Field Reports

            This year’s snowy winter has prompted many of you to ask about supplemental feeding. Seems like many of you in the more southern climes (most all of you are south of us) are seeing more snow than in years while many of us to the north are in pretty good shape.

Most of the deer profession frowns on supplemental feeding unless it is in the form of “natural” foods like corn which has been left standing all winter or woody browse which has made it’s way to the ground do some type of woods work like TSI or a timber harvest.

So, if standing corn is OK what’s wrong with “standing corn piles”? Well, for starters many states have banned the practice of transporting food into the woods for deer or other wildlife. This is an attempt by state agencies to limit the amount of close contact among deer. Most agencies believe that nose to nose contact increases the transmittal chance of many deer diseases including CWD.

Secondly, deer which have been feeding on native browse species struggle to digest corn when it suddenly is made available to them. Deer depend on specific stomach bacteria to digest food stuffs and the bacteria come and go based upon what deer eat. Deer who have been on a steady diet of native winter vegetation struggle to digest corn, hay or similar cattle feeds when it is suddenly made available. Their stomach is full of digestion bugs (for woody browse, leaves etc) but not the kind that will digest corn or for that matter alfalfa hay. The corn or hay lays in the stomach while the deer starve to death with a full belly of food. In past years when feeding was legal in NY Neil used to find dead deer with a stomach full of hay; victims of a well intentioned landowner trying to “save” deer when the snow piled up in the Adirondack Mountains.

Let’s take a closer look at how rescue feeding typically plays out. Let’s say you own a property in southern PA where the weather has been rough this winter. The deer are being hammered by wave after wave of deep snows. The deer are losing body weight too quickly and you know that antlers sizes will be off next year due to the tough winter. You drive down to the local feed store and pick up 500 lbs. of corn just to get them through the next month or so. You dump the feed out in a couple of piles near the center of your property, set up a couple of deer cameras over the piles, and drive away. A nice yearling eight point buck discovers the corn pile and fills his belly with high quality food for the first time in weeks. Other deer find the corn and do the same, your deer cameras document that all the corn was cleaned up within a week. Two weeks after you put the original corn piles another snow hits so you run back to the feed store and buy another 500 lbs. of corn. After all, they have been without corn for a week now.

After eating the corn the nice 8 pointer traveled off and lay down to conserve energy and digest the corn. Before long he isn’t feeling too well. The bulk of corn he ate actually dropped the pH of his stomach and made it acidic. Typically, his stomach pH is a nice neutral 7.0. Tums to the rescue? Not quite, when his stomach became acidic most of the bugs (bacteria) in his stomach died. Now he is in real trouble, the nice yearling buck has a stomach full of corn and very little possibility of digesting the food. But all is not lost, after awhile more and more bugs that digest corn multiply in his stomach and in a few days he starts to be able to digest the corn.

A week passes and he is back on his feet and seeking food. Upon returning to the corn pile he finds it’s totally cleaned up. Bummer, but he still has the hemlock trees and a nice hinge cutting area he can feed in. After feeding off and on all day his belly again is upset. You see, the bugs that digest corn dominate his stomach, most of the bugs that digest hemlock and maple buds are gone. Again he lies down with a full belly and waits for things to change. After a while the bugs that digest woody browse multiply to the point where he can digest the hemlock and maple he had eaten and he is again on his feet trying to find food. He is tired and weak because very little nutrition was absorbed over the past weeks. His body weight has dramatically dropped, he needs food and fast. In the distance he hears the ATV and soon smells the scent of fresh corn. Hallelujah!! The yearling buck fills his belly with corn and pretty soon the same old feeling sets in. Yep, the pH has dropped again in his stomach, his bacteria are dead and the cycle repeats again.

As the snows melt in the spring you go out to survey your property. After a long day of shed hunting you return back to camp and toss two skulls on the wood pile. Too bad about the nice little yearling eight pointer, you had passed him three times last hunting season. You found the eight pointer and another yearling buck dead within a hundred yards of one another. The camera had showed the little guy feeding on the corn for a month or so. You call your hunting buddy to report finding eight dead deer on the property and you agree it was a tough winter and next year you need to put out bigger piles of corn. End of story.

Rapid changes in a whitetails diet is a very dangerous proposition especially during the winter months. If you are running a feeding program make sure that you slowly introduce new foods into their diet. Once they are feeding on a particular type of feed make sure you don’t run out of food for days or weeks at a time. Whitetails just can’t handle the rapid change in food sources. If the young buck in the above story had access to a limited supply of corn all season he would have maintained bugs to digest corn and tree buds at the same time. The month he gorged off and on “rescue corn” screwed up his digestive system to the point that he had little chance of survival.   Without being “rescued” he would more than likely have been a little skinny at winters end but not dead.

You can feed corn and other grains throughout the winter if you so choose, provided you introduce a small bit at a time or better yet have it out all fall and winter. You just can’t expect deer to be able to handle drastic changes in diet. But supplemental feeding is expensive. Corn is over $5 per bag in most places and one deer can go through a bag in a short period of time. Neil has a few clients who are feeding deer to the tune of $1,000-2,000 dollars per month. We would rather see landowners plant a corn field and leave it standing all winter. One acre of corn will generate around 5,000 lbs.of corn for deer and other wildlife to eat. It’s quite a bit cheaper to plant than to buy in a bag.

Supplemental feeding is also tough on habitat. It tends to concentrate deer and concentrated deer destroy habitat. Studies show that a great way to destroy your native vegetation is to start supplemental feeding deer. And by the way, that native vegetation is next years fawning cover, and next deer season’s habitat. If you want to really screw up your neighbors ask them if you can supplemental feed on their property. They will have all the deer all winter but you will have all the cover next fall. If you don’t have good habitat your hunting will suffer. Habitat destruction caused by over concentrating deer is the principal reason we do not recommend feeding deer.

Cutting trees and woody browse is another matter. Cutting generally creates habitat due to increased sunlight on ground. The tender tops of cut trees makes for welcome food for winter whitetails. They are more than likely already eating woody browse so their systems can handle it when it is introduced through cutting. Deer will generally immediately start feeding on tops as soon as they hit the ground.

Bottom line, if you want to do something for your deer all year round, get out your chainsaw and cut down some food and shelter. The deer will use it all winter long and it will stimulate new growth come spring. You can leave some standing crops from fall but don’t introduce new foods to starving deer that cannot digest them and will surely die a slow and malingering death.

It is also important to differentiate between supplemental feeding and “rescue feeding”. Rescue feeding can be summed up in one word “forgetaboutit”! The example cited above lays out the danger of rescue feeding and the reason most wildlife professionals are against any form of supplemental feeding. Supplemental has as many negatives as positives so if you feel you must supplemental feed, proceed with great caution and of course follow the law.

A good fall food plot program coupled with summer cropping and a strong habitat development program (thermal cover, browse cuts, mast trees etc.) will allow your deer to dodge Mother Nature’s winter bullets and give you peace of mind that you have taken care of your deer. As we have said time and time again, “If you want to take good care of your deer, take good care of your land”.

Post Season #2

Neil has been in the woods almost full time since season’s close “tuning up” properties. As we mentioned last week, now is the time to figure out what went wrong (or right) last season and do something about it.

It is also a good time to start taking a good look at your woodlands and developing a sound management plan. We get all excited about planting food plots and such but for some reason we tend to ignore our wooded areas. We’ve said it a hundred times but we will say it again, “when it comes to whitetails, you will get more return on your investment of time and money with a chainsaw in the woods than a tractor or ATV in a food plot”.

Deer are one thing, but another reason to pay attention to your woods is the asset value they represent. We all know the value of timber but do we really? We think of our timber resource as our (Neil’s) 401-K. Our oaks, maples, ash, pines and hemlocks are like stock in a portfolio which appreciates roughly 7% per year. If the standing value of your timber is say $100,000, well, you do the math. More than one land owner has recouped the initial investment in their deer property with timber sales. In today’s economic climate your timber might just be the best asset you or your kids or grandkids might own. But like a stock portfolio your timber must be managed.

