by with no mention of trying to get a shot! You can't have it both ways. Either you're a meat hunter looking for opportunities or your a trophy hunter holding out for the big one! Shoot enough of those does and the chance at a buck will come!

Maybe I do need to do that.

I'm not a "trophy" hunter in the sense that I don't care about any arbitrary standard of a trophy (inches of antler or number of points or whatever else) but I have been targeting a buck which is why I have passed on does.

The law says it has to have 3 point on one side. That's a far higher standard than I personally hold. A spike would be fine. A forked horn would be awesome. It's often painful to let them walk when I'd love to shoot one but the law says I can't.

So, maybe I AM a trophy hunter, just in a different way than most people think of it.

On Saturday, 3 does ran in and, before offering anything resembling an opportunity, scattered. I might have had trouble taking a shot with a rifle they were there and gone so fast. Later, 2 does, a mother and yearling came through alert and moving but not running i might have had a chance but I was waiting for what might have been following and wasn't.

Getting a buck, outsmarting, outwitting and ultimately killing a buck, ANY BUCK, BY MYSELF, has been a near all consuming effort for a while now.