I don't have a problem with gut piles in the woods, but gut pules in garbage bags on the side of the road, that bothers me. As far as how leaving gut piles effects deer, I don't know if it does that much. My brothers father-in-law told me he watched a deer step in a gut pile he'd left earlier in the day. He said that the doe just sniffed the pile and casually went about her business, which was to walk right into his shooting lane. Her gut pile joined the one she'd stepped in a few seconds earlier. I leave my gut piles in the woods. Something will eat it soon enough, and what isn't eaten will bio-degrade into dirt before the trees fill out the next spring anyway.

Mike