2014 - 2015 Deer Season Part 2 - Hunting

This was the best hunting season that we have had since purchasing the property in 2012. This season, we started to see the benefits of all of the hard work and changes that we had made. We killed 3 deer off of the property throughout the season while spending the least number of hours on stand out of the past 3 years.

As mentioned in my last post, I knew that I wouldn't have anywhere near the amount of time to hunt this year as I did last year. With that in mind, unlike last year, I decided that each time I hunted, I would go to the best stand or blind for the day, even in early season. I also knew that most of my trips would include only 1 or 2 hunts and would be spaced by a week or more so I didn't need to worry about burning out my best stands. My first trip down was during the 2nd week of October began with an evening hunt where I had to sneak into the ground blind overlooking the small field food plot because there were deer already in the field. I saw 2 does and 4 fawns that evening and it really got me excited to come back.

2 fawns with a doe on my first hunt

A couple of days later, I headed to the cabin in the afternoon planning to return home after my hunt that evening. On Erin's advice, I went back to the same ground blind overlooking the small field food plot and it was very close to a repeat performance of 3 nights earlier. Just like the previous trip, I saw 2 does and 4 fawns, but the difference this time is that I was able to shoot one of the does at about 15 yards. She ran across the food plot and expired about 20 yards into the woods.

Walking to the blind on the night I shot the doe

Checking for blood after the shot

Early season success!

Anyone who knows me is aware that I analyze (some may say over analyze) everything that I do and observe. When it comes to deer hunting and management, I take that to an extreme. In looking back on my early season bow kill coupled with the trail camera data that we collected throughout the summer and fall, I believe that I experienced this success as a direct result of the work completed on the property this year. The does and fawns that were visiting that food plot in early October were coming from the direction of the newly created bedding areas as a result of the TSI work that was done on the East side of our property. Also, as a direct result of adding a food plot in the small field combined with the edge feathering that reduced the number of trails into and out of the woods funneled deer through the North end of the property much more then the past 2 years.

My next trip to the cabin wasn't until the weekend of November 7 - 9 to hunt the rut with my dad. I headed for the cabin on Friday morning after Erin and the girls were off to daycare and school in the morning. I decided to sit in the new tree stand that we put up behind the cabin, but with the warm temperatures and time of day, I didn't see much before dad showed up that afternoon.

View of the cabin about 50 yards away

That evening, the wind was perfect for another new stand that we set up overlooking a deer crossing near the bottom of the deep ravine, so that is where I headed.

View at the bottom of the deep ravine

I did see a nice 3 1/2 year old buck on the East side of the ravine that evening, but he did not come close enough for a shot. Even more exciting for me is that I saw a bobcat in the wild for the first time ever (it is very difficult to see, but the picture above actually has the bobcat in it). Another advantage of this tree stand, is that I have a really good view up a feeder ravine towards the ridge where the cabin and big field are located. That evening, dad had decided to sit in tree stand that I had sat in that same morning. About an hour before dark, I was looking up towards the big field and saw another deer about 200 yards away. As I watched, I saw the deer begin to stagger and eventually fall. Within minutes, I received a call from dad saying that he had shot a deer but he wasn't sure how good the hit was. He was glad to hear that I had seen the deer go down and he was easily able to follow the blood trail right to him. My dad had finally killed his first deer with a bow! For me, this truly was the biggest highlight of the year.

Dad's first deer with a bow!

Dad's view from the cabin stand where he shot the buck

With dad tagged out on his first hunt of the year, I got my choice of the best stands for the remainder of the weekend and, oh boy, what a weekend it was. Saturday morning I sat my favorite stand on the property, called the ridge stand, and saw 7 deer, including 1 of the larger bucks that we had been getting on trail camera. He is a large 8 pointer with a huge body that I estimate to be at least 4 1/2 years old. He was trailing a doe and completely ignored the grunt calls that I made, but they did walk within range of another stand that . During the same hunt, I had a 2 1/2 year old 10 point buck come within 20 yards. I would have been happy to shoot him, but he never seemed to stop in any of my shooting lanes.

