I have some land in the Upper Penninsula of Michigan that I have a couple foodplots planted on. Over the years I have always hunted where I could overlook the foodplot. I have killed deer in these foodplots but never any mature bucks. I have seen buck rubs on good sized trees that indicate more mature deer on the property but have never seen these deer in the foodplots. I am beginning to think that more mature bucks will not enter my foodplots during daylight hours. I plan on placing a few ladder stands further back in the woods next year just to see if I am able to spot any deer that loiter in the cover until dark before they exit the woods to feed. Anyone else have any thoughts on this.
Only see young deer in plots
- Thread starter Mike
- Start date
Tap
5 year old buck +
A couple thoughts...
How far from the plots do you believe the mature bucks are bedding, and how safe would bucks feel during the daylight along that route to your plots?
There is such a thing as nocturnal bucks. They are usually a product of heavy hunting pressure or negative encounters with humans. And it could be that your mature bucks are not nocturnal, but they are bedding so far away from the plots that they don't get there until well after dark. Can you create some heavy bedding cover closer to your plots in areas with a huntable wind pattern? If you can, treat those beds like a sanctuary...don't disturb them.
And is it possible that you have educated them by putting too much pressure on your plots? Each property is different, but I couldn't get away with hunting my plots for very long. They would figure me out faster than I could figure them out. I stay away from my plots as much as I can, especially around dawn, and at dusk/dark. Mid-day is usually a safer time to travel your fields. Too many hunters want to walk through their fields to access their stands because it's easy. I used to do it all the time and could never figure-out why deer usage got progressively less and less. If you can't access your stands without traveling through plots, then having someone with a quad, tractor or truck drop you off and pick you up is less alarming to deer than a hunter walking through at dusk and dawn. A vehicle they are used to, like a tractor would be the best choice. I believe deer learn and tend to trust which vehicles are the "normal" ones for the property. Act like a farmer on his tractor.
One of my best stands would be an easy 300 yard walk from the house, but I'd have to walk through the plots. Instead of disturbing things, I get in my truck, drive a mile and a half, park and walk back 3/4 of a mile through woods so I don't educate deer in the plots. And coming in from the back side, I tend to push deer into my property instead of away from my property.
How far from the plots do you believe the mature bucks are bedding, and how safe would bucks feel during the daylight along that route to your plots?
There is such a thing as nocturnal bucks. They are usually a product of heavy hunting pressure or negative encounters with humans. And it could be that your mature bucks are not nocturnal, but they are bedding so far away from the plots that they don't get there until well after dark. Can you create some heavy bedding cover closer to your plots in areas with a huntable wind pattern? If you can, treat those beds like a sanctuary...don't disturb them.
And is it possible that you have educated them by putting too much pressure on your plots? Each property is different, but I couldn't get away with hunting my plots for very long. They would figure me out faster than I could figure them out. I stay away from my plots as much as I can, especially around dawn, and at dusk/dark. Mid-day is usually a safer time to travel your fields. Too many hunters want to walk through their fields to access their stands because it's easy. I used to do it all the time and could never figure-out why deer usage got progressively less and less. If you can't access your stands without traveling through plots, then having someone with a quad, tractor or truck drop you off and pick you up is less alarming to deer than a hunter walking through at dusk and dawn. A vehicle they are used to, like a tractor would be the best choice. I believe deer learn and tend to trust which vehicles are the "normal" ones for the property. Act like a farmer on his tractor.
One of my best stands would be an easy 300 yard walk from the house, but I'd have to walk through the plots. Instead of disturbing things, I get in my truck, drive a mile and a half, park and walk back 3/4 of a mile through woods so I don't educate deer in the plots. And coming in from the back side, I tend to push deer into my property instead of away from my property.
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Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
I agree with Tap on thick cover nearer the plots. Same thing we've been doing at my camp. We're turning a wide-open woods into newer, younger growth by logging and then planting spruce, fir, hemlock in the cut area along with caging stumps to grow stump sprouts. We left the tops from the logging to create pathways for deer to travel. Thick, dark & shadowy cover makes bucks feel safer to move in shooting light. The bucks around my camp consistently approach our plots from the darkest, thickest pines, spruce and hemlock. Safer to " test the wind " from those shadowy places.
