What Are Your Deer Hunting Goals This Year?

© By Othmar Vohringer

Set a goal for this hunting season and then work toward it.

I asked a hunting buddy of mine that question and he replied with; “Jeez, buddy turkey hunting season just started and you already think about deer hunting.”

Well, besides being guilty of having constantly whitetail deer on my mind, even during turkey hunting season, I also happen to think that it is important to have goals in life and in hunting.

Just like having a goal in life provides you with a working guideline so does having a seasonal goal for hunting. Without a goal you won’t know what to do or how to get there. It’s a bit like driving a car without knowing where you want to go or how to get there, you end up driving in circles.

This might be okay for the hunter who’s just looking to get away from the daily grind for a bit, enjoying the great outdoors. Killing a deer is a priority but rather an added bonus. However, my guess is, since you’re reading here, you’re the type of hunter that has a passion for hunting and whitetail deer. You're  the type of hunter looking to maximize the rate of success in the deer woods. To achieve that increased success rate you have to have a goal in mind and then work toward achieving that goal.

With that established you need to set a clear goal of what it is you want out of the upcoming hunting season. I don’t know what your goal is. Maybe you want to kill your first big buck, or the first deer period, or maybe hunt a place that is not overcrowded with others hunters. Whatever your goal is for this season, no matter how big or small, you have to plan for it and you have to start rather sooner than later.

My goal for this season is to find an area with a good whitetail deer population. That might sound strange to you, but where I live is not known for abundant whitetail deer populations, it’s an area with a large mule deer population and also known for big mule deer bucks. Through research I found an area with a good whitetail deer population and a better than average trophy buck population. Now my next task is to find private landowners willing to let hunters on their property, which means spending a few days, maybe even weeks, knocking on doors. The chosen area also has vast amounts of public land. My goal is to find the public land areas that other hunters avoid. To achieve this goal I have to study maps to see what the access to these areas are. My task is to find areas where vehicle access is restricted. With restricted vehicle access chances of  encountering undisturbed hunting enjoyment and opportunity rise drastically. When all this is done I have to start scouting and chose possible stand locations.

Of course, I just could drive into the area when deer hunting season opens and see what transpires. But that is not me. I like to set myself goals and then work toward it. It increases my chances of success, and besides that, as a passionate whitetail deer hunter it is just another excuse - a worthwhile excuse – to occupy my time and my mind with whitetail deer.

What are your deer hunting goals for the 2015 season? Let’s discuss it!

Deer Hunting Tip: Always Check The Wind

© Othmar Vohringer

The number one defense of deer is their nose and it is the hunter’s biggest enemy. More hunts fail because deer got a nose full of human scent than by anything else that could go wrong. When I hunt, the wind is always foremost on my mind. I am very particular about checking the movement of the air flow regularly around me.

Before a hunt I check the local weather station to find out what the prevailing wind directions are. I do not own a smartphone but for those that do there are various applications available that provide you with regular updates on wind directions, wind speeds and other weather conditions.

I am old fashioned and check the wind and air currents with the aid of scent free chalk powder. I purchase the chalk that commonly is used for chalk line boxes. This fine powder comes in various colors and is cheap. A big one pound bottle of that stuff lasts me usually up to two years. I prefer the red colored chalk that I fill into a small nasal spray bottle that I can carry in my shirt or jacked pocket. A squeeze of the bottle releases a small cloud of red chalk into the air that, because of its coloration, I can watch for a very long distance drifting in the air current. This provides me with a good indication of what the wind does around me and further away from my stand.

I also use quite often seeds of plants such as Milkweed, Dandelion and other seeds that float in the air and make perfect wind movement indicators that too can be seen for a very long way floating in the air. This becomes particularly important in hill country where the wind is often subject to changes of direction and swirls back and forth.

Regardless of what you use to check the wind, important is that you make a serious commitment to continuously check the wind during your hunt. If you want to become more successful as a hunter you have to pay close attention to the wind and use any available method to check the wind, be they high-tech or old school. Never underestimate a deer’s nose, because it will detect your scent even if you wear scent blocking/absorbing garments and boots.

Rut Myth Debunked – When the weather is to hot the rut will be delayed

© By Othmar Vohringer

Myth: When the weather is to hot the rut will be delayed.