Case in point; in the very near future Neil will not be able to harvest and transport any ash from his property due to the spread of the emerald ash borer. This pest is wiping out ash across the northern states as the larvae feed on the inner bark of ash trees. Agencies across the north, in an apparent futile attempt to stop the spread of the beetle are prohibiting the transportation of ash saw logs and firewood. Neil expects the borer will hit his property in the not too distant future and wipe out his ash trees (talk about your Enron and Global Crossing). If you had a stock in your portfolio which was about to tank what would you do? It may be too late, (due to market flooding) but this might be a good time to get your money out of your ash if you still can (guess we should have said something earlier).

Hemlock in PA and other areas is also under attack by the hemlock woolly adelgid. Although not as dramatic as the ash borer siege, we sure would hate to loose this valuable source of thermal cover for our whitetails and as an economic factor we have it on the “watch” list in our portfolio of timber.

We use Future Forest Consultants (from NY’s Finger Lakes area) to help us manage our timber resources and keep our woodland portfolio (and our deer) healthy and happy. We bring them in to work with many of our clients as well. If you have a sizeable timber resource you should, repeat, should use the services of a professional forester to assist with the management of this asset. But, be sure they understand managing for deer and other wildlife and are willing to work with a wildlife specialist like Neil if you use one.

Did you know that a simple “timber stand improvement” (TSI) can improve timber production by 5% alone and it benefits deer and other wildlife greatly? Did you know that once a professional forester marks the trees for you, you can do this kind of work yourself? Did you know that there are significant tax advantages to implementing certain forestry practices and all kinds of government programs to assist with costs? A good forester can help you get you into the right programs.

Remember a good forester is one who understands and appreciates your wildlife (especially deer) goals and is willing to work with you or your wildlife expert to achieve your wildlife objectives. Neil has worked with many good ones but has run into a few who can only think timber management. They just don’t get the deer thing and are of no use when it comes to deer and other wildlife. In his wildlife consulting work Neil has a policy of always involving a professional forester when it comes to major timber management work. A good forester and a good deer and wildlife manager can do wonders for a property with significant timber assets. No timber assets? Go straight wildlife.

OK enough of the planning and asset management stuff. This report is supposed to be about deer and winter and a great time to be out there doing some woods work for deer. How about doing some browse cuts?

Pick a half acre of woodland (preferably without any valuable timber) that would better serve wildlife as a source of food and cover than serve you as a timber investment. Fire-up the chainsaw and start cutting. You will need to cut about 70% of the trees in the area to get sufficient light on the ground to stimulate regeneration of browse species. Small trees (up to 4” diameter) should be cut ¾ of the way through or “hinge cut” to tip over while staying connected to the stump. This will allow them to remain alive for an additional year or two or even three while lying on the ground producing leaves and some tender new growth (food and cover) for wildlife. By the time they die, replacement species have already taken there place and should be producing food and cover of their own.

Larger trees that don’t respond well to hinging should be cut to drop on top of each other to form massive piles of tree tops. This adds structure to the woods and gives wildlife a comfortable place to hang out. Tree top piles protect seedlings from browsing and permit forest regeneration. This helps insure that your cut over area won’t turn into a barren over browsed area with little wildlife value.

When it is all said and done, you should have created a half acre partial clearing with some trees left standing but most of the trees laying in a tangled mess. If you cringe when you look at it you probably have done it right. The woods will gradually rebound and you will have produced valuable food and cover for your deer, turkeys, grouse and all kinds of other wildlife. Now go on and do a few more.

Cuts like this can provide up to a thousand pounds of food per acre for whitetails (and other valuable species) per year. Unlike food plots it is available year round and it requires no maintenance. In addition to food they provide security cover for fawning and nesting turkeys and escape areas from hunting pressure. A series of browse cuts arranged strategically through your property can improve hunting dramatically. A massive cut like this can make a great sanctuary area.

Get out there now. Beat the winter doldrums this is a great time to do your woods work. Cold temps and snow covers protect the forest floor and every time you run a saw you create an immediate food source for deer as they will feed heavily on the tender tips of the tops. Bring the whole family, build a fire and roast some hot dogs. Get it done now because before you know it you will be out there planting and have no time to spare. Craig planted his first food plot of the 2010 last week (of course he was in South FL) sorry, got carried away didn’t mean to rub it in (or did he).

Next week, supplemental feeding (by popular demand). Keep those emails with questions and comments rolling in.

Best regards,
NorthCountryWhitetails

Post Season #1

            OK, the season’s over, you made up for hunting season by going shopping over the holidays and you are ready to get out there and do something, right? Good!

Most of you know we are not big fans of pre season scouting. It disrupts the woods and gets the deer all on alert just when you want things to be nice and quiet. But, we are big fans of post season scouting and now’s the time to get out there as the deer are still on their hunting season patterns and most of us have some tracking snow to work with. Stuff you learn now will help with next year’s mid to late season hunts.

Get into your hunting areas and figure out how “old big boy” out smarted you. Closely evaluate trails around food plots or your stand locations. Concentrate on trails 75-150 yards from your stands or food plot locations.   How did they approach your set up? Where did they scent you from? Have they figured you out? How can you change the set up to beat them next year? Remember, deer are scent driven. They have the ability to scent check a food plot or stand locations from a few hundred yards away. If you put too much pressure on one of your food plots you more than likely will notice a trail that swings deer downwind of the plot prior to them entering. Envision a jet airplane swinging out and around to get a head wind (or at last side wind) prior to landing. In the late season you are often looking for ways to ambush deer on their final approach to a food source rather than on the food itself. Cut a tree here, block a trail there. It’s time to work out a strategy for next season.

One more thing, if you’re trying to find “old big boy” don’t be fooled by trails with lots of activity. We have noticed over the years that some of our best deer had their own way of doing things. Look for the road less traveled, older deer will often take their time in the woods zigzagging back and forth using cover and their nose to avoid danger. Neil gets excited by faint trails in the thick stuff; he feels he has a better chance of connecting with a good deer on a trail that has a few deer traveling on it per day rather than a “cow path” to the feedlot.

Don’t rely on your memory, make maps of the trails the deer are using. Overlay them on your topos or aerials. It’s a safe bet that deer will be traveling the same way next year once the pressure mounts or the snow piles up.

This is also a good time to check out your sanctuary areas if you are wondering about the habitat in them. We stay out of sanctuaries but every 5-10 years we take a look to see if they are still providing food, security and cover. This is a good time to check ‘em out if you haven’t in a few years. Also, it is the only time you should be doing sanctuary improvement work.

Go to your food sources and “walk ‘em back”. Take the track backwards to see what they are up to. Walking ‘em back is a great way to learn about how deer are interacting with their environment. How do they approach a given area in a given wind? Do they change approaches with the wind? How about bedding areas? Be sure to map where deer are bedding on your property. If you look closely you might be able to determine if many different deer are using an area for bedding or just an isolated doe with her fawns. Good to know when bucks are looking for does next fall.

How far are your deer moving to visit a food source? If it is more than a couple of hundred yards you may need to do some work to shorten the distance between bedding and feeding areas. You want to keep your deer from having to move too far to feed and bed.   If your deer are traveling off your property to bed than you had better find out what type of bedding cover they are seeking and replicate that cover on your own property.

Tracks in the snow can tell you all kinds of stuff about the deer you are hunting. This is the time of year when Neil’s clients get him in to fine tune their properties for hunting. It is one thing to grow big deer; it is another to kill them. If you are frustrated with your hunting and thinking about getting Neil in for a hunting tune up this is a great time of year to do it. All the critical signs are there for the reading and it won’t wreck the deer hunting for next fall.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Post Season

Corn Clarification
Thanks for all your questions. We have received plenty to keep us busy through the winter. Keep ‘em coming.

