Season Update

This season has not gone as expected but overall it hasn't been all bad.  We spent a lot of time scouting and preparing our main hunting area this year and thought that we had the deer patterns and movement all figured out.  We had plenty of good encounters just out of bow range for the first month of the season.  When gun season opened Nov. 5th, everything changed.  The deer were simply gone.

We hunted hard through 20 mph winds and very warm temps the first two days of gun season and did not see one deer.  Considering we had encounters with deer every day we were in the field up until than, it threw us off to say the least.  On our third day in the field we adjusted strategy a bit after the morning hunt and switched stands.  The switch paid off and I shot the first deer of the season Monday night.  I had a second shot from the same spot on Tuesday morning and couldn't pull it off.  A buck and a doe came in a lot closer than I expected and I couldn't get my gun up for a shot.  When I tried the deer bolted and I missed my chance.  We were back out yesterday to wrap up our gun hunt for this property and my brother Matt shot two does out of a herd that ran into his stand during the evening hunt.

We feel like after we adjusted our strategy we were on the deer patterns, we lost them in the middle and picked it back up at the end.  Overall this was a learning experience for us and I hope we get the chance to build off it in the future.  The property we are hunting is a pass-thru area for the deer so it is very important for us to pattern where they are going in and out at any given time.  We hope to develop more food sources for them in the future as we move forward.

Our focus now shifts to our metro property which is shotgun and bow only.  We are very limited as to where and how we can shoot on this property because of houses and buildings in the area.  We are extra careful to be safe and make the best of our hunts.  I hope to have pictures of something large we knock down over the next couple of weeks.  We will also be heading back up periodically to bow hunt on our northern property.