I've sat 4 or 5 stands WAY to manytimes but those are whereI see my most deer. I have one honey hole stand that I just about always see deer..

I also have 4 or 5 stands I should have sat more be cause I KNEW there were bucks under them.

Then I had a couple of stands I didn't sit once. I had game cam pics but the stars and winds never aligned.

Ido believe that if I moved around a bit more I would have seen bigger bucks. When you stink up a sight to much the does and young deer might come back but the big ones are tougher to fool.

As a side note, I should have taken the prevailing wind patterns into account while I was setting stands. I put fixed stands in good locations but they required a SW wind and we didn't get ONE day when that happened...

Been hunting hard since october till now, so lets say 80+ sits. In 7 different setups. I places that I have to hunt are only about 15-30 acres max, I can't set up but so many stands.

I have had about 45 sits thus far.

I have sat in about 14 different stand set ups, on 5 different properties.

I have 3 Ill properties and 3 Wis properties and I hunt them all.

You are right, with mild intrusion, deer will not abandon the property.

The deer are still on my property, they're just skirting my stand. When they skirt my stand, sometimes I see them, but I know they are still there.

I have almost always hunted my properties with this approach. However, the size and terrain features dictate where and how many stand sites I will have. No matter what, I like to have at least 1 stand site for every wind direction, as long as I think they'll be productive. Normally I think that less intrusion (bare minimum of stands) is better.

Now we agree. Stands to reason the less times you hunt a spot.....the less intrusion occurs.

.........and less stands someone sets up in an area = less intrusion.

2 properties:


Property A) 6 sits...1 tree...but it's a small setup.

Property B) 35-ish sits...4 trees (two within 20 yards since I moved to get into bow range). I shot a 12pt and a big doe out of the tree that I moved to...that I sat in probably 75% of the time. When I wasn't there...one of my friends were. So from mid-October into mid-November someone was in that stand at bare minimum 4 days a week in the mornings and/or evenings. Total deer out of that stand this year is 6...3 of which were 120" bucks or higher.

It's just an amazing area....where mysteriously the deer keep coming through after all of us walking/sitting/pissing through there...which leads to my theory that deer are really oblivious to the actual threat of the intruders (hunters). "Sit down...shut up...and you'll kill deer." Those are words of wisdom from my grandfather when I was a boy.

Out of the other 3 stands on Property B there were a few other deer taken, non by me...but that's b/c I was either tagged out or they just weren't big enough. I was only busted once this season...while pulling back on a doe. A bunch of other deer picked me off....just one of those deals.

In the early season I tend to move around alot. But my strategy is different when I am hunting closer to the rut.

I pick outa fewspots (normally bottle necks between bedding and feeding areas or between different bedding) that I think will be most productive and stick to them.

I always have at least oneset ready for each wind direction but it is ussually out of the NW or SE around here...meaning much of my time will be spent in just 2 different stands.

In fact mostof thebucks I have killed have come outthe same2 trees.

The last P&Y buck i shot was on aboutmy 12th (guessing) sit in the same tree that season.

I guess I could move around more (I used to hunt many more locations when I first started) but I like to spend the majority of my time in the locations I have the most faith in.

16 sits 22 sitings 1 kill
13 outta 1 tree
1 in a hayfield
and 1 in a bean field
1 stalk/sit inheavy cover
i know but i aint got money t buy another stand

Hunted one stand 4-5 times, on the fifth time no deer sightings= no more sits there. At the most sat in other stands a max of two times.