I have always wanted to get some cameras out on those plots but have never done so. The property is located a long way from my home in southeast Michigan and I only get up there a couple of times during the summer and then again to deer hunt. Its quite remote (Western Upper Penninsula, Ontonagon County) and surrounded by thousands of acres of both private and national forest. Just talking statistically there are likely some mature bucks in that area due to the vastness of the area and low hunting pressure. Like I said in the original post I have found buck rubs on good sized trees (not small saplings) that I feel are evidence of some older bucks existing out there. I think I am going to move the box blinds further back off the plots and also as I mentioned in the earlier posts place some ladder stands in the timber a few hundred yards away from the plots and see whats moving around back there. I have a sneaking suspicion that the more mature deer in this area are using my plots after dark.
Tap
5 year old buck +
Cameras are great, I love having some out there. But I'm amazed at how often a camera misses getting the photo. I've often watched bucks walk past a camera and I was sure that I would have some cool pics, only to find out, for some reason, the deer didn't have his picture taken, or only got the butt-end of the critter. Short movie clips are better than single pics, but none of my cameras imprint time or date on video clips and I don't like that.
So take camera results with a grain of salt. Just because you may not get pics of mature bucks doesn't mean they aren't within a few yards of being captured (and missed) on film.
I like the idea of cameras but being my property is so far from home I would not be able to look at them until I go up there to hunt. Because of this I have never placed any cameras on my hunting land so my observations are taken from my hours spent on stand hunting. To ALLDAYSIT I have had my plots in perennial white clovers and also in cereal grains Rye/Oats over the years and see no preference, the deer with the exception of last year hammer whatever vegetation is present (They have few other choices as the area is heavily forested). I cannot effectively bowhunt up there due to the age of the trees so this is primarily a rifle hunting destination. Like I said in the original post the problem is not seeing deer in the plots during daylight (does with fawns and and young bucks are seen regularly) I just do not ever see any older age class bucks.
chummer
5 year old buck +
I never get day time photos of any deer in my plots, let alone mature bucks. I started hunting way back and have taken three bucks the last two years. I shot a buck this year that was in my plot every night in the wee hours. I shot him probably 1/2 mile from the plot about 1 hour before dark. I got lucky that I picked where I thought he was bedding and intersected him. I thought he was bedding in the swamp but he came off the top of a hill above the swamp. Get a camera so you have an idea what time they are there. This guy was a regular 1-2 hours before first light so I figured he was that far away from bedding.
j-bird
Moderator
Only time I have ever seen an older buck in my plot was when he was after the does feeding there in the rut. The buck in my avatar was that way. He knew he shouldn't have been out there, but he was looking for a girlfriend and, well that's what got him killed. Lots of good info already in other posts. Trail cam will tell you what's going on and also use the snow after season closes to help figure out where the deer are coming from, even if it's off your property you can use other means to make an educated guess as to where that deer is coming from based on terrain and cover. Then you have to figure out how to best intercept him. Post season scouting tells you what the pressured deer are doing and you need to keep that info in your back pocket for next year. You will still see scrapes and rubs as well. Those deer have figured out a way to survive and survival means age. Hunting over plots is typically a game of volume over quality. You may see lots of deer, but they tend to be younger.
Tap
5 year old buck +
I guess posters of this thread should define what they call "young" or "mature". Around here, 3.5 year olds are in the oldest 10%.
Only 1 or 2 out of 20 bucks might be 4.5.
5.5 and older are 1 in 50 from what I can tell.
Some areas in the country don't consider a buck "mature" until it reaches 5 years old....I'd like to live in those places.
Edit: originally, I had 3.5 year olds mistakenly typed as in the oldest 90%... meant to say they are in the oldest 10% of our buck herd. In other words 90% of our bucks are 2.5 or younger.
Only 1 or 2 out of 20 bucks might be 4.5.
5.5 and older are 1 in 50 from what I can tell.
Some areas in the country don't consider a buck "mature" until it reaches 5 years old....I'd like to live in those places.
Edit: originally, I had 3.5 year olds mistakenly typed as in the oldest 90%... meant to say they are in the oldest 10% of our buck herd. In other words 90% of our bucks are 2.5 or younger.