Fact:
Remember when I wrote in an earlier segment of “Rut Myth Debunked” that the rut is closely tied to the time of the fawn birth. Weather therefore will have very little influence on the rut activity because the fawns need to be born during a very particular time of the year or else their chances of survival will drop significantly. While it appears that a freak warm weather front shuts the rut down, the truth is that the rut is going to happen regardless. Deer biologists have done a great deal of research on this myth of a delayed rut and found out that warm weather may force the bucks to slow down somewhat but they will keep on seeking out and breeding does regardless. While in cold weather bucks cruse around during daylight hours in search of receptive they will rest during warm periods and search for does mainly at night.
Whatever the weather conditions are the rut will happen regardless because nature demands it to happen.

Hot weather will not delay the rut for weeks, or as some hunters have suggested, cancel the rut. Conversely, a premature cold snap will not result in kick-starting the rut weeks earlier either. If you’ve figured out at what time the rut is on in the area you hunt then go hunting regardless of the weatherman’s predictions of a warm weather front. During these warm weather periods take up a stand further back into the timber, near a buck bedding area, and expect buck movement right at dawn and shortly before dusk.

Early Season Deer Hunting Tips Roundup

© By Othmar Vohringer

The most common keywords used by readers of Whitetail Deer Passion over the last two weeks are; "early season deer calling", "early season deer hunting tips" and "early season deer scent".

With over 200 pages of deer hunting information on Whitetail Deer Passion it can be time consuming to find the right information at the lick of a button. To make life easier for you I did the search work for you and provide a collection of links to information about early season hunting tactics, deer calls and scent usage.

Enjoy!

Calls and Scent For Early Deer Hunting Season.

Early Season Antler Rattling Tactics.

Early Season Deer.

Are You Ready For Early Bowhunting Season?

Early Season Scouting.

Deer Scent and Calling Throughout The Seasons.

Making Sense About Scent.

A Year in A Whitetail Deer's Life.

The Most Common Mistakes Made Setting Up Treestands.

There is a lot more information here on Whitetail Deer Passion about early season deer hunting, but I am convinced that the links above will provide you with a solid foundation of tips to get you started in the right direction to early season deer hunting success. 

Best of luck to you all hunting the early deer season, stay safe and keep the Whitetail Deer Passion burning. 

The Most Common Mistakes When Setting Up Treestands That Will Reduce Your Hunting Success

© By Othmar Vohringer

As mentioned in another column here on Whitetail Deer Passion, there is no denying that the invention of the treestand is the single biggest advantage for deer hunters. However, to use the advantages of hunting from treestands to its fullest potential we have to make sure to set them up correctly. It is here were many hunters make blunders that cost them “deerly”.

Here are some of the mistakes hunters make and how to avoid them.


Going too high

The height of the treestand from the ground is determined by the surrounding cover. If the surrounding cover is optimal at 8 feet off the ground then that is where you should hang the stand. Hang the stand any higher and you risk to be sky lighted, deer will spot you from a mile away…and no they will not come any closer to see what that bulging blob on the side of the tree is. In my humble opinion the biggest myth ever perpetrated on hunters is that philosophy of climbing high up into the tree tops to avoid deer smelling you. To avoid deer from smelling me I rely on a good shower and a set of fresh clean under and over garments before every hunt and to make sure the wind is right for the stand I am hunting, if the wind is not right I will not hunt that particular stand and go elsewhere where the wind is in my favor. Tests have shown that no matter how high you climb deer will detect your scent. The tests have shown that when you go high, around 30 to 40 feet off the ground, the air current will carry your scent maybe 100 to 150 yards before it descends to ground level. Do you believe deer that smell a hunter 100 to 150 yards away will come closer to have a look where the smell of human is exactly coming from? Neither do I! On the other hand the same tests, done with smoke cartridges placed at various heights, showed that when the stand hangs lower, around 10 to 16 feet off the ground, the scent seems to linger around the base of the tree. In that scenario with the immediate surroundings of your stand site contaminated with human scent, you still stand a chance of getting deer within shooting range, even with a bow.

Another myth perpetrated by the “climb as high as you can” advocates is that the higher you climb the less likely deer will see you. Wrong! As I stated at the beginning, if you run out of surrounding cover you will stick out like the proverbial thumb against the sky. As much advantage as treestands have, hunting from them has also educated deer to look up into the treetops for danger. In areas where hunters predominantly hunt from treestands deer always will look up first before they look ahead and around. The popularity of hunting from treestands has taught generations of deer to look up for danger. 

