We have pretty stopped baiting until right before season because of the bear problems. 2 years ago, we started baiting Sept 1 for the Oct 1 opener, but neither my brother nor I saw a deer until Oct 20 because of the bear traffic. We had three bait sites for deer, and had over 3000 pics of bears. We have a pic of 6 bears at one time, and many of 3 and 4 bears chowing down. This is all with just corn, no other feed of any kind. Bears can be a huge pain in the ass. Now, we have feeders that are on poles so we can crank up the barrel 12' in the air to keep the damn bears from tearing them up. I would stop baiting all together or he will be stay around as long as there is food there.