We heard from a few of you regarding planting corn for deer. Craig whined so much about not having standing corn this year for the late season hunt so it is no wonder it is on your mind. Some of you reminded us that our book “Grow ‘Em Right” pretty much discourages planting corn as a food source for deer. So, as the politicians say “let’s be clear”.

We absolutely discourage jumping into a corn planting program on a property until you have covered your “green plot” bases. In other words no corn until you have plenty of clover and chicory (or similar) plots taking care of the deer using your property. Green plots are typically some of the first to green up in early spring and the last to shut down in early winter.

Does need good nutrition in early spring, as they are carrying fawns and/or lactating. Bucks need nutrition to jump start antler growth. Bottom line green, green plots provide 25% protein when deer need it most in the north (coming out of winter). Green plots are used all summer and fall as well. On average they produce 3-4 tons of readily digested food per year. This can make a real difference to a deer program as they are for the most part there for the deer day in-day out, throughout the entire growing season.

Contrast this with standing corn which is typically not used until the late fall and early winter. Sure it is a great source of much needed carbohydrates in cold climates but corn provides absolutely nothing for deer through most of the growing season.

Corn is also quite expensive to grow. It gobbles up fertilizer, needs to be kept weed free (use Roundup Ready seed) and works best if planted with specialized planting equipment (corn planter or no till seed drill). It doesn’t work in small plots either as it tends to get nipped early 2-3 inches, or at silk time.

Why then, do we bother with it? Well, it is a terrific attractant during late season hunts and it does provide food when the green plots are buried in snow. Everything in the woods seems to love corn and there is never a dull moment when watching a field of standing corn on a blustery winter day. A good northern planting of corn should produce around 5,000 lbs of corn per acre. That’s a lot of food for deer and turkeys during the late fall and winter months.

We did not start planting corn at Kindred Spirits (500 acres) until we had more than covered our green plot bases. In our case we had well over 40 acres of green plots and hundreds of acres of browse producing habitat before we even began to think about corn. An industry guideline is that at least 3% of your property should be in green plots. We had darn close to 10%. But, those are only guidelines, the best test for whether you are providing enough quality forage is impact on spring and summer plants.

If the deer are still heavily browsing spring and summer native vegetation on your property you probably should be supplying more forage in the form of green food plots. In other words if you are having difficulty regenerating natural vegetation (preferred species that is) you need to either take your deer numbers down or plant more tonnage of high quality forage in the form of green plots.

If you see no or little evidence of deer feeding heavily on summer plants like oak, maple and ash seedlings or berry bushes or other woody browse species you can begin thinking about planting corn to attract deer during the late season. Best to start with at least a 2 acre field to begin with and remember to plant corn in well drained soils. Select a 90 day Round-Up ready variety of grain corn that produces lots of ears.

Make no mistake, we love our standing corn and so do the wildlife using our property. But, corn is a specialized crop which can tie up good dirt for most of the growing season without benefiting anything except your local seed and fertilizer supplier. Cover your green plot bases and then think corn.

Oh, a follow up. In the last field report we told you about a good buck a neighbor killed during the last days of the muzzleloader season. Neil was able to see better pictures of the harvested buck, he was a nice one but not one of the shooter bucks we had photographed earlier in the season.

Keep those questions rolling in.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #9

Well, NY muzzleloader ends today and Kindred Spirits is officially closed for the season. The pipes are drained, the heat shut off and everything is locked up and put to bed for the long winter.

We managed to get in a couple of sits this week and tallied 6 bucks and 21 does in 4 hrs. of sitting. This averaged out to 3.37 deer sighted per hr. We hunted food plots and watched the deer dig through the snow cover to uncover what was left of the brassica. Our tallies would have been higher but we were busy finishing our doe harvest so things were a little busy on the food plots. None-the- less the deer were plenty hungry and readily came to the frozen plots. They were really acting like true “cold weather” deer, eager to scratch up a decent meal before heading into the thermal cover for the night. Cold weather hunting over late season food sources is a great hunt if you can take the cold.

Many of you got an email earlier this week from Neil announcing that he finally connected on a nice 5 ½ year old buck. We were “iced out” of Kindred Spirits and our land partner Dave was kind enough to invite Neil over for a sit. Sure enough the guys “doubled up” each taking a nice mature animal. A big thanks to Dave for his hospitality and sharing his property with us.

Sounds like one of the nice bucks Neil hunted during bow season turned up yesterday on a neighbor’s meat pole. He caught the buck heading into a field of standing corn (gotta love that standing corn). The buck was laying up in a weedy hedge row along a river bottom with some does. He traveled in the actual bed of the river over the 10 ft. bank. Basically he was taking the “tunnel” from his bedding area to his feeding area. No wonder Neil hadn’t seen him since bow season, this guy was smart.

Some guys get all worked up when another hunter shoots “their buck” (like photographing a deer gives you some kind of ownership). We look at it differently. As long as they do it fair and square our hat’s off to them. Sure we do everything we can to keep our deer “to home” but if the other guy does a better job of hunting that buck or just gets lucky, more power to him. Working yourself up about the “other guy’ killing your buck is a sure fire prescription for ulcers and can sour your whole hunting experience. Our advice is to “forgetaboutit” and get on with your program. Every time the neighbor kills a big one he is one step closer to becoming a serious deer manager. Don’t waste your time fretting about the other guy’s success. It shrinks your brain and makes you stupid. Pat him on the back as a fellow hunter who plays by the rules and get on with your life.

We will leave our cameras out for another couple of weeks to see who made it through the season. Last year we photographed 22 unique bucks after season’s end. This year we will have plenty but they will be tougher to catch on camera as our food is spread out over most of the property.

Be sure to finish up your unique buck reports when your season winds up. Neil is anxiously waiting to hear from those of you who have been tallying unique bucks photographed each week. We want to check your buck activity level against ours. Looks like we might have observed a pretty good activity spike in early November but we have a lot of photos to analyze and chart. We probably won’t have much to report until late January.

Looking back we were pretty pleased to have been able to recommend that you should be “heading for the woods” around Nov. 4-5. That was precisely when the trigger was pulled at Kindred Spirits and we made the call a full week to 10 days earlier. We were also pleased to have made the call 28 days later for another breeding period which sure enough materialized. Hope you were able to cash in on one or both.

This year’s subplot has been at our second location (200 acre farm) and the remote camera’s at www.wonation.org. Neil is managing the property with the goal being to build up the deer population on the place and get some age on some bucks. Looks like he got a handful of bucks through the season by supplying plenty of food, good cover and security. Stay tuned as we develop this property over the next few years. It is becoming a great case study and will be interesting to see how long it takes to change the buck age structure on the property. It will all be played out for you on camera at www.wonation.org and on Neil’s blog as the year goes on. Before long we will be planting plots and photographing fawns.

A note about our approach. We do not attempt to “predict” the rut year to year as our good friend Charlie Alsheimer does with great skill and precision. We work in real time within the parameters of a limited time horizons. We are observers, describers, and documenters, of deer behavior. We try to avoid commonly used terms and labels like “peak of the rut” “breeding period” as they represent different things to different people and can lead to confusion or miss communication. We keep the labels to a minimum and tend to use simple, readily understood terms like “activity” or “breeding related activity” (when we really get into it) to keep things simple and descriptive.

We understand the rut to be a predictable and repeatable sequence of events which pretty much play out in a prescribed fashion year after year. These events are followed by other events which are followed by still others. Give us a set of behaviors and we can pretty much tell you what will be happening a few days out and maybe even a few weeks after that. If you have enough data to go on you can pretty much figure out where you are and where you are headed and once in a while figure out what you should be doing to kill a deer or two. We can’t tell you when the rut will occur next year like Charlie can , but once we get our cameras up and running and start sitting in the woods (and getting reports from the field) we can pretty much tell you where we are in the sequence and what will be happening next week or even a few weeks out. We can also suggest some hunting strategies which have worked for us.

