Got A Problem...
 

Alright well, I hunt on a lease with about 2/3rds of the 240 acres being open land. For the past two weeks the land owner has decided he was going to make the open land into a cow pasture. He has been running a dozer and a tracter about three days a week putting in fence posts and grading a hill. So far allot of the work being done is close to my stand and feeder. I checked my game cam and the only thing that was on there was about 5 pics of a dozer going by over the course of 2 weeks. It looks as if they are close to being done with the work but, what i want o know is how this is going to affect the hunting and the deer movement in my area? Should i consider packing up and moving to the other side of the property? I am very worried.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

not in okla is it?

RE: Got A Problem...
 

No, in northwestern NC

RE: Got A Problem...
 

We put a pond in the weekend before season and have done touch ups here and there and it has not been an issue at all. If anything it has helped.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

I think you be fine. The deer know whats going on, so to speak, they'll be around after the work is done!! I use a tractor plowed my plots and dug a hole for a pit blind I put in. The when I went back to the hole the next day their were deer tracks in the hole! They are not to worried about machinery!

RE: Got A Problem...
 

Check the loose dirt for sign, I can almost bet they are still in the area. Deer are curious by nature and if they do not feel threatened they will not be going anywhere.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

Where I was hunting last week, every day there was track-hoe and dozer working going on around my stand during the day. It had been going on for about a week before the season opened. I still took two does and passed up some smaller bucks. They're still there. Every morning there were fresh deer tracks in the dozer tracks. It's almost like the deer are curious to see what's going on.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

I have noticed a ton of tracks through the clover plot which is about 100 yards away from my area. It is looking like my climber stand, feeder, and the food plot is about to become part of the pasture. Will the cattle run off the deer?

RE: Got A Problem...
 

Most likely yes but mainly because of the fence. Although the fence will be easy for the deer to navigate, most likely they will learn and begin to skirt it. I see this on a farm I used to hunt that had high tensil fencing around the pasture. We hunted corners which acted as funnels for the deer. The deer RARELY crossed the pasture.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

If any thing it could help you out a bit since they are used to peolpe doing work around the area

RE: Got A Problem...
 

Move if there is no food or anything to attract them. They take a while to come back to an area that's been having heavy traffic. i'd move.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

I've seen deer run towards the sound of chainsaws - a place we gun hunted a long time ago had a lot of oaks and also a small patch of apple trees, the old farmer went out to cut down a couple of the apple trees to make room for a little storage building and the deer were running towards the sound. It's like Pavlov's dogs and the bells, chainsaw in an orchard is a dinner bell ringing!

RE: Got A Problem...
 

My neighbor did the same thing to his fields last year - converted them to pasture surrounded now by electric fence. It did curtail where they move . . . and when. They don't seem to like to share the pasture with the cattle although the horses don't seem to bother them much. The travel patterns changed a bit and the worst problem was that my neighbor bulldozed a couple trails through a heavy briar-filled thicket so the cows could get to the creek in there. THAT thicket was wherea mother load of deer bedded and it's been nearly devoid of deer most of the intervening time since.

RE: Got A Problem...
 

I hunt a place where the owners fenced off areas for their horses. The deer regularly crawl under or jump over the fences. It doesnt stop them. Last time out, the landowners wife was raking acorns near my spot because she didn't want her horses eating them and getting sick. I stayed there, figured she was as much of this habitat as anything else, and besides she was raking the acorns to the side of the fence I was sitting on. Well, her horses all crowded around to vacuum up all of the acorns she missed, and all I had in range that afternoon was 6 horses. The week before, I took a doe under that oak tree, and the week before that saw a couple more feeding but offered no shot. Those were the only 3 times I got out to hunt that property so far (moving stinks...) I told her after the hunt that I didn't see anything, she did in her big field. She says the horses don't bother the deer, she sees the deer and horses together regularly.