Hanging treestands at the wrong time

Hanging deer stands a few day or even weeks before the deer season opens is a sure recipe to spoil opening day hunting success. If you do your scouting right you should know what areas deer use on opening day, long before the deer move to that area. I hang my stands at the very least one to two months ahead of hunting season. That way the area can settle down and deer get used to the "new growth" on the tree. No matter how carful you are hanging stands it is noisy and the area is heavily contaminated with human scent. If you hunt on public land where it is not logical (stands do get stolen) or legal to hang treestands months in advance you can at the very least locate potential stand sites and do any necessary trimming and preparations. That way on opening day you can move in and carefully place your stand with low impact to the area. Having said that, I find it personally very important to practice setting up stands with the same commitment as shooting your gun or bow… and I will tell you why.

Practicing setting up stands makes it safer to use them because you're familiar with the procedure, but also there are times when a stand needs to be moved during the hunting season because deer travel patterns change. In these cases I move my stands during midday hours when the deer are resting in their bedding areas away from the travel corridors, trail intersections and feeding areas. Such stand location changes have to happen quickly and quietly. This is only possible to do if you are intimately familiar with setting up stands and that means practice and practice again until you have every move ingrained in your brain. I can take down a hang-on stand and set it up again safely in less than ten minutes. Of course, when you relocate a stand during hunting season you want to do so at the time of day when deer are bedded down.
 
Where possible a climbing treestand is much better suited for quick in season changes than a hang-on stand. To make changing stand locations quick and easy I select as many trees as I can and prepare them well before the hunting season opens. However, it must be said that climbing treestand models needing a lot of assembling are not well suited. The best models are those that only need an adjustment of the climbing cables, such as the Summit Climbers.

Ignoring the lay of the land and wind directions

The weather forecast predicts north easterly winds but don’t bet your farm on it that this holds true for your stand locations too. The topography of the land with its hills, valleys, gullies and slopes among many other features can and often do affect wind direction. In addition local thermals further affect where your scent will carry. The solution to this problem is to make sure where the wind and air currents drift. To determine that I always carry a used nasal-spray bottle filled with unscented red snap-line marking powder with me. When I squeeze the bottle I can see the red powder cloud for a long distance flowing with the breeze. This provides me with accurate information of what the wind and thermals are doing.

On that note, where ever possible I set up two stands in the same general location that way I can keep hunting by just going to the next stand when the wind or current changes. If you’re sold on scent eliminating products and clothing don’t think for a minute that deer will not smell you, because they will. I used to be fanatical about scent control, showered in scent eliminating products before every hunt, washed my clothing in scent eliminating laundry detergent, air dried and stored clothing in scent free vacuum sealing bags and wore a scent free coverall on the drive to the hunting area and used scent eliminating spray to treat my hunting gear after I left the truck, including hands head and boots. In addition I spent a fortune on scent eliminating lined camouflage garments and boots. Then one day I learned a very educational lesson that brought me back to reality about scent eliminating products. A buck came in from downwind, stuck his nose high in the air and took a deep breath, then he bolted away never to be seen again. The wind is not your friend, it is your enemy and you should always pay close attention to it.

Getting to and from your stand

How many hunters give any thought to stand entry and exit routes when they scout? My experience is that there are not many. It is a mistake that can you cost deer. It doesn’t take a degree is deer science to know that whitetails are very aware at all times what’s going on around them. The only way to outsmart the deer is to be very meticulous when scouting. Don’t just look for deer sings and a good place to hang a stand, also scout for your own entry and exit routes. The result of that consideration should be that you can enter and exit your stand site without letting the deer on what you’re doing, sometimes that means that the entry route is not the same as the exit route, or that you have to change the routes as the season goes by.

To close for comfort

Another mistake some hunters make in stand placement is that they go too close to deer feeding areas, food plots and bait. First of all it can be a very hard task to kill a deer at the feeding site and second, as studies have shown, as the season goes on deer avoid the food source more and more. No matter how careful you are in approaching or leaving the stand, eventually deer will catch on to you. The deer might not be aware of you but the minute changes and sign you leave behind each time you visit a stand site are often enough for deer to become wary and avoid the feeding area during legal shooting times. It is much better to place the stand back from the food source, preferably on intersecting trails where you will encounter much more deer traffic. Especially if you're after a buck it pays to hang the stand back from the food source. Mature bucks are notorious for hanging up in the woods and wait until nightfall before they enter the fields and food plots.

