A couple of friends and myself went bowhunting this weekend and with a guesstimate of 80% of the corn being down we had a very uneventful weekend. Between all 3 of us we had seen only 18 deer over a 2 1/2 day period, which is absolutely terrible. On the clover/alphalfa fields it would be nothing to sit on stand and see 20 deer an evening, we were seeing 3 sometimes 4… shocking!
On Sunday my friend had noticed vultures diving down to the creek just below his stand, so after his morning hunt he went down to investigate. When he approached the vultures they took flight and soon he had seen what they had been feeding on, 2 yearlings that must have passed within a day or so, there was no rot, meat was red, one had died in the creek and one was on the western bank.. Extremely disheartening!

Yeah for some reason the deer dont seem to be acting or moving like usual in my areas as well. Trail cams are still showing 95% of activity in the dark.

Any thoughts on what killed the deer. Yotes or another hunter?

Yes. EHD (Blue tongue) disease is pretty widespread throughout the county.. and from talking to the neighboring bowhunter he said there were several more further down the creek.

They are saying it might be a "Trickle rut" this year where it might happen over the course of a longer period of time rather than just one short period like most years. I remember when we had one a few years back, it was tougher hunting. This year with the corn up around where I hunt so it will be even tougher. I'm not going to complain or pout about it though, nothing I can do about so I'm just going to go out and enjoy it an hope for the best!

http://www.heartlandoutdoors.com/lak...unting_report/