Starting over

[bat man]

Access is my #1 consideration. Bad access can ruin a great piece in 2 or 3 hunts.
Great neighborhood is my #1 consideration. Hard to 'build' an island of good hunting.
These good neighborhoods are more elusive than the obvious accessibility of a property, and many of the good neighborhoods are pretty secretive. No picture sharing, no buck photos sent to newspaper etc.
I wonder how many good little pockets are out there vs some of the better known 'areas'.

 

[bat man]

One thing I'd be looking for in your search is an area with only a few, large acreage owners in proximity. I looked at a lot of parcels where there were many adjoining landowners (one 40 touched sides with 5 other owners) and ruled them out almost immediately.

Great point.

 

[gunther89]

I agree with Stu and that I would look for a property that is located by a couple large acreage owners. 1 section of our land is bordered by a farmer who owns over 500 acres and he rarely hunts it. Once gun season comes and pressure comes in from surrounding land, our best chance of seeing a mature buck is on that side of the farm where the deer come off his long ridge.

Another thing is do you plan to have deer winter on your property? 1 section of our farm, the deer winter on but the other half they move out and leave for different ground. It's nice when deer winter on your ground so you can follow deer all year and know if a deer survived the hunting season.

 

[sandbur]

^ As discussed above.....part of the price of land here in MN is its proximity to other outdoor recreation. (cabins and fishing and resort areas) The rec property nearer to the good fishing lakes is going for about a 50% premium IMO.

To me its worth the premium to be able hang out at the lake and then do my plotting within a 20 minute drive. Change that drive to an hour and a half......and it would be a game changer for me. Hence the price differences.

Also, some of that land in the low price counties won't support tree growth without lots of soil amendments. You can see the variations in land as you head west of a line between Baxter and Pine River. Then after a stretch....the land has better trees again........but now you are out of "the loop"......IMO.

Then......go further north toward Sandbur's place and the Wolves can become an issue. There are a few counties that hold good deer, are not overly effected by wolves, and still reasonably priced. Once the Potlatch timber sales end, in a few more years....I believe the price of land will go somewhat higher.

I notice a difference in water quality between areas with better soil and those that are more sand based. The lighter soil has had better water quality due to less farming. The irrigation push might quickly change that.

Brooks- how many hunters do you have hunting? What kind of hunter density is acceptable on your own land?

I feel about one hunter per forty is enough.

 

[bat man]

I notice a difference in water quality between areas with better soil and those that are more sand based. The lighter soil has had better water quality due to less farming. The irrigation push might quickly change that.

Brooks- how many hunters do you have hunting? What kind of hunter density is acceptable on your own land?

I feel about one hunter per forty is enough.

One guy per 40 is 16 per square mile. Thats 2 hunters for every adult in your zone.

I run as many guys as I have low impact access for. We often double up on stand if we dont have enough good spots.

I refuse to push deer off my pieces and onto the neighbors or nocturnal.

 

[bwoods11]

Wow we haven't had these prices in my area in 30 years. If u don't think quality hunting impacts recreational land prices, your living under a rock. You can't find land under $3k/acre by me. Quality land goes for $4k. Before the recession, prices were being listed at $6k/acre, which many bought at.

NW MN land is not cheap strictly because of poor deer hunting. I can assure you of that. We have shot a 125-140 inch buck about every other year up there on my 228 acres in Kittson County. The price is lower because of distance from the metro and other major cities, some of it is flat and wet and does not drain well. The first farm I bought up there was $300/acre and had nice CRP to easily make the payment.

There are some very big bucks shot up there and they are heavy in body weight. I personally saw a booner on the neighboring land and his rack was unreal, but his body weight had to be 300 lbs.

The neighbor that borders me to the north has close to 5000 acres and I am guessing 600 of it is a mix of perfect river bottom with oak trees/food plots, thick bedding areas the rest is good tillable. It's unreal---as good as it gets in MN. The only problem is it is tough to pull those bucks off his farm on to my farm. They usually send me trail cam pics.... they have well over a dozen 130-180 inch bucks on the farm every year and they pass 3 year olds and under.

Now that being said, it was better 5-10 years ago, before they issued all the bonus tags. It's a sleeper area. Find a river bottom , big wooded block or CRP farm with thick heavy cover up there and keep some food and you will see plenty of deer and some nice ones. We used to average seeing 12-20 deer per sit, now it is usually 6-10.

 

[bat man]

^^I have relatives east of Twin Valley with Wild Rice river bottom land. Going to spend a little time up there this fall. They killed a 174 up there 3 years ago. Be fun to run the family ground a little.

They have lots of deer sightings since they stopped killing does a few years ago. They plot as well.

 

[foggy]

I used to hunt up in that part of MN....and we saw deer - even in some of the bad years. I think I was hunting there in the 70's & 80's (nobody had hang-on stands yet....I can remember that). No doubt some good deer in NW MN. Always a few dandy buck were taken in the area.....but I was hunting public lands. Agasis and Beltrami County land.

 

[bwoods11]

^^I have relatives east of Twin Valley with Wild Rice river bottom land. Going to spend a little time up there this fall. They killed a 174 up there 3 years ago. Be fun to run the family ground a little.

They have lots of deer sightings since they stopped killing does a few years ago. They plot as well.

I've driven by that area...looks very much like big buck country. Soils are pretty good in that whole area.