Over hunting

Hunting from the same stand every other day is a sure way to let it get “cold” in a hurry. My experience is that a stand should not be hunted more than two day per any given week, with at least two days rest in between. An old but very true saying among experienced deer hunters is; “The best chance to kill a deer from a treestand is the very first day you hunt from it.

So there you have it. I hope these tips will help you to become a better deer hunter. Feel free provide additional treestand hunting mistakes that you know or learned the hard way about it in our comment section.

How To Score Your Whitetail Deer Trophy?

© By Othmar Vohringer

Over the years of writing Whitetail Deer Passion I get a lot of questions about how to score a whitetail deer trophy buck. Rather than writing about it I do one better and let Stan Potts, probably America's most respected whitetail deer hunter, tell and show you exactly how to score your trophy whitetail buck.

For more information on trophy qualifications, registration and rules visit:

Boone & Crockett Club Org. Trophies taken with firearms.
Pope & Young Club Org. Trophies taken with archery equipment (Crossbows are excluded).

If you would like to share your trophy whitetail story with the readers of Whitetail Deer Passion, look here for more information.

Hunting Whitetail Deer From The Ground

© By Othmar Vohringer

There is no denying it, the popular and most effective way to hunt whitetail is from treestands and will most likely remain so in the future. Another method that enjoys a growing popularity, especially with the aging generation of deer hunters, are pop-up blinds. These blinds can be set up quickly with little fuss and are easy and light to transport. Some of the better quality pop-up blinds not only conceal the hunter they also provide shelter from wind and rain since they are, to a degree, waterproof. For many eastern hunters the pursuit of whitetail deer from the ground must seem something only a crazy person would attempt. Granted hunting bucks at eye-level can be extremely difficult, but with a little planning and relearning it is absolutely possible.

Before I moved to British Columbia I did all my deer hunting from treestands, and while I still hunt a fair amount of my time in the woods from stands I have adopted the “western way of hunting” with a great measure of success. Hunting from the ground is “how hunters roll in the west” and it rubbed off on me.

As mentioned above when you hunt from the ground it requires a different set of skills to find a proper ambush site. It is here where good scouting skills pay huge divides. Instead of treestands and pop-up blinds I use the available topography and natural material, such as branches, tall grass and dead-fallen trees as a natural blind. The good thing about natural blinds is that they are very quickly constructed, you do not have to haul them around and they always fit into the existing landscape, unlike many pop-up blinds that need additional camouflaging and have to be set up before hunting season to give the deer time to get used to it. When I hunt deer at eye-level all I carry with me as additional gear is a lightweight stool, a pair of branch clippers and a small folding saw. The stool provides me with comfort and with the aid of the clippers and folding saw I can turn any spot within seconds into a formidable ground blind and no deer will pay any attention to it. More often than not I do not need to make any alterations whatsoever, sitting behind a bush, a clump of tall grass, a thick tree trunk or a dead-fall tree will suffice. Nature is full of hiding places for hunters. You just have to learn to recognize them.

Mobility

Hunting from the ground, without a stand or commercial blind makes me extremely mobile. I am able to set up everywhere I want to and be ready to hunt in less than a minute without having to look for a suitable tree to accommodate my stand or a sport for the pop-up blind . If the wind is right I can hunt right away and if the wind changes on me I can get up a leave in a second and find a spot nearby that is perfect. Mobility also reduces the chances of deer catching on to you, which is what often happens when you hunt the same stand or blind several times.

Camouflage

When hunting on the ground camouflage becomes really important. Good camouflage does not only break the human outline up but lets you get away with slight movement that you need to shoulder your rifle or pull the bowstring back. The best camouflage I found that works perfectly for that type of hunting is the 3-D leafy suit from ASAT. There are many different brands on the market but in my opinion ASAT beats them all. I also found Predator Camouflage to be very useful and consequently wear almost exclusively ASAT and Predator camouflage for over 15 years now.

If you look for camouflage made for hunters, not "outdoor athletes", check out the Day One Camouflage company. This is a great company that makes top quality garments in many different camouflage patters to an affordable price and provides excellent costumer service.