View from the ridge tree stand

Picture of the 8 point buck I saw from the ridge, still in velvet

Picture of the same 8 point buck, now beefed up for the rut

Saturday evening, I decided to sit a tree stand that was on the small field, the same place that I had shot a doe a month earlier. I did see a lot of turkeys, but not a single deer.

View from the stand overlooking the small field

On Sunday morning, I sat in the tree stand that the big 8 pointer had walked by the day before. I did see 3 deer that morning, including another big deer that we had been getting on trail camera. Like the 8 pointer, I estimate this deer to be 4 1/2 or older, but he is a 10 pointer. Sadly, he did not take the trail that came by my tree stand. Instead, he cruised along the inside of the woods and out of sight.

Trail camera picture of the big 10

Another picture of the big 10

Sunday evening was my final hunt of the weekend and I did pass up a 15 yard shot on a small 1 1/2 year old 4 point buck. That evening, I also had a ground hog keep me company as I sat in a ground blind overlooking the big field.

Ground hog (sitting on his hind legs in the middle of the picture)

Although I didn't shoot a deer during my rut hunting vacation, I was still thrilled with all of the deer that I saw and very excited that dad was able to get his first deer with a bow. I did manage to get 1 more hunt in before the shotgun season started in December. I did have a doe and 2 fawns in range that evening, but decided not to shoot. It had snowed most of the day and the drive home was a rough one!

View from the stand of the fresh snow falling

With how well the season had been going, I was really looking forward to the shotgun season. Confidence was high, and got even higher when dad shot a doe from the East stand that morning.

Dad's doe from opening morning

While dad spent the remainder of the morning dragging his doe across the deep ravine, I decided to sit all day. This was the first all day sit that I have ever done on this property (usually we go back to the cabin for lunch), but I had a really good feeling.

My view throughout the first day of shotgun season

Well, that feeling ended on quite a sour note. I ended up seeing 1 fawn and 1 doe during the day, but not a single deer came out to eat in the food plot that evening. In fact, neither dad, nor I saw a deer from the stand all day Sunday or all day Monday. We had intended to hunt Tuesday as well, but frustration got the best of me and we headed home Monday evening.

For the 3rd year in a row, our shotgun season was a disappointment. During 2012, we thought it had to do with the unseasonably warm temperatures. In 2013 we chalked it up to the frigged temperatures keeping the deer hunkered down and  not moving. However, this year, I was just baffled as the temperatures were near normal, and up until the first weekend in December, far more deer had been using the property then during the previous 2 years. I was pondering ending my season and turning my focus to next year. I did see something pretty cool on my last evening of shotgun hunting. Late in the afternoon, a mother bobcat and 2 kittens crossed the big field about 40 yards north of the blind that I was sitting in. A short time later, 2 rabbits busted out of the thick cover directly across the field from me with one of the kittens close behind. That was a pretty cool sight to see.

After having a couple of weeks to calm down, I decided to take another trip down with my bow after the shotgun seasons ended. I could tell that deer had been using the food plots a lot, but the weather just wasn't very good for deer movement. I only saw a doe and a fawn over the course of 3 sits. I decided that any more trips down would be dictated by the weather. A cold front came through just before New Years and I headed down for an evening hunt in hopes that the deer would be coming out to eat. My prediction proved correct as 13 different deer came out into the food plot that evening, including the 2 large bucks that I had seen earlier in the season. Although I did not get a shot off (I did draw my bow 3 separate times), it restored my faith in our property and management practices to see so many deer feeding in our food plots.

My last trip down was under similar conditions. A cold front had just come through and the wind chills were below 0. I bundled up and decided to see in the fence line tree stand that was about 30 yards South of where the 2 big bucks had come out last time. I did see a lot of deer that evening, but sadly no big bucks and none of the does that I saw came in range. With that, my season was over.

View of the moon rising during my last hunt

Once again, we logged all of our hunts this season and I compiled a list of stats to compare to the previous years. The biggest stat that stood out to me was was the difference in hours spent on stand. In 2013, dad and I spent over 206 hours hunting, while this year we spent just over 105 hours on stand. Deer seen per hour on stand was 0.62 (up from 0.55 in 2013 and 0.19 in 2014) while deer seen per sit in 2014 was 2.24 (up from 1.85 in 2013 and 0.63 in 2014). Overall, I believe that the upward trend of these numbers shows how well the changes that we have been implementing are having a positive impact on our deer hunting.