We especially rely on you guys out there and can’t even begin to tell you how important your reports are to us as we document deer behavior across whitetail country. Each Monday after our report goes out, your reports start rolling in. You would be amazed at how these field reports tie together. Whether it is a 2 pager or a “pretty much the same out here” note it all helps us put the puzzle together. Thanks to all of you for reading our stuff and contributing to our thinking.

Now, take a few minutes over the holiday to put an email together telling us how things went for you this season. What did you see and hear. How was this year different from others? How was it the same? Why? Sorry but we are not all that interested in kill reports or pics of big bucks shot but real interested in your general observations of what the deer were doing and why.

Lots of you have written asking us to keep the reports coming. Many of you have submitted topics for discussion. OK, they are in the file and we will start knocking them out after the holidays. Thanks for being a part of the NCW extended family again this year and have a great holiday season.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #8

The curtain came down on rifle season last night and Craig had a big finish with 15 deer sighted in a 2 hr. sit. The mix was mostly does, fawns and young bucks but there is something about a dozen deer silhouettes against snow on the last night of gun season sitting in the same tree that produced a 154 inch buck (the same last evening of the season a few years earlier) to make you feel all is well in the world of Kindred Spirits. Season closes are always a time for reflection, and last night was a good one.

On the pragmatic side of things, entirely too many mature does were observed and we have some work to do this week with the muzzleloaders. Our guess is, we are collecting neighborhood deer as the cursed acorns are now snow covered and our brassicas plots are looking pretty good to them. We also notice the deer move through the brassicas plots more quickly and come to them later than corn plots which we ascribe to a combination of hunting pressure and feeling vulnerable on large fields (3 acre) of brassicas. Last night they poured into the field like football players running out of the tunnel at last light, long after legal shooting time.

Standing corn makes for great hunting when nasty winter weather forces wary bucks out of the cover and into the food. Standing corn provides plenty of cover and is a much more secure place for mature deer to feed. It is also easier to hunt as it is noisy in the wind, noisy when deer are tearing at it and noisy when deer crunch it when they chew. Sure miss our standing corn and so do the turkeys which have found some corn down in the river flats.

This week we observed 56 deer in 17 hrs.of hunting for an average of 3.29 sightings per hr. This is down from last week but we hit some tough wind and stormy weather last week which kept deer off of the plots (when we were on them). We also changed up a few times and hunted the woods looking for a plot shy buck who never went for the change up (neither did Mantle).

We learned a little something on one remote woods sit. Craig was watching a woods draw when picked up a deer hustling right along “leaving Dodge” and heading for cover. Why the hurry? Must be a good one to be moving along like that? Up came the glasses only to ID a 1 ½ yr. old buck acting like the smartest deer in the woods. A few minutes later he heard the neighbor’s 4 wheeler a full quarter mile away. This buck got spooked by neighboring hunters and was still hustling a quarter mile away. Talk about growing up fast (and smart). Two month earlier this same buck would have danced out of the way and gone back to business 200 yds. from the 4 wheeler. Now he is acting like a 4 yr. old headed for a sanctuary at the slightest hint of hunting pressure.

Last week we reported on the “second breeding” which hit exactly 28 days after things broke loose here in early November. Neil pulled some film this week and there on exactly the same day Craig reported seeing the “second season” breeding party was a “caught on camera” buck mounting a doe. Pretty cool to know that at least two does were being bred the same day (or at least within a day or two) in early December, proof positive that you need to be in the woods 28 days after the big event in November. These two events on the same day have really driven the “second rut” concept home to us.

On the really good news side we are excited about Neil’s 200 acre farm which has almost made it through its’ second hunting season. Neil lives in a hard hunting neighborhood and truckloads of “deer drivers” are a regular weekend occurrence. Saturday he watched as 15-20 guys drive the neighboring properties. At least 3 shot volleys were counted. Last year 17 of 18 bucks using his farm were killed. That’s the bad news.

The good news is, in the past 24 hrs. he has seen 5 bucks and a couple of them are 2.5 yrs. old. No doubt he has more but the count won’t be official for a couple of weeks and a whole bunch of NY hunters just got “buck legal” again in NY’s muzzleloader season which opens today.

How did he do it, how does 4 acres of standing corn and 3 or 4 new green plots sound for keeping them home? He hasn’t really hunted it and Butch helps him keep a line on the lines. Stay tuned over the next couple of weeks to see if he can bring a few bucks through the season (sure would be nice if the neighbors or NY State would give him a little help).

Speaking of staying tuned, with hunting season closing for good in a week or so, we will be out of deer hunting and rut tracking stuff to write about. But, we have heard from hundreds of you that you would like to keep hearing from us on deer stuff. We have the unique deer report to compile (hopefully some of you have been keeping track of “uniques” through the season) and will speak to how to compile your report next week.

So, what do you want to hear about and discuss with us for the next couple of months? How about letting us know over the next few weeks? This will let us get together a schedule of reports for you and keep us all in touch until next season (can’t wait). Send your questions and discussion topics directly to Sharon@NorthCountryWhitetails.com and we will take it from there. Also, and this is really important, many of you get this report second or third hand from pass along from friends. As the season ends fewer and fewer friends will be passing the report along. If you want to keep getting the report you must give us your email address. Once again send it to Sharon at the above address and we will take care of it.

Hunting this week? You bet we will be staked out on food sources hoping the onset of winter drives the big bucks to the food during the daylight hours. You might catch some “second rut” action but our bet is on winter food sources. The deer will most likely move late unless severe cold brings them out when the temps are maxed out at midday. Standing corn, anybody?

You can catch all kinds of behavior on the Buck Eye Cams at www.wonation.org if you want to see how weather affects deer behavior. The cameras were almost completely shut down during the 3 days the wind and snow blew last week, the weather let up and the cameras started to burn up with activity. They were cooking yesterday afternoon when I was in a stand looking at 15 deer in front of me. If you aren’t going to school on those remote “real time” cameras you are missing an opportunity to put the behavior story together.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #7

As the season begins to wind down we find ourselves focusing more on the management side of our program, trying to figure out how to harvest does and still keep the opportunity for that special buck alive. Sound familiar? This week we shifted back to plot hunting as the doe groups had reformed and we were hoping the bucks would follow them to the plots. We upped our doe take but still need to take a few more.

This week we observed 97 deer in 17 hrs. of hunting. This averaged 6.9 deer observed per hr. This is once again up significantly from prior weeks. This is a pretty big number which was driven by our return to hunting plots and the deer returning to the plots as well (duh). We did hunt the woods a morning or two looking to pop a doe or solitary buck away from the core plots but those sits yielded only 1 or 2 deer per hr. We also began to see some buck age this week with 33% of the bucks sighted being 2.5 or better. Do the math and you will see they are back on the food plots. We did not check our camera cards again this week so as to keep the pressure to a minimum. Neil says he will check them out this week.

The highpoint of the week can be tied to last week’s deer report. Last week Neil had me add a paragraph on “the return of the rut” after he saw that I had not mentioned it. “Better remind them that next week will be 28 days after we first saw breeding behavior” he admonished. “All those does couldn’t have gotten bred first time around no matter what the state says.”

As if Neil planned it that way, Craig found himself in the middle of a breeding party exactly 28 days after catching a party during bow season (it pays to keep notes). The 3 acre field had deer everywhere including 8 bucks and one very stressed doe ( a dozen or so does and fawns watched indifferently) who was being pursued by a 3 or 4 year old buck (with one antler grossly deformed). A nice deer but still a pass. Three 8pt. 2.5’s were destined to being spectators as every time one of them got close to the action the older and bigger buck rushed them and forced a retreat. A couple of 1.5 year olds ran a side show sparring at the far end of the field. Quite a sit with 28 deer tallied in all. Quite a contrast to last weeks sits and proof positive of the “28 days later theory”.

