Tricks to bow-shooting deer

Know how, when & where bucks travel and figure out how to outsmart them.

How about you? Are you like most bow hunters who are always looking for a shortcut. They continually wonder: what can I do to make each trip more successful?

First of all, don't expect every trip to be successful in terms of killing a deer. It won't be, and besides, if such a thing was possible, deer hunting would soon lose some of its appeal and become rather boring and tedious.

I've come today with a list of things hunters can do to increase their success rate, but I'll probably forget a few and that will make for another blog on another day.

Several tips to increasing bow hunting success.

• Practice shooting every day if possible. Learn your bow, what it will do, and practice often with it. Everything else in these tips will fall apart unless you can hit what you are shooting at.
• Hunting isn't just from October through November. It should be a year 'round activity. Of course, you can only shoot in season, but scouting is often overlooked by lazy hunters. Spend time in the field every week, and especially from mid-August through the end of September. In early spring, as the snow melts, look for those seldom-used trails that bucks often use to avoid hunters.
• Pick ground blind areas and tree stand sites with the utmost care. Know why deer move to those spots, where they come from and where they are going. Learn their bedding and feeding areas, and how to get in and out without spooking the animals.
• Don't go above 15 feet in a tree stand. The downward angles become more acute, and missing or wounding a deer become more likely for many people. Those deer shot at nose-bleed elevations on the television could have been shot from 15 feet just as effectively. This hunter in a Summit (1) tree stand prepares for a bow shot.

Become scent-free with a Scent-Lok suit.

• Learn how to be scent-free. Above all else, hunt downwind of where deer travel. If the wind switches so you are not downwind of the deer, move before they get your scent. Wear clean, tall rubber boots to hunt in, and stay away from gasoline or cooking odors. My Scent-Lok suit goes on every day, and my tall rubber boots are sprayed daily to eliminate any odors. I dress outdoors away from any odors.
• Sitting still is so crucial, and yet many hunters fidget and wiggle around, making noise and spooking deer. Learn how to focus your mind and body into silence without movement. Make a movement only when deer are feeding or looking away, and move in slow motion. Herky-jerky movements are easily spotted by nearby deer and they tend to create more noise.
• Learn to see deer. Forget about those calendar photos of a big whitetail buck. Often, bucks are first seen by a flicking tail, moving ear, sunlight off antlers, but often the first sighting is just a piece of the horizontal body outline. Look as deep into thick cover as possible, and anything that moves in-between will be seen. Learn how to pick apart the cover in search of deer.
• Learn how to get to and from a stand without scaring deer. Each stand should have at least two entrance and exit routes, and mix them up. Go in one way and out another, and try not to use the same stand two days in a row. You must pattern deer; don't let them pattern you.

A deer’s body language tells you about it so to hunt accordingly.

• Study deer at every opportunity. Watch and study their actions and body language, and get accustomed to seeing deer at close range. Buck fever is a fear of failure, and the best way to get rid of that problem is to find a place where deer can be studied at close range. The more deer seen, the less often buck fever will occur.
• Pick a spot. Good deer hunters never shoot for the center of mass; instead, they pick an exact and precise place where they wish to hit.
• Always take high-percentage shots. This means taking only broadside or quartering-away shots. Wait for the deer to give you the shot opportunity you want. Don't take the first shot a buck offers. Allow them to move and turn, and present you with the optimum shot opportunity. Shoot once, shoot straight and don’t miss.

A hunter in a Summit tree stand comes to full draw & prepares to shoot.

• Always know what other deer in the area are doing. Don't get so focused on one animal that you forget that other deer may be looking around for danger. Keep track of the deer, and know that one with its head down and feeding or looking at other deer are preoccupied. If the animal is in the proper position, aim, pick the exact spot, and don't lift your head until the arrow hits and the Game Tracker string flutters out. Always use a Game Tracker because it will help you recover a wounded deer.
• Listen to your gut instincts. If you have bad feelings about taking a shot, or worry about missing, don't shoot. Your gut instincts are always right, and if you ignore them, a wounded deer may be the result.
• Hunters have five senses. Use them all if necessary. Use your senses of hearing, seeing, and smelling. Those three senses are what a deer will be using to try to stay alive once hunting season begins.
• Believe in yourself, your bow, and your shooting ability. Confidence is an important part of hunting, and if you feel confident, you will be. If you dither over choosing a spot to hunt, forget it.

