eclipseman
5 year old buck +
All,
This was my father's and my 3rd season food plotting at our two properties (both between 120-150 acres in size in NY). My father's property (8 miles away) is a hunting paradise for the area. Tons of deer and some pretty nice bucks for the area while my house is poor compared to his but mediocre compared to neighboring properties. I am looking for some advice so please read the entire post before commenting. Since we started food plotting his property has just gotten better and better with regards to hunting. We see more deer and more bucks cruising through. Even with a bumper crop of acorns, we still had a decent year at his property in the food plots.
My concern is with regards to my property. The first year I moved into this property we did not plant food plots and the hunting was not all that great (4 years ago). The previous owner did not hunt the property but let anyone hunt there so im guessing the deer herd was hit pretty hard by locals. There was not a ton of deer sign when i tried some early scoutting even though locals in the area said the deer herd in the area is nice compared to others. The property contains two 4 acre fields that were just wild grasses and then the rest is hardwoods (120 acres). We hunted mostly in and around those fields but did some deeper woods hunting as well and did not see much at all during that season. I did a lot of scouting that winter and as I guessed there just was not a ton of deer sign. The second year we decided to plant food plots. I planted both the fields in clover and brassica. We saw a surge of deer compared to the previous year, especially early in the hunting season which was great for bow hunting but then the deer mostly disappeared closer to rifle season which is mid November. The second year for the food plot was even better. We saw more bucks than the previous year hanging around which was great. We harvested a buck and two doe. That brings us to this year. We planted the same way and had a steller crop of oats, brassica mixture and clover. Through out the summer I was getting some great pics of some decent bucks just like last year and doe as well. We hunted behind my house the first weekend of bow season (October) and saw some of the younger bucks and a bunch of doe but the older bucks were only coming at night (I checked my cameras in that field after my hunt that night). We only hunted that one time because we started hunting my father's property pretty hard chasing after a couple nice bucks. That is where things went weird. In the later part of the hunting season (late November) I said to my father we should hunt my house because no one has been hunting there so all the pressured deer from the neighboring properties must be hanging on my unpressured land especially with the food plots there. I was wrong. We didn't see any deer after multiple sits except for one spike buck. I figured, maybe we just were not sitting in the right places. After the season was over I went and checked my camera cards. I have 7 cams out in the same spots as the previous 3 years in good locations and that is when I realized something was wrong. A week after that first time we hunted there in early season, the deer basically disappeared. The few that did show up, did so later at night. This was quite the change compared to the previous 3 years including that first year we didn't plant food plots. I just checked the cameras again and some more deer have been showing up but not nearly as many prior to the hunting season. Almost like they got wiped out by neighboring hunters maybe? Or maybe they moved elsewhere? Pretty strange. I feel like the deer are not bedding anywhere near my property and are maybe traveling there for a final food destination. So now im second guessing whether we should even plant it at all. Maybe we just use the property as a backup property to hunt occasionally while relieving pressure from my father's awesome hunting property?
As an FYI, My property is pretty old hardwoods which haven't been logged in about 25-30 years. We had a logger and forester come visit this past summer and they both suggested doing a thinning logging in 3-5 years and then a more drastic logging 10 years or so after so I really don't want to go around cutting things or hing cutting things and possibly mess things up for our timber sale. They said to just not touch anything until they get in there 3-5 years from now. While I know you have to watch your back with loggers the Forester is well known in the area so I do trust in what he was saying. What are all your thoughts? Should I keep up with the food plot? I do
This was my father's and my 3rd season food plotting at our two properties (both between 120-150 acres in size in NY). My father's property (8 miles away) is a hunting paradise for the area. Tons of deer and some pretty nice bucks for the area while my house is poor compared to his but mediocre compared to neighboring properties. I am looking for some advice so please read the entire post before commenting. Since we started food plotting his property has just gotten better and better with regards to hunting. We see more deer and more bucks cruising through. Even with a bumper crop of acorns, we still had a decent year at his property in the food plots.
My concern is with regards to my property. The first year I moved into this property we did not plant food plots and the hunting was not all that great (4 years ago). The previous owner did not hunt the property but let anyone hunt there so im guessing the deer herd was hit pretty hard by locals. There was not a ton of deer sign when i tried some early scoutting even though locals in the area said the deer herd in the area is nice compared to others. The property contains two 4 acre fields that were just wild grasses and then the rest is hardwoods (120 acres). We hunted mostly in and around those fields but did some deeper woods hunting as well and did not see much at all during that season. I did a lot of scouting that winter and as I guessed there just was not a ton of deer sign. The second year we decided to plant food plots. I planted both the fields in clover and brassica. We saw a surge of deer compared to the previous year, especially early in the hunting season which was great for bow hunting but then the deer mostly disappeared closer to rifle season which is mid November. The second year for the food plot was even better. We saw more bucks than the previous year hanging around which was great. We harvested a buck and two doe. That brings us to this year. We planted the same way and had a steller crop of oats, brassica mixture and clover. Through out the summer I was getting some great pics of some decent bucks just like last year and doe as well. We hunted behind my house the first weekend of bow season (October) and saw some of the younger bucks and a bunch of doe but the older bucks were only coming at night (I checked my cameras in that field after my hunt that night). We only hunted that one time because we started hunting my father's property pretty hard chasing after a couple nice bucks. That is where things went weird. In the later part of the hunting season (late November) I said to my father we should hunt my house because no one has been hunting there so all the pressured deer from the neighboring properties must be hanging on my unpressured land especially with the food plots there. I was wrong. We didn't see any deer after multiple sits except for one spike buck. I figured, maybe we just were not sitting in the right places. After the season was over I went and checked my camera cards. I have 7 cams out in the same spots as the previous 3 years in good locations and that is when I realized something was wrong. A week after that first time we hunted there in early season, the deer basically disappeared. The few that did show up, did so later at night. This was quite the change compared to the previous 3 years including that first year we didn't plant food plots. I just checked the cameras again and some more deer have been showing up but not nearly as many prior to the hunting season. Almost like they got wiped out by neighboring hunters maybe? Or maybe they moved elsewhere? Pretty strange. I feel like the deer are not bedding anywhere near my property and are maybe traveling there for a final food destination. So now im second guessing whether we should even plant it at all. Maybe we just use the property as a backup property to hunt occasionally while relieving pressure from my father's awesome hunting property?
As an FYI, My property is pretty old hardwoods which haven't been logged in about 25-30 years. We had a logger and forester come visit this past summer and they both suggested doing a thinning logging in 3-5 years and then a more drastic logging 10 years or so after so I really don't want to go around cutting things or hing cutting things and possibly mess things up for our timber sale. They said to just not touch anything until they get in there 3-5 years from now. While I know you have to watch your back with loggers the Forester is well known in the area so I do trust in what he was saying. What are all your thoughts? Should I keep up with the food plot? I do