Our strategy for the rest of the season will be to get the doe harvest done while trying to get a look at one of our shooters (we had 3 shooters a month ago, but haven’t see them yet). We will concentrate on the food plots in the evening as they seem to be attracting crowds again. We still see plenty of acorns in the woods but the brassicas is holding up and drawing nicely. Maybe they are looking for a change of diet.

Neil is seeing a lot of action on the remote camera sites as the deer are returning to the food plots. All good stuff and all there for you to check out. We will leave the cameras running until the season has closed for a few weeks. Check them out at www.wonation.org. One of the cameras is trained on a plot that features an electric exclusion fence. Many of you have asked about it. Neil’s blog at www.wonation.org discusses this in great detail. If you are interested in excluding wildlife from food plots (for certain time periods), Neil discusses this strategy in great detail in his blog. The blog should be posted early this week.

Traditionally these last weeks of our season have been our best for the bigger bucks. But, generally, by this time we are pretty much socked in by weather and there is pretty good snow covering on the ground. Temps are low and we have some of the only food in town. Neighborhood road traffic has ground to a halt and most of the neighbors have hung it up. Things are pretty much back to normal as the season draws to a close. As of yesterday the woods are wide open, the temps are still kinda mild and there are still pickups full of hunters running the roads. Plus those ^&**$$#^^ acorns are still everywhere. We may need a little luck to get it done this year.

If you are hunting this week and you have good food plots, that is probably your best bet. But, keep the pressure to a minimum. Watch for some isolated rut activity and remember the dominant bucks are still out looking for does to breed and the 28 days later theory will be operating.

One more thing. We are aware that many of you who get this report are passing it along to friends. This is terrific and what we hope for. We really appreciate it and we appreciate hearing from you (our primary mailing list) and all the new folks out there. If any of you are not on our direct mailing list email Sharon at Sharon@NorthCountryWhitetails.com or sscholl@rochester.rr.com and ask her to put you on the direct list. Also, many have asked for more info on NorthCountry Whitetails. You can find out more about us and our various programs and land offerings at www.northcountrywhitetails.com. Some of you have asked about our book which was out of print through most of the summer while we were deciding whether to reprint or not. Well, we have reprinted Grow “Em Right and it is available now for 19.95 plus s&h. Call Sharon at 315 331 6959 for a copy or you may order it on line. Most of you “old NCW hands” already have your copy but many of the newer members of the group don’t and, there is always Christmas (great gift idea).

Thanks to you all for reporting back to us to us and your continued support. It really helps put things together for us. Some of you will be seeing your observations in our next book (of course we will ask permission first). We enjoy doing the report as much as you seem to enjoy receiving it.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #6

The week after the gun opener is always an interesting one at Kindred Spirits. We spend most of the week keeping an eye out for trespassers and road hunters and wondering which if any bucks got through the opener. This has traditionally been the least productive week of our NY hunting season. We pull back from the core “killing areas” and any hunting we do is totally “low pressure” as we attempt to get things to get back to “normal” as quickly as possible.

This week we observed 125 deer in 34 hrs. of hunting. This averaged out to 3.6 deer per hr. which is significantly up from last weeks 2.4 per hr. which is significantly up from the prior weeks 1.4 per hr. This uptick in sightings is due primarily of the return of doe family groups to food plots (bucks no longer ambushing does there) and our return to hunting plots.

Our buck count plunged this week (12) with only 2 bucks breaking the 2.5 or older classification. Either all 40 or so bucks using our property have been killed by the neighbors (highly unlikely) or they have themselves tucked away in safe houses waiting for the fireworks to die down (much more likely). They still have acorns so they don’t have to travel far to get a good meal.

We have not checked cameras in a few weeks in an attempt to keep the pressure to a minimum. Neil is waiting for a windy, stormy day to go pull film. If we don’t get one soon he will do it around 9-10 at night to avoid driving the deer to the guns of our neighbors. Our Buckeye Cams however, have been working 24-7 at our other location and are telling a story of their own. These remote cameras are really great when you don’t want to be out there pulling film. Check out the fight they caught last week at www.wonation.org.

Our doe groups have definitely reassembled and are looking to get back to their old routine. We have also begun to notice more food plot material and less acorn matter in their rumen content. This indicates movement back to food plot feeding, however, we are still seeing acorns on our access trails and roads. We are still taking does but not on core food plots.

The bucks have more or less gone underground since the opener but as the week after developed we did begin to see some easing up with more bucks easing into normal behavior patterns. We have seen some “buddying up” by bucks and more social tolerance. We are also seeing more “sparring” than “fighting”. We have some “traveling” by bucks but nothing like the pre breeding period of about 4 weeks ago. We are confident the buck activity will resume (it always has) as they recuperate from a month of rut related behavior. Our “shooters” often disappear in early November only to show up again in early Dec.

Our hunting strategy for this week will be “high stealth” food plot hunting. We will watch them from a distance (you never know when the big boy will follow a doe out to feed) and be sure to get in and out of the woods without getting caught. When and if we hunt the woods we will be hunting the edges, watching the wind, and being careful to get in and out without getting caught. Basically this week will be all about keeping and eye on things without alerting deer and chasing them to our neighbors. Some of the neighbors have begun to drive hunt and some road hunting is going on. The deer have begun to funnel into our property from the external pressure and we want them to stay there. We also want them to get comfortable again on our plots so when the bucks start using plots again where we can get a look at them.

We have never been much about blaming the weather for tough hunting (we always seem to be able to work around it) but lately we have found ourselves wishing for some severe temps and weather conditions to drive the bucks to our food plots. We believe they would just as soon stay in the security of the cover to do their feeding and in 50 degree weather they are in no big hurry to walk a half mile to an exposed food plot to feed. Severe weather (single digit nights, snow and driving winds) will drive them to the plots and get them in front of us. Mild weather allows them to stay hunkered down.

Traditionally our best hunting has been at season’s end over food sources. Hunting low pressure this week will help set up the end of season play. Hope the weather cooperates.

One more mention, the breeding fired up around Nov. 4 here. All the does could not have been bred and will recycle 28 days from around the 4th. This will create some new buck activity and a few isolated breeding parties. We’ll be in the woods the first week of Dec.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #5

Just when things started getting back to normal in our whitetail world, opening day of gun season arrived. Anyone who has ever hunted the opener in NY or PA or any other serious gun state knows the name of that tune, and while a great tradition that we wouldn’t miss for the world, it does have its impact on the deer using our property.

First the lead up to the opener. By getting back to normal, we mean doe groups began to re-assemble (a sure sign of post rut behavior) young bucks were beginning to “buddy up” again and miracle of miracle we were beginning to see deer again on our food plots( in spite of the acorns which still are everywhere). Not that we were eager for the “bucks on parade” phase to end, but the real “parade” only lasts a few days around here. What we were eager to be done with was the “lockdown” period of seeing very little deer movement and very little food plot activity. Neil’s blog headline “Caught in a Rut” www.wonation.org of last week pretty much told it all.

Prior to Saturday’s opener we observed 32 deer in 13 hrs. of sitting for an average of 2.46 deer per hr. (see what I mean about getting back to normal). A total of 11 bucks were sighted including 5 bucks 2.5 yr. or older. The buck to doe ratio was almost 2 to 1 which is an improvement over earlier weeks. The 2.5 to yearling buck % also improved to almost 50%. This is the direction we were looking for. More use of food plots, (as opposed to random feeding on acorns) and a higher % of older bucks showing up. We did not hunt as hard last week as we were looking to let the resident population relax a bit and trying to reduce some pressure we had been putting on the bucks.

