As i’ve mentioned in the past, I hunt primarily two spots. One spot in New Jersey and another in Long Island, New York.

LONG ISLAND
My hunting buddy, Harry shot a really nice eight pointer in Long Island on Holloween see below:

This land is only 4 acres and is surrounded by the suburbs. The deer Harry shot was the resident “nice buck”. I had seen it along with a little 4 pointer before. After harry shot it, we gave the property a break for a while and eagerly awaited the Rut so we would get more big bucks travelling through our little hunting spot. I don’t know if it was just us, but we haven’t really seen good signs of the rut on this property. I’ve hunted hard since the 5th and seen very few deer there and no deer chasing. From talking to other Long Island bowhunters, the rut is actually starting to end now and my last good hope will be next week.

NEW JERSEY
Its been a similar story for us in New Jersey. Where we were seeing tons of deer before November and had great expectations for the rut. While my hunting partner there did finally see the Piebald in the woods while hunting..see below:

Though he didn’t get a shot at it. He also had a big pig come to his stand but also didn’t get a shot (that was a little over a weak ago and since we never had a photo on the game camera of that one, we were thinking the rut was starting to kick in). Making a long story short, after seeing that buck (over a week ago) neither of us have seen any good bucks and not many does. It has been very strange. The only thing I can contribute this to is the fact that I’ve seen a number of coyotes on this land recently and had never seen them before. If the coyotes are holding up on our hunting spot it clearly cant be good for hunting.

FUTURE HUNTING
Today is Friday November 13th, and the weather in the northeast is terrible. 25mph wind and rain. I’m taking tomorrow off but will be hunting hard on sunday and monday and will hopefully have good news to post early next week.

Good Hunting
d

Answer:
Big bucks seem to shy away from ridge tops during most daylight hours, even during the rut. It is likely that the scrapes are being freshened by smaller bucks, while the biggest ones keep an eye on the area from thicker cover just below the top of the ridge. There is usually a faint trail down over the side that is used primarily by the older bucks. Hunt the side hill trail on the downwind side of the ridge top. Look for rub lines to verify your choice of ambush.

We’ve also had excellent success hunting these bedding ridges during the mornings when bucks are cruising to look for any bedded does or signs of estrous activity. Generally, this activity will also take place primarily on the downwind edge of the ridge making the stand already described the best for morning hunting, as well.

Answer:
If there are several beds (3 or more) fairly close together it is probably a doe bedding area with the signs of a family group hanging nearby. If there are single beds, mostly isolated, the chances are better that it is a buck bedding area. Bucks will definitely bed near security cover like you describe and they do like to have a view of their surroundings so it wouldn’t surprise us if the bed you found is used by a buck.

Generally, bedding areas are best in the morning. You have to try to figure out where the deer are coming from (a food source most likely) and approach the area from the opposite direction. In your case you can use the creek to get in and out if it isn’t too deep. During the rut you are actually better off hunting doe bedding areas. Right before and after the rut the buck bedding areas are better (if you are able to distinguish the two - it can be tough).

We’ve spent a lot of time hunting general bedding areas (buck and doe) during the rut in the last couple of years and found them to be very good in the mornings, usually well after daylight. So, don’t leave your stand too soon.

Additionally, I checked out the Rocket Steelheads you recommend. I have a question concerning them: As you know, my ACC arrows are of a small diameter. The Steelhead’s ferrule is of a significantly larger diameter then my shaft. Does this mean that on impact with game the head is having to punch a much larger hole than necessary to allow the arrow to pass through, thus sacrificing what looks to me like a lot of penetration?

Answer:
It doesn’t matter which fletching orientation you use. Most of us use right helical because that’s kind of the standard. If you use feathers you will need to use the clamp that goes with the feather. For example: right wing feather goes with right helical clamp. Plastic vanes will work with either left or right helical (and straight).

The Steelhead has a pretty big cut-on-impact tip so we don’t think the size of the ferrule will limit penetration, but you may be giving up a tiny bit more than you would using a broadhead with a smaller tip and thin ferrule. We’re not sure which head that would be that would also be as strong. We recommend that you not worry about the ferrule size because you are probably talking about almost negligible differences.

The first two weeks of October brought what my brother calls the “October Lull” The deer just seemed to stop moving, we had had a lot of deer on camera but none were walking around during the day. Well, that all changed this weekend.

