RE: Winter deer herd
Ahh the old days,
When I grew up I used to see similar sights, on a smaller scale,(less land and less deer, but same concentrations).
I never see that anymore, in fact those pictures really brought some memories of what things were like when I was kid. Unfortunately my family were not hunters and at the time all my experiences with the deer were exactly what you were doing in this pictures, scouting,observing etc.