We have deliberately omitted our gun opening weekend sightings as that data has little to do with behavior patterns and everything to do with hunting pressure and who hunted where. We will resume gathering data on Monday. We also did not check camera film from our 9 cameras at Kindred Spirits in order to keep pressure to a minimum. Nothing worse than “bouncing’ a nice 2.5 yr. old on opening weekend. Bang! He’s dead in 30 seconds flat. We will check cameras this week as well. Our remote Buckeye Cams are still working 24-7 (this is the beauty of remote cameras) however and picked up some interesting stuff this weekend. Check out the strangers who visited us at www.wonationorg.

Then came the Saturday gun opener (boom boom, bang bang) and everything is set back a week to 10 days. Make no mistake, we were part of the bang bang (taking 50% of our doe harvest goal in two short days) but, by Sunday noon most of the deer had gone underground. Most of the behavior we witnessed was deer on the move, relocating to safer spots. We also witnessed a smattering of legitimate breeding related behavior. Neil caught a world class chase last night while Craig saw nothing watching his favorite 3 acre food plot. Basically though most of the deer have “gone to ground” from the pressure and won’t start to show again till later this week.

Chaos aside, we were pleased with the opener. Our hunters made nothing but one shot kills and harvested the does swiftly and efficiently. Each year we get more and more excited about our doe harvest and take pride doing it effectively and efficiently. We really enjoy hunting does. We are very careful about which ones we take and are very selective in shot selection and placement. NY has helped us along with a liberal allotment of DMAP permits and legalizing rifles in our area. With no shortage of opportunities there is no excuse for sloppy hunting or shot placement and we are proud of our approach to managing our deer numbers. We like filling our freezers with a few left over for the Venison Donation Coalition. There is something about a full meat pole to keep spirits high and for a bunch of mature buck hunters the does sure fill in the blanks. Every year we put more and more emphasis on our doe harvest and we seem to be making room for more bucks as a result. If only we could protect the habitat a little more without taking the numbers too low.

Speaking of pressure, the acorn crop really helped us out here. We were able to take our does far from our core area food plots by hunting the oak woods. We hate shooting does on core area food plots and this year we can get all we need by hunting the woods on the perimeter of our property. And of course the bumper acorn crop is really helping out the deer. We skinned more than a few does with an incredible fat reserve already built up for the long winter ahead. Every deer we opened up was chock full of acorns, a stomach full of carbs filled at the expense of very little energy. I guess we have been a little selfish complaining about all the acorns.

This week we will hunt as little as possible to allow our property to rebound from the opening day pressure. What hunting we do will be sneak in and sneak out without being noticed. We will try to keep out of our core areas and let all the neighborhood deer find out food plots and secure areas. If we hunt mornings it will be in out of the way locations away from our food plots. If our neighbors are pounding their woods, so much the better. Our property is already loading up with neighborhood deer. Neighborhood pressure will neutralize the bumper crop of acorns surrounding us. The mature deer will stay away from the pressure in spite of the bumper crop.

There are plenty of older bucks out there working the late breeding does. These bucks are doing some chasing and lots of following. Sooner or late they will follow the does into one of our plots or return to them of their own choosing. We want to give ‘em a safe place to “hole up” and recoup from the pressure of the opener and the stress of breeding. Some really severe weather will help our hunting as well.

We need to take a few more does from the fringe areas but this week it will be all about low impact hunting while the bucks recover. Tread gently and let the neighbors do all the work.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #4

If the weekend of the 7th had bucks “actively engaged” with the does, the weekend of the 14th found “married”. While Craig spent most of the week riding around the country in an airplane, Neil was busy checking out the deer activity. What he found was less intensity in the buck movement category (compared to earlier weeks) with fewer chases and more “partnering up” between bucks and does in isolated pockets of cover.

Cameras showed very late food plot feeding and doe family groups beginning to re-assemble. The warm temps undoubtedly contributed to the late evening food plot use. Morning (cooler) sits were more productive than evenings with deer still on the acorns. Unfortunately they didn’t have to cover much ground to find them. So there wasn’t a lot of moving around. Our best sits were in acorn areas when bucks came by to check on feeding does and fawns, unfortunately most of the bucks were young ones. We predicted this week would be one of our most frustrating and it was. Just couldn’t seem to get in the middle of that mature buck-doe activity and most of the buck sightings were young bucks.

Let us know what you are seeing. One of the NCW families has already reported a great Veteran’s Day weekend so all of you can’t be in slow down mode like us. It is important to hear from as many of you as possible (a sentence or two is sufficient). Also, check out our cameras and blog at www.wonation.org for some cool pics and Neil’s analysis. A new blog will be up late today or tomorrow.

This week we logged 51 deer in 35 hrs. of sitting, for an average of 1.45 deer per hr. (almost identical to last week). A total of 8 bucks were sighted. The big difference being the number of 2.5 yr. old bucks or better being lower than past weeks; 15% vs. almost 30%. This is a very low number for our property but the data don’t lie.

We have not reported “unique” buck sightings in a couple of weeks due to the sheer volume of photos to go through. We know we are seeing new bucks weekly but the process is time consuming what with hunting two shifts per day, time is short. But, we are storing the pics. and will be analyzing them as soon as more time is available. Be sure to save your “unique buck” pics as they are an important part of the picture and we will be needing this data at season’s end.

Neil hunted another farm one day this week that allowed him to keep an eye on hundreds of acres of deer habitat at a time. He watched does feeding peacefully on food plots with older aged bucks working not too far away. The bucks never came by to check out the does. His take away----does on food plots are not necessarily, or at least not always, the “main attraction”. You would expect to see these roving bucks “all over those does” but they took a pass and never worked the plots. Guess nothing is for sure in the deer woods this time of year.

Last week we encountered a perfect storm in the form of a huge acorn crop blanketing the area, warm temps, and mature bucks in “lockdown” with receptive does. This perfect storm wasn’t a total bust but it sure slowed things down here at Kindred Spirits.

Our success here at Kindred Spirits has in no small way been driven by setting a better table than the neighbors. This year Mother Nature created a “welfare state” by delivering a bumper crop of acorns throughout the neighborhood. The “food playing field” was leveled this fall with the adjoining land owners not so much as buying a bag of fertilizer or a gallon on chainsaw gas.

Combine the parity in available food with our continuous hunting pressure since Oct. 15 (in spite of our low impact hunting approaches) and the fact that many neighboring properties have yet to see a boot track and you begin to get the picture of our situation.

With gun season just around the corner we are concerned about the initial neighborhood kill with the deer spread throughout the woods. That will change after two days of gun season as the pressure mounts and the deer seek out the safe havens of our sanctuary areas. If we can keep the pressure to a minimum we will see a migration of good deer home to Kindred Spirits and we will have a good chance of seeing some pretty good deer in the gun season.

However, deer are slaves to their stomachs, and as soon as the pressure drops on the outside they will head for the acorns once again and be once again vulnerable to neighborhood ambush. We sure hate seeing all those young bucks picked off. Especially with an over abundance of does that need to be taken. Oh, by the way, our corn crop failed this summer and our late season food source (other than &$%#@@ acorns) will be a late summer catch crop of brassica put in after the corn drowned. Whaaaaa!

We share this as a means of helping all better understand how the dynamics of property management operate. We have preached “food, cover, security” as the keys to property management for years. This year our food advantage has been marginalized, but we are still looking at a positive situation as “high impact” neighborhood hunters put pressure on mature deer. Our enhanced cover and security might be our “ace in the hole”.

But, bow season is still with us all week and we will stay after them hoping to catch breeding bucks moving from one doe to another. We’ll hunt the acorns hard at the traditional feeding times and won’t be afraid to put in a midday shift or two in some core areas. When a buck is done he is done and there is no rule as to when he moves again. Mild temps. will keep movement to a minimum but to quote Woody Allen “80% of success is showing up”.