The camera had been showing a small but respectable 10-pointer (actually probably a nine since one point was quite small) had been coming by every few days. In fact a week before, it was a Ten-Pointer..see above. But a few days later, it had broke the front tip of its left rack. See below:

The Day of the Hunt
On Saturday, we were pretty confident that a recent cold-snap would help get the deer moving and that proved to be correct…it was an incredibly short hunting trip. I hadn’t been in stand for more than a a half hour when a couple of yearlings showed up. Shortly after that, a spike joined the party. I enjoyed watching them for about 15 minutes, the trail camera even got a photo of the three of them..see below:

The cool thing about this photo is, it was taken just as the small spike picked up the scent of a buck approacing, and he is staring into the woods trying to see it. I noticed the spikes behavior and was staring into the thicket as well. It took about another 15 minutes for the buck to show up. It took it’s time to get into an opening, but when it did, it was only about 15 yards from me and was perfectly broadsie…I couldn’t and wouldn’t turn down that opportunity. I hit the deer right where I was aiming and it ran off out of eyesight. I waited about an hour and then met my hunting buddy and we went to go track the deer,…turns it out it only ran about 70 yards.

This buck is by no means a monster, but for me it is a really nice trophy and will fill the freezer. I still have my New York Tag and will be able to shoot another buck in New Jersey after the 31st, so I’m hoping this isn’t the biggest of the season, but for now SCORE FOR TEAM 5. I believe this will count as a nine point.

Answer:
There are two reasons your sight pins have to be lined up well left of the arrow. First, when you draw the bow you apply enormous torque to the riser through force applied to the cable guard rod by the harnesses. At full draw the riser actually twists slightly. This effect brings the sight pins to the right – more in line with the arrow.

The second reason your pins are located to the left of your arrow is even more significant. If you place your hand on the bow in such a way that you cause the bow to turn to the right when you draw it, the pins will be moved in that direction – again to a place that puts them in line with the shaft. Ideally, your hand and wrist will produce absolutely no torque because this assures the most consistent arrow flight and accuracy.

Answer:
We believe that human breath is one of the strongest sources of human odor. Other strong sources include your hair and armpits. To best deal with mouth odor it pays to brush your teeth often with baking soda toothpaste. Also, Scent-Lok offers Breath Shields that can be worn over your mouth while hunting to help remove breath odor. Some experts also say that regular teeth cleanings will help to reduce breath odor. You can also try Robinson’s Breath shield gum or try a scent-eliminating mask like the Scentlok face mask.

Someone may have led you to believe that the key to shooting a decent buck in the early season is just a matter of trekking across as much prime real-estate as possible. Sure, on occasion a hunter gets lucky and tags a good deer the first week of the season, but for the majority of others this tactical approach results in something closer to a crap shoot. To consistently pattern an old timber warrior before the season opener, there’s much more planning, scouting and research required beforehand. Let’s take a look at a few early season tactics that have worked not only for myself, but many others as well in the past.

Gain Access Early

In the early years, gaining access to bowhunting real estate was certainly much easier than it is now. It wasn’t uncommon to have several pieces of ground sowed up within a couple of days going from door to door. Unfortunately, as people with big money enter the picture, the days of finding a place to hunt through a friend-of-a friend are slowly approaching an end.

You can bet if you’ve been watching a buck that’s highly visible, some other hunter is working on it too! Personally, I never stop working on keeping the areas I have and looking for new ground. This might entail stopping by on occasion to shoot the bull with the landowner, or possibly offering a portion of the game you’ve taken. Believe me when I say, it’s a small price to pay.

Zero In On Key Food Sources

High in protein, the soy bean is one of the whitetail’s favorite early season foods.

Of all the cash crops, soybeans have been at the top of my list for years. I’ve known a whitetail enthusiast from Illinois for a few years now that normally needs to re- plant a particular food plot twice each year. Hunters would be well advised to take advantage of beans from the get go.

It’s best to look for deer goodies in small concentrations, which makes it much easier to narrow down a buck’s feeding pattern. Deer are opportunists and if you’re banking on a food with a short shelf life and haven’t taken the buck before it’s exhausted, chances are the opportunity will never be presented!

A good example of concentrated foods might be small stands of acorn bearing hardwoods. It’s been my experience that white and red oaks are especially great choices, however, this doesn’t mean that deer won’t feed on pin oak, burr oak, swamp oak, shingle oak or shin oak. It’s simply implies that red and white oak nuts are most commonly found in the areas where I hunt in the Mid-west.