Get A Rest

© By Othmar Vohringer

©Copyright Heidi Koehler Photography

A few years ago I accompanied one of my hunting partners on a moose hunt. I was a novice at moose hunting and came along for the ride providing a second pair of eyes and hoped to pick up a few hints and tips along the way. We may have driven for about half an hour along a logging road in the wee hours of the morning when I noticed some movement in the mist down in a swampy area. My hunting partner noticed the shadow in the mist too and stopped the truck. When the shadow stepped onto the road in front of us we saw that it was a legal moose. My partner jumped out of the truck, slammed the clip into the rifle, worked the bolt and a second later the .30-06 barked loud and I saw wood splinters fly off a tree about three feet above the back of the moose. “You missed by about three feet, hold lower” I said to my partner. Again the gun went off. This time I saw a small cloud of dust just behind the moose. “You missed again” said I and he responded with “Damn rifle”. The third shot at the quickly departing moose also hit a tree.

After listening to my friend’s excuses of why he missed I ventured the opinion that perhaps he should have gotten a rest before he pulled the trigger on the rifle. “What rest do you mean? I slept very well thank you very much” he replied. No, I was not talking about that kind of rest but rather resting your rifle on something to steady your aim and increase shooting accuracy. Shooting off hand is without question the most unreliable way to get a clean killing shot at an animal. There are only a few hunters that are capable of shooting accurately off hand, and even they only manage some kind of consistency at very short distances. Depending on speed of the bullet and distance to the target a fraction of an inch of movement of the barrel at the moment you pull the trigger can be as much as ten inches or more off the target downrange.

How Do You Pass Your Time In A Treestand?

© By Othmar Vohringer

“How Do You Pass Your Time In A Treestand?” This was an actual question a hunter asked on one of the many hunting social forums proliferating the internet. The person then went on to elaborate on how bored he gets sitting for hours motionless in his treestand as he waits for a deer to walk by. What followed the initial question of the poster was quite amusing and entertaining to read. 

Most of the forum members advised that they pass their time via cell phone, connecting with friends on Facebook, Twitter and other online networks. One of them proclaimed “I am actually right now in my treestand and checking out the latest posts on this forum.” A few others wrote that they take a book with them to read while in the stand, others read their favourite hunting magazine while others watch hunting TV shows on their newfangled electronic devices.

Interestingly enough from the 40 plus replies to the question not a single one of them mentioned that they hunt while on stand. Hunting deer from treestands is still somewhat new to British Columbia, and yes, it is the most effective way to ambush deer, particularly the wily whitetail deer. However, to take full advantage of a treestand scouting for the exact location of deer travel hotspots is of paramount importance. Just hanging a stand somewhere along a deer trail can have a hunter sit for many hours and days on stand without ever seeing a deer.

Are You Overanalyzing Hunting?

© By Othmar Vohringer

There used to be a period in my hunting career where I would analyze everything down to the smallest detail. While this can be a good thing it also can quickly turn into self-doubt caused by trying to analyze too much. I used to ask myself all kinds of questions before a hunt.

Things like.

What stand should I hunt today? Will the wind be right for that stand? Will the deer move by that particular stand or have they gone elsewhere? In addition to all this, and more, I was concerned about the wind, weather, moon phase, the gear I had with me and on and on it went.

I constantly asked myself; “What if?” The questions and analytical process seemed endless. It came to a point were hunting became a chore rather than an enjoyable time in the deer woods. One day a few seasons ago I just had enough of it and told myself. “Just go hunting.” Ever since that day I enjoy hunting more and appreciate the time in the woods more.

Hunting has become too complicated, when in fact it is simple. If you’re doing your scouting right then what else can you do? With years of hunting experience under by belt I remind myself that I should trust my knowledge and gut feeling more. I’ve been a successful hunter before I started to worry about every little detail and I am still a successful hunter now. But now I enjoy hunting more again.

The lesson learned here is. Don’t overanalyze hunting too much. Do your due diligence in practicing your shooting skills, learn about deer and their habits and scout. When all this is done just go out and hunt.

Watch Out For Deer Crossing Road Signs

 © By Othmar Vohringer

Hunting Tip Of the Week:

Deer crossing signs alert drivers to be careful of deer crossing the street. Usually such signs are posted where over the years several deer/vehicle accidents have occurred.

