Do you hunt over acorn flats in the mornings during early season? Do you try to hunt trails from the oak the flats to bedding? Do you even hunt at all in the mornings during early season?
I find I spoke deer walking into the acorn flats. Not always but some. I hunt them in evenings mostly. Unless you get in an hour before daylight
I hunt the hardwoods, public land. Up until last year, I hunted mornings all of early-season, and rarely hunted afternoons just because it's what I grew up doing. I finally stopped doing that last year and hunted afternoons only until Halloween ish and saw more deer last year than I ever had before in a season (In those woods). Every place is different though, but for me personally, I will not hunt a morning now until the rut.
I heard recently that guys don’t hunt morning in early season. I was going to try mostly evenings this season (early season) and see what happens. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Very few times have I killed a deer on opening morning. Now I have killed them first week or so in the morning but that was in the mountains of VA, completely different from what I hunt on a regular bases.
If I have time to hunt I'm going for it. Even though my hunting lands aren't perfect, they are big. Meaning I dont care if I burn a spot in the morning. I'm hunting around deer. I will hunt oak flats, bedding....I'm not treading lightly unless it is a great bedding area that has been consistent to heat up come closer to Oct 20 and beyond.
I seldom hunt early season anymore but when I did, it didn't matter. I had so many properties to hunt. I went when I wanted. Now days, I usually don't go out till mid- late October. But morning hunts are just to special the first 2 weeks of Nov to pass up.
well, with most of what I hunt it's huge tracts of pine plantation and undergrowth and cutovers with small oak flat islands.. they bed 360 deg around the flats.. it;s tricky. but I think I am going to steer clear of these flats until afternoon. I checked several yesterday and there were very few acorns. very few. and they were green.. it's still early so hopefully they will drop soon. There are not many oaks at all in 7k acres that I hunt. So the ones that do drop get a lot of attention.
When you have as many acorns as we do yes. I go in way before light and in some cases with the blinds I will go.out at 2-3 am and sleep in the blind until legal. My cams tell me the "legal light" travel is right at legal light. Thats when they are moving off the big farm fields. It's also when surrounding hunters are moving the deer. My trails are clean and quiet.
I only hunt mornings on Saturday. I usually don’t take vacation days to hunt because my work schedule allows me to get out in evenings. I have 2 spots that are perfect for catching deer in mornings moving off of fields to bedding. I can get in without disturbing anything so it works out perfectly for mornings. It is usually a longer walk in but it’s what needs to be done. Typically deer pass by between 7 and 8:30 on way to bed. Sent from my iPhone using Bowhunting.com Forums
I mostly hunt mornings because it's easier for my wife. The kids have barely woken up by the time I'm getting back home. With that said, I spook a ton of deer walking in and have never gotten a buck early season.
I had almost no deer sightings last year during morning sits. I am switching to more afternoons this year. Especially one of the private pieces I hunt cus my stand is on the edge of a bean field and I expect to catch them moving out towards it in the evening times. I took 2 weeks vacation starting November so I will just hunt as much as possible then otherwise it will be free evenings
You hunt feed like acorns or plots you will push deer off before sunrise dang deer will just lay down by food for the night.
The whole trend of not hunting mornings in October is, in my opinion, stupid and misguided. I understand the premise, but the fact is that most of us (myself included) have limited opportunities to hunt each year. Many of us are relegated to weekends and a few stray vacation/sick days from work. So if I have the opportunity and the season is open, I'm going to try and make the most of it. As others have said, food sources inside the timber near bedding areas, water sources, or even bedding areas themselves, are going to be your best options for September and October mornings. Try to avoid destination food sources (fields) on your way in, and avoid areas between those fields and where you plan on hunting. Also, try to get in a little earlier than usual if you can. While it may be a long shot at killing something - it's much better than no shot when you're sleeping in. On a related note, modern behavior of human beings is a very interesting thing to me. Up until a couple of years ago, nobody talked about not hunting mornings in Sept/Oct. Don Higgins was the first person I saw talk about this in his book. People starting picking it up and repeating it in videos, on podcasts, forums, FB groups, etc. Before you know it, everyone is going "Yeah, hunting mornings in October is stupid!" I'm over here wondering WTH just happened. I have this same conversation with my wife about going apple picking or other stupid things she makes me do. Before she started seeing everyone on FB and IG posting pictures of it, she had zero desire to go apple picking. Heck, she probably didn't even know that was a thing people did! Now all of a sudden we're picking apples and making apple pies like we're Mr. and Mrs Betty Crocker. Point is - hunt when you can, be smart about what you do, and make the most of the time you have available. None of it is guaranteed and I'll be damned if I'm going to waste time in the woods because some jamoke on social media says that's what I should do.
Justin-- I hunt when I feel the odds are in my favor, not just because I have time to hunt. That what drives my evening hunting. Its not FB or Don that is for sure. That is a luxury that I have worked long and hard to get to. Nothing like having a big bedding buck living in the only small wood lot you have between ag field blown out by your early morning entrance along the field edge..