 

[nwmn]

I used to hunt up in that part of MN....and we saw deer - even in some of the bad years. I think I was hunting there in the 70's & 80's (nobody had hang-on stands yet....I can remember that). No doubt some good deer in NW MN. Always a few dandy buck were taken in the area.....but I was hunting public lands. Agasis and Beltrami County land.

now you're lucky to see a deer in agassiz. grygla/fourtown/skime areas have been hit hard with the tb from a few years ago and the increase in wolves as well.

deer numbers are bouncing back this year. last year I never saw a deer on a scouting trip to grygla, this year we saw deer in every field.

our neighbors are a lot lIke us. alluding back to bat man's earlier post about #1 consideration being neighborhood; this can make or break the hunting or herd. if your neighbors consume about 800 acres and are passing does and shooting 140+ you'll do alright. you can get nice deer to grow when you get lots of land enrolled in a well tuned program. our neighbor shot a 165 last year that I had been getting on camera a few times, and the year before shot a 19 pointer, unsure of the total size. our land wasn't expensive either. I feel inch for inch and deer for deer, the best bang for your buck (no pun intended ) would be up here. there are pockets of good deer numbers and quality. don't need to spend 4k an acre to hunt nice deer. that just blows my mind.

 

[sandbur]

One guy per 40 is 16 per square mile. Thats 2 hunters for every adult in your zone.

I run as many guys as I have low impact access for. We often double up on stand if we dont have enough good spots.

I refuse to push deer off my pieces and onto the neighbors or nocturnal.

I would put it at almost 3 hunters per adult deer and that is only if you consider a 1.5 year old an adult.

We will double up in the stands also, and I just let my daughters shoot if they see something they like.

 

[sandbur]

A lot of these posts discuss neighbors. If you only have 80 acres and have 6 or 8 neighbors, there is a good chance land will change hands and your hunting can quickly deteriorate (or get better).

 

[MoLandOwner]

A lot of these posts discuss neighbors. If you only have 80 acres and have 6 or 8 neighbors, there is a good chance land will change hands and your hunting can quickly deteriorate (or get better).

If you have 8 neighbors, that also increases your chance of buying more ground by 8 times over only having one neighbor. As most people, not all, only hold ground for an average of 7 years.

 

[West Branch]

I think in the 4-5 sections around us there are maybe 3 owners with 20 acre parcels, 3 with 40, and a couple with 80. Most with smaller parcel have access to other land or fairly low pressure public land. I think we have 8 neighboring owners on 600 acres. Neighborhood is what makes are our area decent despite wolves and bad winters. Hopefully I am still positive next week when I finally check the trail cameras for the first time in a 1.5 months in a week.

 

[bat man]

Of the 300 some pieces I have looked at online I found very that had decent access, few small acreage neighbors, no public land on borders, no excessive rifle towers, swamp for security cover, and big enough to hold a few deer. I drove up yesterday and walked a 180 acre piece and put out 3 cameras with Big and J plus some small 'deer' bricks of salt with corn smell etc to draw the deer in for pictures. I appear to get decent inventory in less than a week this way.

As I walked a was looking for signs of deer browse, and realized I had no real gauge to decide if the deer numbers were decent or not. I know appx how many deer are on my current parcels, but I do not actively study browse in the woods.


The northern high ground was a mix of aspen regen and oaks, with some jack pine

willow/tag/cattail swamps for security center of property

and southern part had jack pine wmix with a pile of these openings

another opening


Soils are poor. Anybody have experience plotting on these soils. Deal breaker?


So I have 3 cameras soaking for a week and we will see what we get.

 

[sticknstring]

Any high ground running N to S through the swamp funnel? Good or bad depending if you want a central sanctuary or access between timber parcels. Any access other than west rd? Highways eat up a lot of deer, at least round here. Pry not nearly the traffic up there. Openings would be perfect for putting in plots though.

 

[bat man]

Is this the parcel that Art and I drove past a couple days ago?

It is.

Any high ground running N to S through the swamp funnel? Good or bad depending if you want a central sanctuary or access between timber parcels. Any access other than west rd? Highways eat up a lot of deer, at least round here. Pry not nearly the traffic up there. Openings would be perfect for putting in plots though.

It appears the deer can move north to south through 'higher ground' in the swamp but I would never be stepping foot in there or within 50 yards of any of the swamp edges.

 

[Riggsgwp->]

http://m.edinarealty.com/Mobile/Listing/AdditionalImages.aspx?listing=150158485
This is a place I would think would have some potential. Buy the additional 100 acres and create an access road all the way around the property. It's not a finished property but the room to improve would be there plus you'd have a cabin and outbuildings.

 

[wiscwhip]

I would agree with SNS. IMHO, that west road doesn't look like it will help your access at all. Am I missing something. By the looks of that opening in the jackpine, are you sure this property is in MN, stu can attest that it looks a lot like Juneau Co, WI. The Mehtomedi Loamy Sand isn't all that great and the Friendship Sand totally sucks! Can't speak to the others, but that muck will not likely be easy to plot in. It looks like between the muck and the 2 I mentioned, that is over 50% of the soil on that parcel.

 

[bat man]

I would agree with SNS. IMHO, that west road doesn't look like it will help your access at all. Am I missing something. By the looks of that opening in the jackpine, are you sure this property is in MN, stu can attest that it looks a lot like Juneau Co, WI. The Mehtomedi Loamy Sand isn't all that great and the Friendship Sand totally sucks! Can't speak to the others, but that muck will not likely be easy to plot in. It looks like between the muck and the 2 I mentioned, that is over 50% of the soil on that parcel.

Thanks Whip - Is all loamy sand jank soil for plotting?

North access is all wide open cattle pasture so the deer should not frequent it. South access is an actual road on the map I have but it turned out to have been turned into a gated 4 wheeler trail.