Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Another thread got me thinking......

Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised if they saw how/where you REALLY hunted?

I mean.....size of your woodlots; quantity of deer/turkeys; quantity of quality bucks; proximity of dwellings/structures; etc...??????

That's why I love having friends in to hunt. When I speak of hunting certain areas....seeing certain animals......I KNOW they can relate.

Would your fellow HNI'ers be surprised if they saw how you really hunted?

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

No, I don't see how they'd be surprised. I mean we have plenty of Ohio, Pa guys online they know the types of terrain etc. Plus in my team threads (contest) I get pretty descriptive on set-ups and stuff. Plus I hunt alot of Public Ground and anyone is welcome there..they may be surpirised where I go and how I get there....lol.



For the PA boys, I've spent so many days on SGL 74 I can remember when the bridge WAS there ;)

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Definatly no big woods here! I have a 4 acre parcel and an 8 acre, and also about 50 acres. 3 different farms. Alot of feilds but hey it seems to work. Lots of houses around and the deer are there!

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

No my place just like everyone elses, ;)

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think they may be shocked to see the quality of bucks in my area and just the sheer number of deer too.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think that I've fairly represented my hunting area on here

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think they would. BUt who knows.

Ryan.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Nope, it is woods thats it. No fields, no buildings no nothing. Just woods.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

TeeJay....from the description of your hunting grounds.....I think many woud be surprised at how you hunt.

Respect.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Yes. I think a lot of HNI guys would be really shocked to see the amount of hunting pressure that public (or open-private)land in SW PA receives. In the farmland that I hunt after work, I feel like you can't move 300 yards without running into a tack line, an old treestand, a pile of deer bones, an estrus bottle, a scent wick or a tree with climber tracks running up it. But hilly farmland really isn't anything unique.

In the gamelands, it's your standard laurel highlands - which is quite unique, and would be really neat to a lot of people who've never seen that type of terrain.It can, however,be intimidating, and not exactly conducive to great bowhunting.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Yes, I didnt kill a deer last year that was out of sight of a house.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Nope. Everything I explain in all my post's is the truth. I've got nothing to hide.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

No.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Yea, I believe a good bit of people would be shocked to sit in some of my stands. Nothing like sitting in a stand that you can see two houses, the back of a maximum security prison, and the building site for the new county jail, while having planes from the airport on the other side of the woods fly over head;) I guess the nice part is that on Friday nights I can hear the High School football games and every now and then I can hear the college band practice :D

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

While I'm very open about how I hunt and the property I have access to I think some would be shocked as BuckMagnet said to climb in a stand and have cars driving by close enough to hear their stereo on 5 as they drive by, or to have the land owner come out her back door and wave as she waters her pansies.

Quik brought up a good point about pressure too. I don't think anyone except in maybe MI or NY, and maybe some places in WIcan appreciate the kind of pressure we see.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Refreshing, BM....and what I was getting at. I think a LOT of guys in this forum (me included) are mor ein-line with your way of hunting. I had a post in here last year that listed all the things I "might" be able to see/hear from my stands (depending on wher I chose to sit that morning/evening).

The two bucks in my avatar came out of a 5 acre woodlot. I'm betting some people's best came from similarly sized parcels. No shame in that. I go where they are.....and where I have access to them.

One guyI know of kills his best deer in a 12 acre parcel.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

They'd be jealous....:D

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

No suprises here.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

The only thing that would surprise anyone is the fact that I didn't kill a deer this past season. Had a great spot, lots of bucks, just couldn't get it done. I am also in sight of a couple houses/roads where I hunt. All small parcels.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Yep, I think most would be surprised. I only saw 5 deer total while bow hunting this year and Last year I did not see a single deer while bow hunting. Not a single one. That makes for some tough sits in the stand.

I may chnge my signature to one similar to Quicksilver's. Something like "The undisputed king of watching trees grow!"

