Deer Reaction to Vehicle in Fields?
 

What are your observations on how deer behave when a vehicle is driving around the fields? More specifically if they hear a vehicle a couple hours prior to sundown will they change their routine for the night and not move until after dark?

The reason I ask is that I have a good size area that I need to check/move cameras so I use a truck in the field to get to them so it doesn't take me 4 hours to get them all. I was thinking of hunting the same night in the area but I am not sure what their typical response would be.

Insights?

Usually does not bother them until they get shot at, then anything unusual is suspect. I used to check fox traps with a truck through the fields and the deer took it pretty well until rifle season opened. The one farmer I know keeps a 30.30 on the corn picker during deer season and does pretty good.

imo..as long as the vehicle leaves...all that matters...go in and out the same way or pass through one end to the other exiting at an entirely different location.

Deer and Vehicles
 

Been seeing them for years. Some of those deer unfortunately get run over by those vehicles. If a deer was totally adverse to a vehicle and a highway, it would never cross a highway.

Saw a recent video of a hunter who had constant trail cam shots of deer going by an area that often saw a vehicle on the land.

The thing that use to get me is how the deer were use to the leaf blowers in the nearby apartment complex. And I never heard of farmers complaining about never seeing a deer from their running tractors.

ya that makes sense. They actually hear it leave should put them more at ease.

Deer will get used to anything that is routine

If an army tank regularly drives through the property where you hunt, they'll get used to that. If it's not a regular occurrence and it's something out of the ordinary, they won't.

I've had deer on my camera an hour after I've left. I'm convinced they got used to hearing me drive up and drive away. In fact, I now sometimes purposely drive up early in the afternoon, drop some bait, and drive back off to the edge of the property and walk back in.

Always see deer.

after they are used to it, you can have someone drive ya in on the dl

Out here in the west it doesn't bother them that a truck drives by. Its the trucks that stop that get them all riled up.

In wisconsin if a truck or quad is drivin off road the deer will spook at the sound or sight of the truck or 4 wheeler. Driving a tractor to check cameras is the best way to do it around here if you have those means. Deer are not scared what so ever to a tractor.

The other evening my dad was shelling fairly small field of corn and he still had a few rounds left to go and he said the deer were already coming out in the field to scrounge for dropped corn. He said there were probly 10 or so out there without a care in the world. Same thing with coyotes, Ive had one come within 50 yards of my tractor while I had been disking a field next to some woods for a few hours. He just kind of looked at me as he was crossing the field, but payed no real attention.

I came back from my climber after several hours only to see an entire herd lounging around my Jeep.

Alot of it has to do with perceived threat.

Are they gonna run off outta sight when you come driving in or driving by? I would fully expect them to. But they r probobly just getting outta the immediate area. And many times deer circle back out of curiousity. The hunter may not see them but the deer could be somewhere checking out what they were riled up by. Alot more deer see hunters than hunters see deer - that's a fact.

Quick story. We had a 3 day gun season and we hunted Friday and Saturday but only the morning of 3rd day. It was getting kinda warm and we had just basically said let's break camp.

Well a few of us stuck around and did some stand maintenance, trimming and firewood gathering for the next outing. Ran all over the property with some ATVs hootin, hollering and even drag racing the quads in a bean field.

A few hours later 3 of us decided to hunt the late afternoon and evening and we shot a bunch of deer all right around and in the bean field we had been racing in.

I shot my first archery buck last year in a stand that I wasn't real familiar with (on my hunt club you can hunt in other people's stands as long as they aren't there). I accidentally parked my truck about 120 yards from the stand in plain view. I walked in in the dark in the morning, and when it got light I realized I could see my truck. I then saw a big buck following two does, and none of them seemed to be bothered by the truck. They crossed the powerline about 50 yards south of the truck. An hour later another buck came from the opposite direction, apparently having crossed the power line in the opposite direction and also wasn't bothered by the truck; he ended up in my freezer.