Well everything worked out last night and had a couple does come in to my set, nice quartering away shot and she dropped within sight. Now it was a little warmer than usual up here in MN yesterday and field dressed her right where she lay. As I was dragging her out I dragged her right past a scrape I hadn't noticed before. Any opinions if this will effect my hunting spot and if the gut pile will have any effect either.
I saw this the other day ...take what you want from this video... Hunting Myth Buster: Never Gut a Deer Near Your Treestand - Wide Open Spaces Sent from my SM-G935R4 using Tapatalk
I don't gut in the field, for a variety of reasons but in your case the gut pile will be long gone before the rut. The video really just shows deer only showing up in the dark so I would not call the video proof that it has no effect on deer traffic in the area.
We have a stabile but growing wolf population in northern MN where I hunt, and we have started sighting wolves more and more in recent years. Our fear of gutting deer around stands is that it will pull wolves or other predators which will in turn spook deer from the area. But that might just be overthinking things; just the way we do it.
I tried this a few years ago. Shot one in the morning & gutted near my tree stand. That evening I was back in my tree to see what they did. They were nervous at first, sniffing the pile, but then acted normally. Kinda got the feeling that my human smell was all over the ground & that made em jumpy...not the guts. Now I drag to the edge of the woods & gut.
I have noticed that the deer are curious and do not just avoid the area because of it. I would not leave the gut pile in a trail or a scrape but off to the side where I can shoot. A morning success leads to a good afternoon varmint hunt.
So the gut pile is off of the trail about 10 yards, it was when I was dragging her out I went across the path with the scrape on it. I'm just going to stay out of that area until Halloween weekend and hopefully with some rain and other critters it will be back to normal by then
You come all the way to Northern Minnesota to deer hunt, why? I will say there are some trophy deer but not many up north.
Several years ago my dad shot a doe in the evening. The next morning, I sat in the same blind and watched a little six point walk up to the pile and sniff it. He walked off like nothing bothered him. I wouldn't worry about it.
I gut the deer usually where it drops or I've taken the pile closer to my stand in hopes of taking a predator. I also put my trail cam over the gut pile you can learn a lot that way. I don't think it spooks the other deer I've also had other deer come smell the pile.
The deer came to that scrape that night with no problem. They can tell you went through there and were gone so life went on for the deer. More than once I have put a camera on a scrape and have deer there an hour or two after I left.
I field dress them where I find them usually in sight of my stand and have killed consecutive days in a row or a few apart
I currently live in PA, but my family still lives in MN. I come back to join the annual hunting trip because nothing beats deer camp.