A few years ago while scouting in Illinois, I discovered a small grove of persimmons consisting of about a dozen trees, of which only half were bearing fruit. Setting up in the grove the first evening of my hunt in November, I arrowed a nice buck just two hours later. Although I’ve never found persimmons anywhere in my home state of Iowa, you can bet when traveling to the southern states where they are more common this fall, I’ll be looking for the sweet treat.

Element of Surprise

Aerial photos and topographical maps can be used year a round for mapping out all the pertinent information such as, bedding, trails, rublines and scrapes in your hunting area.

“One sighting of a buck may not warrant moving in with a stand, but two or more should!”

There are a couple of ways to maintain the element of surprise with little or no impact on the deer herd. As mentioned, glassing from nearby roadways has been the normal practice for many, while others choose to setup with spotting scopes much like the tactic used in western hunts for elk and mule deer. Although I often use these same approaches to scouting, observation stands setup around the outside perimeter of the hunting area has been a personal favorite.

As I sit back and look at my nearly 30 years of bowhunting experience, a good percentage of the big deer I’ve taken were a direct result of spotting the buck from another stand first and then moving in for the kill. This tactic is often referred to as “working from the outside in.” Nevertheless, the whole object of this tactic is to first observe all deer movement to determine where their entrance/exit routes and bedding areas are. In doing so, you’ll be able to determine the best ambush point with the least amount of risk involved and the best odds of tagging the buck. One sighting of a buck may not warrant moving in with a stand, but two or more should!

Hunting Pressure

Although the majority of hunters consider the rut the most productive time to sit on stand, it doesn’t necessarily mean their odds of bagging a buck are the greatest. Because hunting pressure is normally at an all time high, coupled with unpredictable travel patterns, bucks can be here today and gone tomorrow. Obviously, if there are fewer hunters in the woods during the pre-rut, it’s self-explanatory why your odds of bagging a buck on a routine travel route will never be greater. Let me explain why.

First, bucks are most patternable during a time frame that I like to call the early “pre-rut ramp-up,” which runs up to about a week prior to peak rut activity. If left undisturbed, most are quite comfortable in their core area during the first month or so of the season, therefore actively making scrapes and rubs that help us identify their whereabouts. Another advantage of hunting this ramp up period involves bachelor bucks. Because some bucks are still traveling together, chances are the rub lines and scrapes you find were made by a group of deer and not a loner. This alone has proven time and time again the deadliness of hunting rub lines and bed to feed travel routes during the early season. Unfortunately, all too often after the first phase of hunter’s trek across the sacred ground, the bucks are scattered to parts unknown.

Secondly, with each passing day moving closer to the madness of the rut, priorities change from feeding to locating a harem of does. Because of this transition, feeding and travel patterns become the least predictable of any other time of the season. There’s simply no rhyme or reason to there travel patterns and in some cases bucks leave their core area haunts for long periods of time searching for hot does.

Many bucks are pushed into nocturnal seclusion, feeding only during the twilight hours. This probably explains why some hunters complain that they were seeing a lot of deer during the early season and as the rut approaches, they seem to evaporate. If you’re going to be an early season hunter, then you need to focus your efforts on early season strategies that put you in the transition routes early on!

Play The Wind Game
Some hunters never consider the wind when setting up stands and consequently void the element of surprise their first time out. When hunting from stands without considering the wind, you’ll always run the risk of pushing deer out of the area. I’ve come to understand over the many years that knowing how to play the wind game should be an essential part of any hunter’s strategy. During the warmest part of the season winds can be so unpredictable, even the most experienced hunters can mess up a good ambush site. Certainly most have experienced hunting fickle winds such as thermal eddy currents and what I call, “back drafts” created by some barrier or break line in the terrain.

For example, a few years ago my son and I were hunting the smaller ridges of a narrow draw that paralleled two higher ridges on both sides. The problem wasn’t identified until the first day we sat in our stands and It cost one us an opportunity at tagging a big 10 point spotted the week before.

As the southwest winds blew across the north/south ridge, I noticed on occasion a warm thermal back draft coming back up the ridge. At the time I didn’t think much about it until the buck unexpectedly came down the ridge rather than up as we expected. Obviously, the old warrior had used the back draft to his advantage before, because just short of shooting range another blast hit me in the face and the big buck vaporized. In this case, the back draft was created by the wind rolling off the encompassing higher ridge.

Mapping Your Area
Here’s a tip for those of you who want keep track of your stand sites and the type of winds you might expect or experience in various terrain features. Aerial photographs and topographical maps can help you keep track of the four polar coordinates and what the winds might do before leaving your front door. Mark your potential stand site locations on the map during post-scouting and pre-scouting, but pay close attention to the rise and fall in elevations. In doing so, you can sometimes predict what the wind will do under certain conditions. The key to success here will be hunting the stands only when the wind conditions are perfect.

