Bow stand log

[bottom-bouncer]

Here we go thursday nite I went out after dark to make some mock scapes got out to the area spotlighted the field and there was three shooter bucks in the field along with 6 does and another seven deer across the road so I just drove away. friday my son brought one of his friends down for the weekend to hunt he is a young memeber FM. Got in the stand around 430 seen a deer in the thick stuff couldnt tell what it was. That was the only deer seen friday nite. saturday morning we didnt see a single deer when we left we drove out the back way and seen 20 does and fawns in the field across the river from our land. saturday nite we tried a different area I had three does and two fawns come by but just a bit out of range AJ passed on a doe that he said was farther out than he was comfortable with cudos to him for passing he later shot at and missed another doe. This morning I had one pass by before it was light enough to see AJ seen a doe at 75 yds and my son passed on a small 6. I went out alone tonite and had a doe come by at 100mph being chased by a 120-130 8pt. watched them for abit and then a little 4 point came out into the picked bean field I have never seen anything like it the doe and eight made back into the field and the little 4 started posturing at the eight I almost laughed out loud. I also started seeing more buck sign this weekend hopeing for cooler temps this week.

[Jack Stasney]

After shooting a doe last week in the morning I decided to try evenings. Felt good about it as Thursday I saw a nice eight and a four in my yard in front of my house just after dark. Was able to get out Friday night and tonight. Well the buck sightings ended in my yard. These still and warm evenings are keeping those deer sitting tight till dark. Hopefully a little cooler this week to get those deer moving. Did see a Great Horned Owl, yeah I've seen them before but this was different. The thing flew up next to me (about 20ft) and stared right at me for a couple of minutes. Had his head down and was peering at me, it was a little spooky. Those things have some huge talons. Anyways he flew a way and all was good.

[mrklean]

i finally got out for the first time this year. Hit up one of our small groves maybe 2 acres that my dad was seeing 4 doe in. snuck right up on them about 15 yards away watched them for about half an hour before the wind changed and they smelled me. Good first time out this year

[Finlander]

Hunted saturday. Tried to get to my stand from the farmhouse windbreak to the alfalfa field then take the field edge to by stand in the corner of the field, when I noticed a doe and two fawns about 100 yards out in the field. It was 4:30 and I waited for 20 minutes before a truck and trailer scares them into the pines, so I get going thru the field edge to my stand, get set up and about 15 minutes later I hear noise behind me and see a deer come out of the willows and onto the woods road so I turn to grab my bow and look to where the deer is and it's gone! Just dissapeared! Oh well!

10 minutes later I see another deer 40 yards away coming from the east of me so I stand up and safety harness carrabeaner clanges on my treestand and it looks up at me like what's that?

So it gave up and started eating twigs and stuff then it meandered down the valley and gone.

Little later, I hear all this comotion as three deer go running away with there tails up and start snorting as they were directly down wind of me. Oh well!

So far that's eight different deer sighted for the evening.

Then with about five minutes of legal shooting time left, out in the alfalfa field I see a doe standing there, then I see six more coming from the pines and they are all in full sight of me. I took another 15 minutes before I could get out of there without blowing them out of there. Had to go out the back way which worked out good as they were all there when I drove by the field.

Fun evening for sure!

14 deer sighted for the evening!

[matchset]

went out last night...brought my decoy and just tickled the antlers!

didn't see any deer; but i squeaked in coyote running the ridge 200yds out! probably would have gotten a shot; but he held up at 50 yards when he spotted the buck decoy.

[MOSSY]

went out last night,had a nice doe come in at 10 yards,she ran about twenty yards and tipped over.I sure love those tracking jobs

Mossy

[FishLocker]

Trigger, That is one fine buck. If I were you, I would check the possibility of working out of your "home office" all week and bring you laptop into your tree stand...I think the IRS would consider that a home office///maybe?

[Archerysniper]

Tonight I went back out to the food plot where I shot the one a few weeks back. Really quiet out till around 6:30 when I could hear a deer coming through the leaves out steps a little spike he stuck around for 10 minutes munching cloves then headed south across the drainage ditch and into the corn.

[MUSKY18]

Went out again tonight.......all was quiet, with the exception of tree rats and one rooster Pheasant that wanted someone to find him with all the darn noise he was making. On the way home, there were a lot of combines out in the fields hammering away on teh corn fields. On a bright note, I did find this:

[rcook72]

Saturday in Western MN. Small 8 came out and hung under my stand util he decided to go push off a forker that was rubbing a small sapling and chewing on a licking limb. Sunday in WI nadda. Monday back to WI check the cam and a 10 pt came in 15 minutes after I left. Tonight my decoy showed up and decided to give it a whirl. A button buck showed up at 6 and walked around the decoy checking it out then fed for another 10 min in the food plot. 3 does with fawns randomly showed up until it was dark. While waiting to figure out how to get out of my tree because some does were still within 10 yds of my tree I heard a buck grunting back down in the woods. Fun night. Unfortunetly I am going to be very busy for the rut working 6 days a week. Hopefully my one day off next week shows a little more pre rut activity.

[archerystud]

Went out last night (first time this year) and didn't see anything. I did have a fresh small rub right under my tree however.

[james_walleye]

I can say this, the rut is not going down here at all. When it hits, a buck will come and work his way around the field edges and leave scrapes every 50 feet. Nothing like that yet. Again had multiple does in the field last night with no buck sighting. Here's to another week of waiting. It certainly feels like an October lull.

Hey Trigger the land I hunt by you, i've had scrapes under every overhanging branch of the field edge since October 3rd as well as some rubs in which you can see antler tips tickling the tree about 11 inches above the top of the rub. Hopefully the camera i placed sunday gets a snapshot of him.

[96trigger]

Went out tonight, saw a few more scrapes and rubs. The buck activity is picking up, but I am still leaning towards it happening mostly at night. Tonight was tough, never saw a deer and my tree was whipping in circles, don't know if I could have held the bow still enough to aim and fire anyway. Those 40 mph gusts were wicked. Had a friend that was bowhunting also, he has seen deer every night out, he was even hunting a corn field that was just picked and that should have brought them in by the herd, he saw nothing. That says something right there. It should only get better from here on out, I look at the end of next week and the following as being a prime time to be out. I will be putting the bow away for awhile and will be taking a youth out hunting this weekend. Hopefully, I can give a positive report. I think tomorrow will be awesome and I fully expect to see lots of deer movement as the temp is supposed to drop 10 degrees and the winds are supposed to subside, it's really nice outside right now. I'll report back even though, I won't be hunting. I will probably try and do a little rattling tomorrow morning to see if I can't get the youngin to take a crack at a nice buck.

James, I have to give the farm were we hunt a little break, there are two youth hunting out of my stands this weekend. I'm hoping that they both do well, but that they don't contaminate the area too bad. I'll probably give it a good break and won't hunt it much next week, then hit it hard before fire arm season.

[gobigred]

Hey all,

Have been out a few times around mankato,have only seen fork bucks and fawns. Corn is mostly out so that should help. Don't get to hunt until next saturday but that should be about perfect. No sign of any scrapes, some small rubs. I'm getting a little antsy, but the prime time is coming soon!

[1eyeReD]

Went out yesterday for a morning hunt on a public piece. Got there early. Walked in around 5:30am and greeted a doe hanging out right on the trail under my tree and saw her eyes glowing across from my headlamp. She paid no mind and just continued moving off into the darkness. Got my climber up and by now it was about 6:15am. The rest of the sit until shooting time has got to be one of the most action packed sits I've ever had. It sounded like a whole heard of deer came through under me. Leaves rustling everywhere! Along the trail, under me, behind me, in front of me. Back and forth, branches and stumps cracking, oh man. I thought I was really in for a good hunt!

As shooting time approached, it had quieted down, but I had one deer remaining on the trail offering a 10 yard shot. Kept puttin her head down and then lifting up, but down there it was still too dark to distinguish if it was a doe or a small spike. I waited. 10 minutes later, I had just about enough light in the woods to see color in my shooting pins. I have a bonus tag so I was sure the smoker was going to be used later on that day. She lifts her head up and as the wind shifts her way, she turns to look up at me.. [PoorWordUsage].. It's a he! Little small spike buck. He pees on the ground where his head was down. Turns out he was making a scrape.. So I let him pass... He stares at my frozen silhouette for another few minutes and spooks, running out of there like he saw a ghost. 5 Minutes later, behind the brush I can see a huge brown body slowly moving in the same direction of the small buck. I looked closer and saw what seemed to be a massive deer rump. This had to be either a really huge doe or that might just be "the one" but it's moving the other way. Rest of the morning was quiet (dang wind!) I'm definitely going back there next week. Took 3 days off to hunt and I now finally found a spot I have confidence in. Life is good.

[Lunker]

Hunted last night in WI. Deer were moving with the incoming weather. Saw 2 bucks(1 spike, 1 6 or 8, didn't get a good look), 2 does from the stand and deer all over the road on the way home.

Shot one of the does shortly before sundown. Pulled out and came back at 10pm. Tracked for two hours, blood was spotty and eventually I called it and came back this morning. She had gone a total of about 200 yards after being lung shot, and did not drop much blood. Coyotes found her first and ate most of her back legs, backstraps, and some guts. Frustrating. Think I may have lost some confidence in Muzzy broadheads...

