I've been seeing a small bachelor group of bucks....coming into a bean field corner every west wind we got.....for several weeks. In the last two weeks.....NO sightings.
Gut tells me their food source has changed, but the beans have never (or COULD never) been more lush.
We have a bumper acorn crop, this year. Could it be as simple as them preferring acorns over something as luscious as perfect beans?
I still see some does in the beans......but even their sightings have dimineished. I'm not "worried". I know they're still around (deer), but being able to pattern them has just become a little more difficult. I can't see them, now.
So the question is.....we hear all the time that the acorn is their preferred food of choice. is the attraction THAT powerful to these delicacies?
Is there any corn in the area? Around me, they are in the corn right now, acorns are falling everywhere (also walnuts and beech nuts) but they are in the corn and my food plots.
Nope, Matt.....NO corn around here (in my immediate hunting area). They'd have to travel several miles to get to corn, this year. My bet is they're in the mast crops.....which is REALLY good with Rob and Matt coming down in one week.
Jeff it is my experience that acorns seem to be the prefered food when they drop. When i go to Pulaski this weekend to scout, I won't even worry about what's in the fields, if the acorns drop, they will be eating them just like last year when we were up there. My brother said all the deer were eating them until dark and then they made their way to the field .
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The ability to get close to game remains the essence of all bowhunting today.
Same thing happening here in my area. The bear seem to prefer them also as my baits were being hit daily a week and a half ago. Now its maybe once every three to four days.
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Where i hunt in NOVA the white oaks will take precident, but sometimes because of the close proximity of orchards, when there picking the deer get thick into the orchards especially the vineyards when the grapes are ripe. Are there any orchards/vineyards??? If your mast is good the acorns could just be the thing they want, best bet is once you start hunting use the time in the stand to make notes of what there doing, sometimes shooting a doe, and opening her up will tell you where she feeds.
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Jeff-
I haven't seen whitey or any of his friends in the beansin a couple of weeks. I pulled my cameras about two weeks ago but when I hung my stand for opening morning there is still plenty of sign there. I hung my stand in an oak ridge about 100 yards off the bean field and another about 1/8th of a mile away ata creek crossing.
Acorns....above all?