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think I represent/describe my hunting lands pretty well, so I don't think people would be suprised if they've read my posts.

However what I think a lot of people may not fully grasp is
1. How much pressurethe land gets both hunting & non hunting related.
2. How many deer can still survive and be founddespite that pressure.

And probably for thosefrom PA if I gave county locations, they would expect one of my spots to have a P&Y behind every tree, and the other to be completely void of deer & big bucks, where in fact both have lots of deer, and I see many more (relatively speaking) big bucks in the spot that ISN'T supposed to hold them.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think most would be shocked! Big woods and not a lot of deer. Kinda like looking for a needle in a haystack. I could bait (and I have) but I never took any pride in killing one that way. I read gregh's buck story from last season and he said he saw 7? bucks that day. I am lucky to see 7 during the entire rut. My unofficial sightings are about 1 deer per full day of hunting. It's a lot different than small woodlot hunting. I did a lot of that in my younger years. I love the big woods and I love to roam. It's great to be able to walk all day and never run into a fence or no tresspass sign. You have to be mentally tough to hunt for days without a deer sighting. My record is 7 days in a row w/o a deer sighting. I have done that twice. My love for the big woods far outweights the need to see a lot of deer. Mixed in all that big woods are just enough big bucks to keep me trying:D

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I hear ya, Magicman. I saw a total of 4 different bucks, last year..........and all but one were 1.5yr olds.;)

Although I see great numbers, "sometimes"......I had a stretch of 6 days without seeing a deer, last year.....and 17 TOTAL buck sightings (4 separate bucks)all season.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I would like to add that I am not complaining. I wish I would see more deer but I love being in the big woods setting. I will never explore it all before I die but i'm going to try:D

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I don't think any of the HNIer's would be surprised in how I hunt. I don't think it is that different from anyone else's style.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I also stated that that was a freak occurance and why I think it happened. Here is a more normal year of mature buck sightings for the month of November. Some of these are the same bucks. This is in a bow only county.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Your graph would be pretty accurate for me as well on the days you seen the most mature bucks. Most of mine are on the 6th but I see a fair share in between the 1st and the 5th also.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Me neither, MM......just stating a stat. I'd LOVE to see less deer.....and we're working on that.;)

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

like quik and rybo said...nothing too different about SW pa farmland/rolling hills/small wood lots either broken by fields or houses...but i do feel most of the out of state guys dont realize what hunting pressure is. i bet jaws would drop if some of you could get an ariel view of a typical day in rifle season...youd see a sea of orange...youd see guys lined up walking towards guys lined up sitting...even in bow season i got competition with other bowhunters, small game hunters, fall turkey hunters, coon and predator hunters at night, people spotting deer at night scare them out of fields(mainly because a few bad apples chase them or drive into the fields..)

alot of guys would also be very surprised at the cover deer can and will hide and bed in...ive jumped deer in places i would have bet piles of money that there wasnt a deer in...jumped a buck one year out of a low growing wild blue berry field...stuff would have trouble hiding a big rabbit let alone a buck...alot of our deer simply evade hunters like that...and will bed in back yards and places hunters cant/wont go..

so i doubt anyone would be too surprised over the land i hunt...then again they might..sometimes im on a gamelands thats over 10k acres...others i can see houses and roads...just kinda diverse like that...but our pressure would likely surprise alot of people..yes you hear us talk about it all the time and THINK you have an idea...but without seeing it, it would be hard to imagine..

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think a lot of folks would be surprised if they bowhunted whitetails inthe country I hunt.Some may even hateit.Low deer density coupled with massive expanse of country that is bothrugged and littered with ample feedin every direction. There just are not many variableshere during hunting seasonthat congregate deer.

When Rybohunter wasout here elk hunting with me.. One of the first things he said to me in regards to bowhunting whitetailshere in these Mountains/Forestlands, was....