Next year, year 4, is a big decision year for me. We are running out of new management projects on the property that allow us to have a direct impact on the deer hunting. I have narrowed down our best food plot options in both what to plant and where to locate them, we are fairly confident in our stand and blind placement, and we know when and where to hunt in any certain conditions. This off season is about closing the gaps that we have identified and hopefully reaping the rewards of 4 years of hard work, and at times, great frustration. The reason that I see it as a big year, is that I have decided to make it my "decision" year. Based on what happens during next deer season, I will either make a decision to either keep the property and continue to do hard core deer management, or to sell the property when the mortgage is paid and buy somewhere else. Only time will tell.

Wow, when I started, I had no idea how long this blog would end up. I hope that you have enjoyed reading about my season as I know that I have enjoyed writing about it. It was the best season that we have had yet and I cannot wait until next year. Only 246 days until bow season opens...I had better get to work!

2014 - 2015 Deer Season Part 1 - Preparations

Going into this year, I knew things were going to be a lot different than last year. With a new baby on the way, I knew my time to do projects over the summer and time to hunt in the fall would be limited compared to 2013. With that in mind, I knew that I was going to have to pick and choose which management projects that I would complete for the year. The one thing that separated my property from the thousands of neighboring acres are the food plots that I plant, so I knew that food plots had to be my first priority. The second priority was to create thick bedding areas on the property hoping that deer would begin to spend more time on my property instead of just passing through.

In mid-March I headed to the cabin to put out my Trophy Rock mineral and do a little shed hunting. I found my first ever shed antler on the property laying in the middle of the big field food plot. It was a very large 5 point side. I found a second shed antler from a different deer the next day. It was sitting 10 yards behind one of our tree stands in the middle of the woods.

The 2 sheds that I found

In late January I met with Jesse Knox from Dbltree Habitat Services to look over my property. I ended up hiring them to perform Timber Stand Improvement (TSI) on 6 acres on the East side of my property. Timber stand improvement involves selectively cutting low value trees. The benefit is that crop trees, such as Oaks, are released and allowed to thrive with less competition for water, nutrients and sunlight. Also, more light is allowed to reach the forest floor allowing undergrowth and younger trees to flourish. This provides a lot of cover and browse for deer (as well as other wildlife).

Good TSI is suppose to look like tornado damage

They also completed 2 acres worth of edge feathering along the entire west boarder of the woods. The goal of edge feathering is to provide both a physical and visual screen along the edge of the woods to help funnel the deer into and out of the food plots. It also provides benefits to other animals like rabbits and song birds.

Trees dropped along the big field as part of the edge feathering

Edge feathering creates quite a mess along the edge of the woods

The timber work seems to have paid off already in year one. We noticed that turkey nesting was much more successful on our property this year with at least 2 hens with 5 poults each. We also had many more does with fawns on the property throughout the spring and summer months.

One of many pictures of hens and poults
that the trail cameras produced

Fawns don't get much smaller then this

The next project for the year was to plant food plots. One observation that we noticed with our food plots in 2013 is that there were large gaps in time when the deer seemed to not favor the foods we had planted. I went to work on figuring out how to provide different kinds of food that would hold deer on the property throughout the fall. Ironically I settled on a food plot rotation designed by Paul Knox of Dbltree Habitat (the same company that performed my TSI work). The goal of the rotation is to provide food for the deer year round in 1 food plot as well as to build up the soil through crop rotation (similar to rotating beans and corn).

Once things started to green up in April, I took a trip down to spray glyphosate on all of the food plots to eliminate weed competition. Then dad and I headed down the weekend after Bridget was born and worked from sun up to sun down on Saturday. The plan was to lime, fertilize, till and plant 2 acres in total. We left the original 1/2 acre of clover planted in the big field the previous spring but planted the remaining 1 1/2 acres to annual clover and oats. We also planted food plot screen across the north end and up the west side of the big field.