If you are experiencing the same bowhunting frustration take heart. Heavy acorn crops combined with mild falls and winters (yet to come) typically result in great deer the following year. How’s that for a silver lining? And, there is always the chaos of gun season.

Next week we will report on the first weekend of gun season and tell you how you can get your hands on a few hundred thousand acorn producing oaks, free for the digging.

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #3

A quiet week and an “interesting weekend” would pretty much sum up last weeks activity. Once again we hunted oak woods and food plots all week. Of the two the oak woods were the most productive sits. The plots remained relatively quiet through most of the week with just a few sightings late in the evening on plots.

This week we logged 19 bucks and 60 does with 38.5 hrs. of sitting. This nets out to a little over 2 deer per hr. This is down some from past weeks but we generally experience a ‘lull” just before things begin to pick up. Our camera pics are also off from past weeks as were the three live cams at our other farm. Check them out at www.wonation.org. Last week was definitely the calm before the storm but the storm clouds began to gather over the weekend.

We observed a few noteworthy events this weekend. First, we passed our first “almost mature” buck of the year. We have photographed some nice “shooters” but as most of you can attest, a scouting cam pic. taken at 3 a.m. is a far cry from a point blank bow shot. Our hunting partner Steve had a nice 3.5 yr. old at 15 yds. Saturday morning and decided to take a pass. A true “catch and release” as we have this fellow full framed on camera for him to put on the wall. Next year the 9 pointer will be a “man” but……………………?

We also observed much more aggression and posturing by younger bucks, especially in the 2.5 yr. old range. We watched a few bushes getting torn up, saw some tough guy attitudes, heard some grunting and even some snort wheezing. We also saw some interesting doe behavior including a shortage of does on their old familiar haunts in favor of doe groups hanging out in out of the way places like thick brush and steep ledges. Clearly they are feeling some buck pressure and trying to make themselves hard to find.

Craig watched 12 does and fawns moving steadily through the woods single file on their way to a food plot for a late (almost dark) brief feeding frenzy. They were crossing an oak flat after leaving a brushy clear cut area. Occasionally we see doe-fawn groups moving like this during gun season when the are “coveyed up” trying to stay alive, but this early? Usually the does move around in family units of 3, 4 and occasionally 5.

Our neighbor Barry shed some light on this when he reported a spike “guarding” a food plot for an entire evening. The spike took up a position at the top edge of a 1 acre plot located on a side hill. Each time does came into the plot he rushed them and ran them off only to return a few minutes later to take up the same position and rush the next group of does who showed up. Kinda like that dog that chases every car that comes by the farm house. No wonder the does are staying off the plots (at least ours) with the yearlings out there patrolling all the familiar places.

As expected, we saw a number of bucks “on the march” just moving through, not really sure where they are going or for that matter why. But we definitely photographed fewer bucks this week than the last two. Any ideas out there? We had been pulling film every week so they may have gotten camera shy. Most likely, many of our does have pulled off the plots and the bucks have followed. Any ideas?

We expect the switch to be thrown sometime this week. This can get pretty “site specific” as the does start to come into heat so many of you may already be seeing great activity. We have seen plenty of “rush and flushes” to date but have yet to see our first “tongue out, hot and heavy, run or be gored” chases. Those are the ones we wait for, when older age bucks truly are stupid. We have also not yet seen the “age turn over” when older age bucks begin replacing younger bucks in the overall mix of numbers and show up in observable locations during daylight hours. These are the markers we always look for.

This week we will concentrate on hunting travel areas to intercept cruising bucks. We will begin moving into our core areas (have been staying out of them) to try to get in the middle of a real chase or even a “breeding party”. We’ll hunt mornings and evenings and when we see the critical markers kick in we will hunt pretty much all day. It should be an interesting 10 days.

Note; A number of classrooms and young hunters and outdoorpersons have started monitoring our remote scouting cameras at www.wonation.org and reading Neil’s blog. Are you checking them out with your kids and grandkids? If not, don’t complain when they want to go to the mall or listen to CD’s with their friends next time you ask them to go to the woods with you. This is a great way to get kids and the whole family into watching deer and other cool outdoor stuff; all in real time with the click of a mouse from the comfort of your home.

Be safe,
NorthCountry Whitetails

Weekend #2 Mid Week Report- 2009

The Calm before the Storm

            I have spent the last week pouring over thousands of pictures and can say that things are starting to get interesting in the deer woods. We are fast approaching prime time when bucks will start to aggressively cruise during daylight hours. For those of you monitoring the live WOW cameras www.wonation.org you might be surprised, buck photos are way down over the last week. You should correctly wonder, if the buck photos are down how can we be close to all hell breaking loose?

The answer; we are stuck in the yearly calm period. Let’s back up and evaluate what we have seen on cameras so far this season. The WOW cameras have done a great job this year documenting deer movement on our 200 acre test site. We initially started with about ten unique bucks using the farm. A few bucks left and a few new bucks showed up as testosterone levels elevated to their peak level around October 15. Buck photos were at their peak level for the season around the same period. The WOW cameras were showing dozens of photos daily of bucks feeding, sparing and just hanging around the food plots. Many of the photos were taken during daylight hours. It was a good time to be in the woods. Not a lot of big buck activity but good deer movement. But things changed.

Around the 21st of October the photo number started to drop. Bucks were hard to find on camera, especially during daylight hours. So what happened did the neighbors kill all the deer already? Did hunting pressure on the WOW site spook the deer to neighboring properties? How about a food shift, did the deer switch to a new food source not visible on camera?

I am sure the neighbors killed a few deer already but the buck population remains fairly intact. The WOW property has only been hunted one evening so far this archery season so the low photo number is not related to hunting pressure. What about food shift, I visited the property two evenings ago to see if the deer have switched to the standing corn. Nope, I only saw one gray fox, couple of coons and one very brave skunk. Past experience has taught me the answer is bucks are lying down. Yup, it’s that simple, they are on their bellies right now and not very active. The lay down period is a critical marker that helps determine when bucks will again become active.
Ok, so what’s happening with the bucks on the WOW site? Deer physiology can explain. If you look back to an earlier blog I described how the testosterone level on bucks will double from September until around October 15th. During this time period bucks often experience 30% body weight gain. The buck photo level was at its peak as bucks finished packing on the pounds in the food plots. They were fattening themselves up in preparation for breeding when they will bleed off the 30% body weight gain. So where are the bucks now, they are fat and happy they don’t need more body weight so the desire to feed is not as high. Bucks have reached peak body condition and are in a holding pattern until does trigger the next segment of the fall rut.

Ok, we are all hunters, what do we do when the bucks are lying down after they reach peak body condition. First and foremost don’t push them. Don’t chase them into bedding areas just because you aren’t seeing them around the food plots or transition areas. If you push them hard now you can make them nocturnal and very difficult to see in another week when they start moving on their own. If you are hunting mature bucks take some time and do a few more chores around the house, it’s a good time to earn brownie points and keep the pressure off the big guys.   I raked the leaves yesterday and will forgo tonight’s evening hunt to take my father in-law to diner. Based on the ongoing camera survey I think we are getting very close but we have a few more days to go.

So here is how I see the next ten days playing out in the deer woods. A few lucky hunters will start to see good buck movement starting this weekend. Yearling bucks will be on their feet first followed by two year old bucks flexing their muscle. Dominant bucks will start to walk younger inferior bucks off of food plots and away from doe groups. When a more dominant buck uses his body size to intimidate another buck and continues to pursue the lesser buck it is called “buck walking”.    I am not talking about the little shoving matches we have been witnessing for the last month. Dominant buck walking can last five to ten minuets when bucks can be totally obsessed with one another. Expect to see quite a bit of body posturing within the next five days, this time the body posturing will be the real deal.
Bucks will start to more frequently use grunts while with does and snort-wheeze when confronted by other bucks.

