Started today in the draw stand. Just before morning twilight I hear two bucks going at it. As twilight hits I see a large buck making his way in my general direction. I grunt at him a couple of times and he stops and looks. As he starts walking in his original direction, I do a little light rattling. He never gives me a second look and walks into the draw further South. I watch for him to come out the other side but he never does. I remain in the stand until well after sunrise grunting and rattling about every 30 minutes....NOTHING. I came home, ate some food, responded to a few threads and then went out to the creek bottom stand. It takes about 40 minutes to walk there from here when there are no leaves on the ground. It took about an hour to get there quietly. I get to where the stand was and it's gone. I sat down in a tree fall and contemplated what next. As I sat there, I see another stand right on the creek. Funny, I didn't put one there and no one else has permission to hunt here. I crawled up in that stand and proceeded to wait. I saw a doe walking South half way up the hill. The hill is about 300 yards long and 200 feet in elevation. A while later, 2 'yotes are heading South along the same trail as the doe. Then I was treated to a buttload of turkeys on the other side of the creek milling about. At 4:30, the sun is no longer visible and I can see a doe heading North along the edge of the field. When I could no longer make out details on the hillside, I thought I should check the batteries in the flashlight for the exfiltration. Crap! I left my flashlight in the garage!!! I decided it would be best to get out while I could still see the little thorny locusts. I made my way to the edge of the Marsh on the North and I was about 100 yards from where I thought I was. I finally made my way to the top in the most unintrusive way and made the walk home. I called the property owner and told him about one stand missing and another (which is in better condition than my missing one) down along the creek. He asked me to recover the stand tomorrow and leave a note tacked to the tree for the owner of that stand to contact him. I will do as he wishes. Says if they can't produce my stand, theirs just became mine. Long day down and another to follow again tomorrow....
I put that newer stand there so you wouldn't hurt yourself in that old one. Plus I thought the location was better..
Where my stand was has 6 trails coming together. Today I counted 15 scrapes and Lord only knows how many rubs. One of the rubs was a 5" diameter tree stripped from the ground to 5' off the ground! The "newer" stand is next to the creek and looks over the creek bottom. There are several tracks crossing the creek where the stand is, but all of them are human!