There are many other tips, but these are enough to start with. Master these, and we'll think about a graduate course in the near future.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors

A new look at winter

Use common sense on snowmobile. The DNRE is checking trails.

Yesterday and today, with their cold temperature and several inches of blowing snow, seems so typical of our annual two or three really nasty storms. For once, the county Road Commission was on the ball removing snow and icy crud from back roads.

It was a day most of us would like to forget. Frigid temps made it sheer misery to be outdoors. But outside I went, along with tens of thousands of other families in northern Michigan, to remove the residue of yet another heavy snow fall from our driveways.

The only saving factor today featured a pale lemon-yellow winter sunrise with lots of sunlight, and I stood outdoors for 20 minutes  watching the sun creep above the horizon and turn into a sunny morning before it began falling apart with more snow late this morning.

Live it up and enjoy the stark beauty of a fresh snow fall.

Winter, the coldest and nastiest of our four seasons, is much more than inclement weather. It's more than cold snaps or knee-deep snow, and snotty roads.

It's much more than felt-lined boots, ice spuds or two-pound monofilament humming from the pull of a bull bluegill in 12 feet of water under six inches of ice. It means more than Gore-Tex lined gloves, wool scarves, down-filled jackets or ear muffs. It is an attitude; a thought process; a willingness to live with the cold and snow, and still find it enjoyable ... most of the time.

Winter is a season of the senses. It's a time to use our eyes, ears, nose, touch, and yes, even our taste buds to better realize all the pleasures that the winter months can offer..

I'm a tracker, and always have been. It's fun to trail a fox or rabbit on fresh snow, and 60 minutes of walking the track of an animal can teach a hunter more about the critter than years of hunting.

Hearing is important, and for sportsmen, the finest sound is silence, which is nothing but the absence of noise. Nothing can compare with the soft hush of a cedar swamp or an evergreen plantation during a soft snow fall.

The swish of cross-country skis or snowshoes on snow is a delight that stimulates the senses. Silence on the ice is something to be treasured.

Paying attention to our five senses while outdoors can help us admire the winter.

Days when snow flakes  as big as half-dollars drift lazily down from a leaden sky makes me think of winter. It's easy to spend hours or days searching your soul in a cedar swamp looking for a snowshoe hares being chased by a long-legged beagle.

It's easy to overlook the clamor of a beagle pack (in itself a pleasing sound), and equally easy to forego the pleasant task of heading off the circling snowshoe hare. It's just as much fun listening to hounds in full cry as anything I can think of.

Many hunters find it easy to fall in love with winter during a long period of winter silence. It delivers a tonic for the soul which can't be found elsewhere.

Other winter sounds are common. The croak of a raven, and the early dusk hooting of an owl, are but two that trigger my winter thoughts.

Winter smells come to an outdoorsman clean, fresh and sharp. The air smells purer and less polluted now, and all smells appear stronger. A wood fire at home, and the scent of burning maple and oak is a winter tonic as it wafts across our nostrils.

Taste is one sense few sportsmen think about. I delight in the savory taste of a winter cookout, and it's always possible to catch a mess of bluegills for some of the finest eating in the world.

Hickory nuts are present in many winter areas, and if one can beat squirrels to them, the mast can offer a winter taste treat. They often seem a bit more winter-sharpened after lying beneath a mantle of snow for two or three months.

Touch ... it's a friend of the winter outdoorsman. Remember the first fox squirrel or red fox or cottontail rabbit you bagged? Chances are you stroked the soft fur and guard hairs, and felt a tiny twinge of remorse.

Snowmobiling can be a great time. Leave the booze home and be courteous and safe.

Winter is much more than cold, ice and snow. It’s a time to enjoy the outdoors.

Winter means more than a hunting, cross-country skiing or fishing trip. It offers the opportunity to get closer to nature and to see a side of winter wildlife that very few people know exist.

Search out the hidden wonders of nature, and use all five senses. You'll soon learn just how much fun winter can be, and it's not always necessary to fish or hunt. Living through a winter can be a good time.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors