Im New and whats the game plan for opener??

[Bassboy1645]

Hi everyone im from mankato,mn and im goign to school for college in ely. Cant wait for opener!!!! scouting last weekend i stumbled into a beaver pond wiht a crap load of heavy use trails through some nasty stuff. i found a stand of aspens big enough for a tree stand and im very confident in my set....whats everyone hunting since there isnt fields or acorns up here?? any tips i shoudl know about the deer up here compared to southern MN??? Thanks alot!!

[Steve Foss]

Whooo boy, is it different than farm country. I spent most of my years bowhunting CRP/sunflower field/shelterbelt corners in eastern N.D. before moving to Ely. What a change.

Look for big swamps surrounded by ridges that connect logging cuts containing young aspens, if you have time to scout yet. Logged over tracts that are a couple years old are full of pincushion size aspens, and those deer graze on aspen leaves tremendously up here. If you have such a cut near bog/swamp, and there's a ridge between two swamps that leads to the cut, you're in deer heaven, and the deer will travel the higher ground between the swamps to and from the aspens. This early, you'll be concentrating on feeding patterns, not the rut, regardless of where you hunt.

There are some pretty new cuts out the Echo Trail, and also some older ones, that all hold deer. You can see some of them from the road, even. I'm not going to be more specific than that, since I hunt some of them myself!

Otherwise, if you don't mind traveling to the Cook area (about an hour's drive), you can get the names of some farmers up there who are combing deer out of their hair (and their hay fields) and want numbers thinned way down. Try Tom Rusch at the DNR office in Tower and see if he knows of some. That number is (218) 753-2580. Up on those hay fields, the deer bed in the woods and hit the alfalfa to feed late in the afternoon, like you're more used to from farm country.

[monstermoose78]

some good hunting lays down near babbit as well for bow hunting. Watch out for crazy bull moose this time of year. I have seen them rip apart pine trees rubbing their antlers and bushs.

[SFBOY]

the best advice is to avoid big woods situations. there are deer there, just not in any large numbers. i have a friend up near two harbors that owns a 40. his land and the land around him have not seen much logging in the last 40 years and the deer just are not in his area as much as areas that have had some logging done. my key is to find areas that have been logged off in the last 3 to 5 years and sit in the funnels that have been created or on the edges of the cuts.

my father in law and the guys in the shack talk about hunting pressure if there is a guy within a half mile of them. i grew up hunting in wisconsin where hunting pressure is just a fact of life. up north in minnesota, i have seen deer walking around in field edges and through clear cuts on the monday through friday of opening week that behave as if no one has been in the woods all week long. find a good spot, be patient and wait. minnesotans are lucky to have their gun season coincide just about every year with the height of the rut. those bucks are chasing and if you hunt does, you should have a decent chance of finding bambi's papa cruising the area. good luck and always be prepared for unexpected cold or snow. three years ago we woke up north of hibbing to a nice windy day with temps at -18. that's alot of fun sitting for 4 or 5 hours looking into a -30 wind chill.

[Bassboy1645]

thanks guys......im confident in my set. i have hunted up here before but thats was a long time ago before i knew anything about deerhunting. i have taken a few since then and yes i am in a funnel between some swamps and ridges and yes the aspens are brand new from last yrs cut. plenty of fresh sign in there so im confident....thanks for the info and good luck everyone!!

[Steve Foss]

Yep, sounds like you're set.

If you're in a managed unit (like 115) and REALLY like deer meat, you can get an all-season license, which lets you kill three deer with bow, gun or muzzleloader or any combination of those weapons (which means you can take three deer with nothing but a bow if you want, or nothing but a gun or nothing but a muzzleloader, but no more than three on the license total) and you can also buy an over-the-counter bonus tag for a fourth deer. That's one antlered and three antlerless deer.

But you gotta REALLY LOVE venison! I don't have time to bowhunt this year but am getting the all-season license anyway, as well as the bonus tag. I'll try to fill them all during gun season. Think that's excessive? Heck, I'd rather take deer the DNR says can stand the harvest and eat all that healthy low-fat meat than gorge on beef from the store.

And get those does! That's how to thin the population.

[Bassboy1645]

I love venison!! we apply for state parks every year gun hunting and last year we hunted ol kipp state park in winona MN. six of us shot nine deer the first weekedn and 5 more the second!!!! this yr we applied for tettegouche park down by silver bay. hope we get drawn!!!!

[kingkidfisher4431]

Im staying at the school as well bass boy!!!! We could hook up and i could show you a few spots i know of to hunt... I dont deer hunt but bird hunt and fish everything, but on some of my bird trips ive stumbled across a couple spots where i found myself saying, "if i had a deer stand this is where id put it". Post back on here if your interested in that at all, and id be happy to show you some hunting spots and maybe some fishing ones too...

[Mark Gangl]

I'm up here as well. You guys first or 2nd yr? Never hunted deer heavy up here, i go to my dads in nashwauk or my aunts in cook usually.(never had a garage to do any cleaning before this yr) Plan on trying for ducks a little and i'll be doing the 3 deer all season and going out with the muzzle loader. Anyone trying for crappies around here lately?

[NAMAKANWALLEYE]

Hey,

Im not an avid duck hunter, but I remember seeing a lot of foul, on fall lake, Just inside the BWCAW on fall lake, East of the Fall lake campground landing. You can take a 25 h.p., I'd give it a try.

--Mark

[Bassboy1645]

kingfisher....ive shot a few birds before but im having trouble finding some now. its been awhile since i bird hunted but we always got ours after the snow. shoot me a mail im at [email protected]. i check em in the morings before class and nites im either hunting or collecting leaves for my stupid drendology project!!!!