davidmil

I try to. Sometimes it changes or is swirling after I get up. Every hunt is started with determining wind and then I'll decide where I'm going. I've changed locations when the wind has changed. When you don't hunt it, you'll fail. I've had a couple locations that stand out in my mind. One location was best for AM, but the prevailing wind was always 180 degrees wrong. I waited and waited for the odd ball wind to come and be steady that would allow me to hunt that location. I hunted it twice the first 2 years and shot a buck both times at less than 15 yards. I put a guest in it the third year and he shot a beautiful mature buck. If I had hunted it on a wrong wind I'd just have been tipping off the deer and make them change their pattern. I really don't have such things as permanent stands or locations. I rely on multiple locations in an area or zone that are carefully selected.

DaveH

I pay strict attention to wind direction and then do my best to hunt only the stands set up for that. However, the wind tends to change directions multiple times while sitting in the stand and I can't count how many times it has blown from every direction on the compass in less than an hour. You can have deer come in from downwind occassionally since numerous factors come into play. But for consistency, you have to stay downwind from deer in order to get a shot a big, mature deer.