[sticknstring]

That's too bad. Were you able to tell where you hit her on the carcass? Unless you were confident of a solid lung hit, you did the right thing backing out. Too bad the 'yotes beat you to her. I'm not sure if I'd blame the broadhead though, Muzzy's are about as dependable as they come. Shake it off and wrap a tag on the next one.

[Archerysniper]

Well the pre rut is on listened to a knock down drag out battle for a half hour didn't see any deer but could hear them moveing, fighting and grunting, had a buddy closer to the action and he could hear the bucks weezing and panting.

[Lunker]

Almost forgot to mention. The spike, which I saw two times last night(seen a few times as a loner earlier in the season) sticking right on a doe both times I saw him.

[96trigger]

Sat all day Yesterday (Thursday) with a youth. we ended up seeing only 2 deer. Walking out, kicked up plenty of deer as we could hear them blow at us from a meadow on the other side of the bluff. The full moon right now is so bright, they are really active at night. I was surprised with the wind being so strong on Wednesday that they weren't feeding a little later and that they were already in thier ding area that early. We were calling pretty aggressively with the grunt tube ratte bag. About 9:00 we heard one big crack. The kid looks at me and says "fight", right after he says it, we hear a couple of snort wheezes going up the other side of the bluff. We never saw either buck, but tend to believe it was a bigger buck chasing away a smaller one, as there was no sparring, just one BIG hit. Walking out we had a doe at 40 yards start feeding in front of us. Told him it was his choice if he wanted it, but he is waiting for a nice buck, she fed in front of us for 40 minutes as we just stood there and watched. We finally had to wave and whistle to get her to move and she trotted off. Moved ot a different farm for the afternoon and evening. Had about a half mile wheeler ride to the stand. Never saw one deer on stand. On the way out to the wheeler we got to the field and saw a buck emerge from the wheeler trail. On the way back, 3 new fresh scrapes on the wheeler trail. Had we just been off the trail, probably would have had a nice shot during shooting hours as he left the woods just at dusk. Too dark to see how big his rack was, but he was a big bodied deer. I am in for an all day sit today, babysitting that is. Probably won't get out again until maybe Saturday night. The wheels of the rut are turning, but they are slow. More prerut, scrape, rub activity, but not alot of chasing yet.

[sticknstring]

Good to hear guys - keep the updates coming. I sat last night with the video camera. Beautiful evening. Combine picking the rest of the corn on one side, still standing on the other. Figured some deer would be pushed into the timber but I didn't see anything... nothing on the cam either.

[archerystud]

I sat this morning but didn't see anything. Sounds like a wet weekend so I may not be sitting but doing a bunch of scouting. That's fine for me as I have the week off before gun season to bow hunt so hopefully I can find a new honey hole.

[2044Mustang]

I too was out this morning, didn't see a thing. Kind of frustrating but with the moon as bright as it was last night I had a feeling going in that it would be a slow morning. Hopefully tonight!!! Good luck everyone!

[matchset]

65 degrees right now! kinda discouraging.

[delmuts]

Keep the reports coming! All i've been able to do is read about hunting.( fell last week while fishing, and buggered up my shoulder. Managed to pull my bow back once yesturday!) Hopefully monday i can get back at it!

[2044Mustang]

Was out tonight, very warm, had a fork come in at dark. let him walk, hopefully will see something over the weekend. good luck all.

[psepuncher]

went out at 6am

Had to do an about face with the lightning.

[tunrevir]

Went out and got on stand by 615 a.m. Saw a doe and a fork on the drive to my hunting spot and a car that had just hit a deer. Got on stand, rattled early, nothing, rattled again about 8 had an 8 point at about 70 yards checking out the area, 2 does later in the morning in roughly the same area. Hopefully the cold weather coming in will kickstart things a bit!

Tunrevir~

[engfish]

Hunted last evening and didn't see anything until I got down from my stand. The beanfield across the road was loaded with deer--more than I've seen at any time this fall. So I sat and watched them until I could quietly sneak across the road and back to my car. Last weekend they moved earlier when it was overcast, so I'm hoping to try again this evening and check out the field from the other end. With the rain this morning and the full moon last night, it was easy to make the decision not to go out this morning.

[Twins 57 Fan]

Went out this morning at 6:30. At 7:50 I saw two does on the neighboring field, they hung out and fed for ten minutes and headed back in to the woods. At 8:30 a small four pointer came underneath me. I passed and as he walked away I tried different calls on him. He responded to a bleat, but ignored grunts and rattling. The deer are finally moving by me. The rut is close!