Tilling up 1 1/2 acres of the big field

Big field after spring planting was complete

1/2 acre of clover in the big field planted in 2013

In the small field we planted perennial clover with oats with plot screen across the north end. It had been quite awhile since that field has been tilled, so it really put our ATV and disk to the test. I think it turned out really well and it was this food plot that made all the difference this season (more on that in my 2nd post).

Dad tilling up the small field

Clover in the small field turned out great!

In mid-June I took a trip to the cabin with Abigail and Hunter. I don't think it could have been any more fun. She had fun running around playing outside, roasting hot dogs by the camp fire, and riding the ATV with me to check trail cameras. Weekends like that one are the reason I bought the cabin in the first place.

Enjoying the outdoors

Picking some flowers to take home to mommy

Weekends at the cabin make for one tired puppy

I was a bit short on help last summer because mom and dad had a lot of weekends filled up and my brother-in-law Mike had some unexpected events come up that prevented him from helping out as well so I talked my father-in-law Kurt into helping out for a weekend. (Ok...so it wasn't that hard to talk him into it). We headed down in the middle of July to mow off the oats that were planted and to plant 1/2 acre of turnips, radishes and rape.

Kurt manning the mower

With all of the spring and early summer rain, the oats,
weeds and grasses had grown 6 feet tall

A return trip in August showed the turnips and radishes
that Kurt and I planted were doing very well

With the good growing weather and no drought conditions this year, several of our apple trees actually produced fairly well this year. Any apples that fell off throughout the fall did not last long and one of the apple trees had a deer scrape open up below it.

Finally! A decent crop of apples

For the 3rd year in a row we were able to have a family camp out at the cabin over Labor Day weekend. Everything was very wet and muddy and we all left a day early due to more rain in the forecast, but everyone had a great time.

Grandma and Grandpa being silly with the grand kids

Erin brought Bridget down for her first visit to the cabin

The kids enjoying s'mores

Of course the weekend couldn't be all fun and games. Dad and I had a lot of work to do. When we got there Friday night, there was rain in the forecast overnight, so I hooked up the mower and stayed up well after dark mowing the yard and both clover food plots. By the time I was done I was exhausted and soaked to the bone. The next morning, dad and I headed to the bottom of the deep ravine to clear out the trees that fell as part of the TSI done in early spring. Miserable does not even begin to describe how we felt.

Soaked and operating chainsaws in a running creek

The remainder of the day was filled with extreme frustration as we tried to plant a 1 acre food plot of rye, oats, peas and clover. The field was extremely wet. I managed to get the ATV stuck 3 times while pulling the disk and ended up taking a break for a couple hours in hopes that the field would dry out a bit. We got back out after eating an early dinner and were able to get the planting completed just as the sun was setting.

Pulling the disk through the muddy ground caused the
ATV to overheat (notice the seat is removed to help it cool down)

Even with all the struggles, the food plot turned out great

Since the weather forced us to leave a day early, dad and I had to return the following weekend to finish placing tree stands. It turned out to be a great thing anyways because we had recovered from the previous weekend and ended up getting the work done much more quickly.

View from a new tree stand placed on the west fence line

I also took the opportunity to sight in the new barrel/scope combo that I bought for my shotgun (see the 2nd blog post from last year to find out why this was necessary)

Sighted in at 100 yards

I had planned to take Abigail bow hunting with me for the 1st time this year, but she was still struggling a little bit to walk through the taller grasses and woods on her own. That wouldn't necessarily be a big deal, however, the problem would be if I shot a deer and had to track it with her in tow. Instead, I decided to take her down the weekend before bow season opened to sit in a ground blind and watch for deer. We took our supper, chairs, and plenty of books and activities in a bucket to the ground blind on the small field. She had a great time watching for deer and reading books. We even saw a doe with 2 fawns!

Abigail watching for deer

Of course I couldn't end my first post without a mention of my best buddy. Hunter was disappointed at the lack of trips to the cabin this year, but he did take advantage of every single trip. It is still one of my favorite things to see his excitement when he realizes that we are getting in the truck to go to the cabin. It is his favorite place on earth!

Hunter exited to be back at the cabin

Check back in the next couple of weeks for part 2 of the 2014 - 2015 deer season. Thanks for reading!