Furthermore, position your stands in such a way that you’re able to cover nearly any wind condition that might crop up. This may entail having as many as 5 or 6 strategically placed on the same piece of ground, but your odds of getting busted are reduced considerably.

Conclusions

Whether you’re hunting the early season or not, maintaining the element of surprise should be the most important detail of your plan of attack. Since deer feeding patterns are by far the easiest to undermine, concentrate your long distance scouting and observation stands near primary food sources. Always remember, don’t get hung-up on a single food source that you may have read about that worked for someone else. Continue scouting throughout the season and keep your eyes open for new sign of a feeding frenzy. Chances are within a few days of observation, you’ll be able to locate that hot stand site that will lend way to tagging a buck. As the pre-rut ramps closer to the final days before the peak rut, change your strategy to hunting doe transition routes from bed to feed. I’m confident that if you follow these simple early season rules, you’ll be tagging a buck too! Good luck and happy hunting!

Gain The First Light Advantage!!
Interestingly, most hunters find it increasingly difficult slipping into stands as the season wears on. By early November deer have become educated and probably know your every move. Although getting to a stand is normally easier in the evening, the morning hunts can be a nightmare.
The main reason why success rates are lower during the first two hours of the morning than the last two hours of the evening is because deer are still feeding when we try to approach our stands. A good tip here is to wait until first gray light when deer move off the fields. In many cases you’ll be able to spot deer feeding and make a plan to slip around them unnoticed. You may have to take the long way around or possibly choose another approach route, but your chances are still better than blundering across open fields or noisy timber in the dark.

If you’re previous observation revealed a buck feeding in the same area in the evenings as morning, it might be best to abandon morning hunts and stick to the evenings. Slipping into stands in the evening has proven much easier, since deer normally haven’t reached the feeding area yet.

Answer:
It is best to be in your stand a good hour and a half before you expect any movement to occur. This will allow you to get settled in and not risk bumping into any deer. This means you need to be out there at least three hours before sunset. Specialized clothing will allow you to stay warm for this length of time. First, pay particular attention to your hands and feet. One of the neatest products for your hands is the Hand Blanket from Ice Breaker. It is a large insulated muff that attaches around your waist and keeps your hands very warm. A good pair of warm pacs are a must.

I’ve got trophy deer within two hours in every direction and in four different states. This year I will be hunting New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania.

NEW JERSEY
The New Jersey land is a beautiful piece of property that my hunting buddy got us permission to hunt. We have permission to hunt about 80 acres of land…woods and fields. We put the camera at a natural bottle neck (a small strip of land that leads from the woods to a river/food supplies)

The Camera location/Treestand Location is right between a river, two fields and a prime bedding/staging location. As you can see from the photos, there are plenty of deer walking by.

This photo was taken in early September...I was surprised the buck was still in velvet.

Every year we have a pack of does and fawns running around the woods. Usually, these are the only deer you see. Of course on the opening day this year, we needed to fill doe tags first and we didn't see one of these girls.

We've got a bunch of pictures of these two bucks hanging out together. Both my hunting partner and I saw this Piebald last year and werent sure if we'd shoot it. It put on some good antler growth and now we are both hoping to get a shot at it.

What do you think...would you take this buck?

The camera I used was the Reconyyx RC60 - Reconyx RapidFire Convert Color IR High Output Camera
http://www.eders.com/products/reconyx-rapidfire-convert-color-ir-high-output-camera-camo.html
or
http://www.bowhuntingoutlet.com/rc60-rapidfire-covert-colorir.html

It was very easy to set up and I got hundreds of great photos from the pre-season.

The coolest deer that showed itself to the camera was a piebald buck. I hunted a week ago with no luck but now I know what I’m looking for. I’ll be hunting Jersey again next week.

New York
Hunting Long Island, New York is really interesting. I primarily hunt a 4-acre piece of woods that a friend owns. To most people hunting four acres sounds crazy, but believe it or not this piece of property has a ton of deer on it (it is surrounded by corn and a vineyard and there are not a lot of woods around the northfork or long island so this little spot is a tru honey hole. I’ll be putting a camera out on this land on sunday

Pennsylvania
My brother Rob recently moved to Pa, near the Pocanos and has a lot of deer running around his woods. I will be getting out there at the end of october beginning of November. He’s been scouting a lot and i’ll post some pics of Pa soon as well.