For hunters these sign have an additional meaning. It means that the stretches of road where such signs are set up are traditional deer travel corridors. Such places are a good starting point to look what’s on either side of the road that makes the deer cross on that particular place. It is not uncommon to find some type of food source and structure that are hot deer magnets.

Before you run off and start scouting make sure it is not private land, if it is, get permission before you set foot onto the property. Over the years I had good luck discovering deer hunting hotspots by starting to scout at deer crossing road signs. While some of these traditional deer crossings are active all year others may just be used by the deer at specific times of the year. In any case, the areas near a deer crossing road sign are always worth a closer look.

River Bottom Hunting Success

© By Othmar Vohringer

On Saturday, October 13, I went to one of my favorite stand locations for a morning hunt. From dawn to 10 am I've seen only one doe with a fawn. I went home and decided to come back in the evening. In the evening I passed by a river bottom on private land where I've permission to hunt.

As I glassed the fields I saw about 50 mule and whitetail deer in the field, among them several small bucks. The big bucks wait until nightfall before they come out. One of the smaller bucks, a mule deer, caught my eye because of his very unusual rack. I decided then and there to abandon my initial plan to hunt my other stand and instead take this buck. I sneaked as close as I could without spooking the deer and hunkered down behind the field irrigation pump. As I ranged the distance it showed 280 yards. It's a bit of a long shot for me but I am confident on taking them. The crosshairs settled on the bucks vitals, the Weaterby Vanguard .270 barked and sent the Federal Accu-Bond 130 grain bullet on its deadly mission.

Upon impact the buck kicked his hind legs hard upward, indicating a hit in the heart. Then he jumped across the creek and disappeared from sight into the thick stuff. It took me almost an hour to retrieve and drag him back across the creek. The hardest part was dragging him through the thick underbrush back to the creek. Thankfully my wife was on hand to give me a hand between documenting the event with her camera for an upcoming article on hunting river bottom deer.

Usually I don't hunt this river bottom until late October when the foliage is all off the trees and bushes. The reason for that is that with the foliage still on it is nearly impossible to see more then a few steps ahead of you. Yes the river bottom is that thickly overgrown with trees, vines, and low growth brush...your typical deer paradise.

River bottoms can be very hard to hunt due to their small size - deer quickly catch on to hunters - and they are often hard to get to it. The reason why I love river bottoms more then any other structure is twofold.

1. They are deer magnets. River bottoms provide everything deer need to survive. Lush and plentiful food all year long -even in the winter - and lots of cover that provides security for deer.

2. Above all I like river bottoms because most hunters avoid these places like the plague because as mentioned they are hard to get to and hard to hunt. Most river bottoms require that the hunter has a boat or a lest a pair of good hip-waders.

Getting to river bottom deer hot spots often requires boats or hip-waders. 

Shooting a deer in a river bottom is the easy part...

...dragging them back though the thick tangle of brush and across the creek to the waiting truck can be real hard work.

I'll be back in that river bottom at the end of October and see if I can tag that big whitetail deer buck I've seen there earlier in the year. I love hunting these river bottom deer.

(Images courtesy of Heidi Koehler Photogrpahy) 

Whitetail Deer Hunting Tactics: Read All About It

© Othmar Vohringer

Common belief has it that outdoor writers are the lucky ones because they can spend all their time in the great outdoors. While I admit that I call myself “lucky” I do not spend all my time outdoors. A good part of my time as an outdoor writer is used up in my office writing about the outdoors. Proof of that are my new articles published this fall in the BC Outdoors and western Sportsman magazine, available on the newsstands now.

Western Sportsman magazine. September/October 2012: Beat Them To It. On page 69 I reveal seven of my favourite early season deer hunting tactics that may help you too to get an early season buck this year. Here is a teaser.

Hunt Escape Routes.

For most hunters there is nothing worse than having to share the same area with hordes of other hunters. In fact, dealing with all the other hunters used to be the reason why I rarely went out in the early season. Not anymore! I learned how to use the other hunters as my involuntary deer drivers. When hunting highly pressured areas I forget about scouting for deer sign. Instead, I scout for other hunters and the sign they leave behind. Given the habitual human nature the hunters will do the same things again this season. Try to find trail markers hunters have left behind (they always do), stand locations and easy walking and driving access routes to the area.