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bigbendmarine
5 year old buck +
Ditto on Bueller and J-Bird's comments. Actually, during the initial week of gun season (which also coincides with our rutting activity heating up), each of the last 3 years I've had 3.5 year olds harvested following does into one of my plots.
I would prefer hunting travel routes and staging areas but my land is narrow and has my home sitting almost smack dab in the middle so picking off bucks slipping up and crossing property boundaries into the edge of my food plots is my best option until some of the land management work I'm now doing pays off down the road by providing better cover, bedding, and influenced travel routes.
J-Bird's comment on volume is absolutely right... I average seeing 8 to 10 deer per sit on my plots, but almost all are does, fawns, and 1 to 2 year old bucks. As mentioned above 3.5 year olds tend to slip-up during rut... 4.5+ (each year I have a few on camera) are crazy smart and almost exclusively feed from my plots between midnight and 3a.m. That said, even the 4.5+ bruisers tend to slip up a SINGLE time or two and get caught on camera with shooting light but I have yet to be sitting there when it's happened. We've got a real long season here in FL (gun from Nov through late Jan) and will say that the oldest bucks do sometimes feed in daylight near the very end of season after rutting is done, they've lost lots of mass from running and are hungry, and many of the weekend warrior deer hunters have called it a season, and things grow a bit more quiet.
I would prefer hunting travel routes and staging areas but my land is narrow and has my home sitting almost smack dab in the middle so picking off bucks slipping up and crossing property boundaries into the edge of my food plots is my best option until some of the land management work I'm now doing pays off down the road by providing better cover, bedding, and influenced travel routes.
J-Bird's comment on volume is absolutely right... I average seeing 8 to 10 deer per sit on my plots, but almost all are does, fawns, and 1 to 2 year old bucks. As mentioned above 3.5 year olds tend to slip-up during rut... 4.5+ (each year I have a few on camera) are crazy smart and almost exclusively feed from my plots between midnight and 3a.m. That said, even the 4.5+ bruisers tend to slip up a SINGLE time or two and get caught on camera with shooting light but I have yet to be sitting there when it's happened. We've got a real long season here in FL (gun from Nov through late Jan) and will say that the oldest bucks do sometimes feed in daylight near the very end of season after rutting is done, they've lost lots of mass from running and are hungry, and many of the weekend warrior deer hunters have called it a season, and things grow a bit more quiet.
You live in Michigan which is a heavily hunted state. You said you have hunted close by the plots. Those two things alone are enough for a mature buck to pick up on. I live in Ct and never have seen a mature buck in any of my plots during daylight hours. You may move your stand further back off the food plots to catch the mature buck before darkness and guess what? You get the samee results. The rubs you see, whether large or small , gets hunters excited , but the mature buck could just be traveling through and feeding in your plots. He could be bedded 700 yards from your plots and he could be bedded a mile from your plots. Don't think for a second that a mature buck won't travel a mile to feed and be bedded back down before daylight again. Try and find out if you have a mature buck living on your property versus traveling through. As stated above, try setting up cams on travel routes. You gotta respect how smart those mature bucks really are. I have so much respect for them and deer in general.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Agreed, Bob. ^^^^ A mile walk even in mountainous terrain is no sweat for a deer, whereas for a human it would be a marathon. Big bucks get big and old from being smart. Deer pattern US too. The big boys stay clear of us. Rut = best chance to see them during daylight.
Catscratch
5 year old buck +
Piggybacking on Tap and others, distance makes a difference. I've got a spot that is two miles from food and it is an outstanding morning hunt. They come back at the same time every day, but the route chages some everyday so it still isn't easy. It's difficult to hunt due to wind and access so I tend to only hunt it every 2 or 3 yrs. But it is a very predictable spot to see old deer. I don't like to hunt near food most of the time.
bwoods11
5 year old buck +
I live a long ways from one of my properties. Cameras are the backbone of knowing what is going on down there.
I'd suggest buy 3-4 cameras with long battery life, put a 8 or 16 card in there and keep the cameras up year round. You will learn so much.
If a mature buck never shows up on camera, you might have your answer. If you see several, then the pattern process begins!!
I'd suggest buy 3-4 cameras with long battery life, put a 8 or 16 card in there and keep the cameras up year round. You will learn so much.
If a mature buck never shows up on camera, you might have your answer. If you see several, then the pattern process begins!!
