My thoughts exactly...
Moral to so many stories I hear about, is that too many people "wing" deer because they hit something they didn't see during the moment of truth or low light. Very sad!!!

I'm not saying one way is right, or one way wrong, so don't throw me under the bus.[8D]

I'll quote an older friend of mine, and a conversation from a few days ago...
"I don't mind shooting through a little brush as long as it's within a few feet of the deer, cause I know the arrow will only deflect a few inches off the intended target point, and as long as I can hit a pie plate I'm happy".

Guess what??? Yeah - you guessed it!
He called me to help him track a doe about a month back and you should have seen what he thought was a little brush.[:@]
That fool pissed me off and I let him know it! He's too experienced @ 65 to be this foolish.

I told him we will do a little exercise... I'll put his target in back of some brush/twigs and practice shooting through it.
I bet him that he will run out of arrows quicker than he thinks! He just laughed @ me getting upset.
Guess what the crap head's on his own, no more help setting stands or scouting for him.

Unless you can be patient enough and not force questionable shots and realize the deer may come back if he is not spooked, then don't bother trimming if you don't want, but the alternative is not a healthy decision for both parties.

It's a good thing you don't live here. You would have no choice! We don't have woods!

[Deleted by Admins]

I don't clear highways, but I do trim several shooting lanes. I am a believer that if you get your setups hung early and get the trimming done way before season starts, you don't have to worry about the deer noticing anything is different when I am in the stand actually hunting.

i only do the bare minimum to be safe and try to do it earlier in the year

When I was still known as txrookie Davidmil gave me a lesson about being a minimalist at cutting lanes. I paid attention to what he had to say and think now that its the only way to go to keep my odds of being busted to a minimum.

I used to hunt in THICK canebrake swamps. This was a mix of pines, hollies, and shrubs head high. My buddy would cut lanes radiating from his tree stand for 60+ yards. This was for gun and bow and cut in the summer and re-trimmed each year. What he found was the bucks would walk around the end of his lanes. I prefer cutting just windows if necessary. The upper branches if possible, rather than the whole tree. Take the limbs down the trail with you and drop them somewhere else. That's if it's pre-season. In season just what I can reach from my stand.

I'll even go as far as to rub dirt/mud on my "white eyes" so nobody, including deer, will notice a cut.