"How do you pattern deer in this stuff?" "I wouldn't know where to start!" :D

Of course it can be done.. if a hunter does his homework. I am also really looking forward to hunting some Idaho farmland next fall. It will be nice added dimension to what I am used to hunting.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Well put! I do hunt a little around home here, but I love getting up north!

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

You have never seen Pressure until you have 2 hunting clubs surrounding 40 acres with 3 to 4 stands right on your property line and you only have one access point to get there. IHATE hunting clubs/leases.

LT

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Hey LT,

How bout walking a field edge that has over 20 guys lined up about 10 feet apart sitting on buckets. Then seeing another 7 guys driving the ridge towards them, heading 100 yards down through the woods to a powerline that has 9 guys sitting on it, and several more driving another section of woods towards it[:-] That was two years ago on the first Saturday of rifle season here in PA. Its nothing to hear more than 300 shots on the firstmorning of rifle season here.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

My deer hunting property, which we are no longer going to retain after this year (thats right... as of June 30th... I have no where to bow hunt), pretty much sucks..... no wonder we aren't bothering with it anymore. Overpriced, under populated, and we have ZERO control over it. Had too many hunts get messed up last year.

Now my duck hunting spots.... yeah I suspect you'd like my blinds ;)

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think they'd be a little surprised HOW I hunt, especially turkeys and bear. I'm real aggressive.

Where I hunt, prob not. I can BOWhunt ~1000 acres on/around, and around our farm. It is all working farmland, with the exception of ours. I hunt a lot of swamp edges, and ridge lines during the rut, and field edges in the early and late.

A fellow HNI'er will get to bear hunt my land Fall of 09;)

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

Yea there arent many people that hunt the coastal areas of the south on here, I imagine they would be surprised at the quality and quantity of deer and turkeys, as well as a good ol southern briar patch trip to get a deer [&:]

:D

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

In my neighborhood, YES.

On my property in IL, probly not. Lots of hills and woods.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

The property I mainly hunt would shock many people. It is four acres and a half mile from a Mall in the outskirts of Chicago in Kane County. When the wind blows out of the South you can smell KFC and I am less than 200 yards from a major road. The homeowners kids are usually 75 yards down the ridge on afternoon hunts on the trampoline and somethimes people from the forest preserve next door get lost and walk 20 yards in front of me never knowing I am there.

The first time I ever hunted it I climbed into a stand that was on the property but abandoned and saw 14 deer in the first half hour of light. The property has numerous 8-10 pointers on it every year ranging in size from 100-140" and a few larger from time to time. The best part is that the bucks aren't overly sensitive to smell.

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

RE: Do you think your fellow HNI'ers would be surprised?
 

I think I would have to say that members here wouldn't be surprised on how I hunt, but more how IHAVE to hunt. It is a stark contrast to many in this thread on how theyHAVE to hunt. It honestly surprises me that people are hunting so near malls, stores, homes, etc. as well as the pressures associated with over crowded woods. I think if I lived back east I may give up hunting all together because of that pressure. That being a matter of how I have "hunted" for most of my life. The thought of paying for hunting grounds escapes me. The idea of following a deer trail to a tree stand that has as many human tracks as deer tracks is beyond my comprehension.

I guess I have been "spoiled" by being able to hunt vast areas of public land all my life. That being said, 80% of my hunting has been spot & stalk mule deer and elk over miles of country. Tree stands?? That would be nice, but first it is hard to pattern mule deer; and second, where is a tree?? With a bow you can spend hours belly crawling thru sagebrush in hopes to get close enough for a shot. Steep terrain plays into account as well, as you may spot a group of deer 500 yards away (as the crow flies) but it can take hours to get into position for a shot.

I know Rybo got a feel for hunting the big woods of Idaho with Shed & myself. I would like to show him (or anyone else) the hunting in my area of steep, open country. I think when I moveup in the timbered areas where a few whitetail are,I would see hunting a little more as described by many of you.