Bucks will not be focused on feeding just checking does. I would expect to see better daylight photos of older bucks starting this weekend. I will start hunting for the first time morning and evening starting this weekend. Buck pressure on does will increase until the middle of next week. Around November 4th doe family groups will start to disperse. Does will be sick of bucks midway through next week, they will do everything possible to avoid bucks including avoiding traditional social areas like food plots. The dispersal of does will make bucks cover more ground to find does. Good time to hunt ridges or any known funnels.

Around the 6th of November good bucks will be on their feet hanging with does. If you observe this behavior it might look like the buck is tending the doe but they are just hanging close. He may hang with a doe for an hour or half a day before he switches to another doe. I usually don’t see long chases during this period of deer behavior. Bucks just seem to want to be close to the girls at this time. This will last a day or two and then…….
Well, the next phase is the frantic chasing period when bucks are seeking does for breeding. Based on the WOW cameras and other camera research I estimate around November 8th bucks will be on their feet and running hard! Daylight photos of bucks streaking through plots with their mouths gaping wide should show up between November 8th and 11th. The “magic time” usually only lasts a couple of days and then the breeding starts. Bucks will run regardless of weather, rain or shine they will move. Several years ago the “magic time” started while we had 60mph gusts of wind. It was so windy I couldn’t make a twenty yard shot with a bow but still had a ball watching the bucks run does. One factor that can mute the “magic time” is temperature. Buck movement will be significantly reduced when the temperature is above 45. They will still run but they will have to frequently rest to cool.
Of course there will be some properties that kick in a little early and a few that are later but if you have been saving your vacation time for hunting season November 4th – 11th should be dynamite. I will be in the treestand sun up till sun down if possible during those days.

I’ll be blogging more frequently over the next couple of weeks to let you know what we are seeing from the treestand and on camera. I’ll be discussing hunting strategies as the next couple of weeks play out. Let us know what you are seeing? Blog when you see your first three year old bucks during daylight hours on camera or from the treestand. Let us know if you are seeing good bucks chasing does as you drive to and from work. Let’s all communicate together on www.wonation.org.

Weekend #2 - 2009

Calm before the storm, “I’d rather eat acorns” or too hot to trot? Which ever way you slice it, it was a relatively quiet week at Kindred Spirits. We hunted a combination of oak woods and food plots. The woods sits were relatively productive but the food plot sits were atypical to say the least. Over the years we have gotten accustomed to having our early season deer show up at the plots a couple of hours before dark and feed heavily until quitting time. This year most of them are showing up late (like they do in mid-November) and moving through the plots rather quickly. In other words they are not keying in all that much on the green stuff. Our photos are way down and so are our hunting sightings.

This week we logged 11 bucks and 21 does and fawns in 6.5 hours of sitting. Craig had a big 6 buck night (Sunday) which drove up the numbers but 5 of the six showed up after shooting time. This nets out to almost 5 deer sighted per hr. which ain’t all that bad but it still “feels” quiet to us. Maybe that’s because the woods hunts yield only a few deer per sit and the plot hunts have been very quiet until almost quitting time. We are still not hunting most mornings so as not to put too much pressure on the property. We are also still hunting the fringes keeping out of our core areas.

Our working theory on the “late shows’ is the heavy acorns. Acorns are still heavy in most of our woods and the deer are working them hard. Acorns are slower to digest than green plots so if they feed mid-day they may not be all that hungry by early evening. With a light to no acorn year we literally see fawns running into the plots and immediately “chowing down”. Mama reluctantly follows wishing the kids would stay in the woods until later. This year the whole family is showing up for late evening social event, a nip here a bite there, moving right along. Nobody seems all that starved. In other words, by the time they hit the plots they have been nibbling on acorns for an hour or so or they haven’t yet digested their midday meal of acorns.

On the behavior side we are beginning to see the buck doe ratio change in favor of the bucks, we are also seeing harassment of does but mostly brief “rushes and flushes’. No real hard chasing yet. Our doe family groups are still very much intact. A sure sign of things “happening” is when we see the does and fawns split up by aggressive buck chasing. That probably won’t happen for a few weeks. Light sparring is the norm but no serious fights or aggressive domination behavior has been seen. We are also seeing a turnover of 2.5 year bucks as a number of our pre-season 2.5’s are not being photographed. We are steadily seeing more mature bucks in the 3-4 year range who seem to be displacing some of the 2.5 bucks. That’s fine by us.

It looks like we have picked up a few more unique bucks this week which will push the tally up to around 35 unique bucks so far. Neil is tallying them today but still has thousand of pics to go through. Hope you all are tallying your uniques and on a weekly basis. Trust us, that data will come in handy when we put it all together after the season. Hope you are also visiting www.wonation.org to check out our blog and our 3 live cameras. They were pretty quiet last week after an uptick a few weeks ago. Not many acorns at that location probably the “calm before the storm” or perhaps they are in the cornfields which are near by.

We picked up a couple of “shooters’ last week to go along with the 2-3 we already had. One in particular has been a regular visitor all season and we knew him from last year. We named him”Fat Boy” due to his big old man’s hanging belly (no comments please) but he has yet to be photographed in the day. Talk about nocturnal; he is all over the internal core of our property all night long. Anytime between an hour after dark to an hour before dawn. We’re hoping he will show himself in the day during “prime time” and give one of us a shot. His antlers are in the 130’s but he is one heavy buck. Hope he holds most of the weight till we can get him on a scale. Stay tuned.

This week we will still hunt the fringes but have enough shooters working during daylight hours to keep things interesting. One of them could present a shot at any time. We should see some ramping up later in the week but we probably won’t be hunting cruising bucks for 10 days or so. Fat Boy has been “night patterned” and we will move on him later if we can figure out his daytime routine or what cave he hides in.

Thanks for all your emails. Some of you are really paying attention out there. Most of you experienced that snow shutdown like we did on opening (NY) weekend. Now we can all sit next to the fire next time it starts snowing and not miss a trick (that’s the value of sharing information). Anybody watching their barometer and checking against deer movement? Some of you are.

Weekend #1 - 2009

Ok, weekend #1 is in the bag but that’s about all. It started to snow Friday and we woke Saturday to a 4 inch blanket of snow and more on the way. With no need to go out and wage war with the elements we opted to hunt “low pressure” (read no pressure). Neil sat out opening morning on his farm and Craig sat the “gold stand” (the big overstuffed gold chair in his cabin). Actually, the “gold stand” is a highly productive stand affording a view of the side hill 50 yds. away; three deer were spotted moving through the brush that morning (you will undoubtedly hear more reports from the gold stand as the season progresses and Craig’s bones continue to age).

We did get in some productive sits this weekend and observed a total of 5 bucks and 30 does and fawns in 12.5 hrs. of watching. This nets out to 2.8 deer sighted per hour. That is pretty typical for a Kindred Spirits opening weekend.

No shots were taken although a number of doe opportunities were presented. We occasionally fill doe tags on evening hunts but would prefer to take does in the morning when we have plenty of time and light to recover and process the deer.

We observed some pushing and half hearted harassing of does by young bucks but nothing that could be categorized as rut-like behavior. They are walking around but seem to be much more interested in food than girls.

We hunted woods and food plots and saw deer working both locations. The deer hit the plots quite late in the evening (darn close to quitting time, like late November).We are not entirely sure why but if they fed mid-day on slow to digest acorns they may not have been ready to feed again until almost dark (as opposed to late afternoon).

As mentioned last week, the acorns are on and our food plot cameras are way down in terms of actual photos. Our deer are clearly spread across more of our property than usual. We are not fond of hitting the woods and ridges too hard this early in the season as we like to save those areas for catching up with lonely bucks on the prowl and that is a few weeks away. They are working brassica and clover but it is far from the only game in town. On the soft mast side we have pears but very few apples.

We also are seeing a lot of bear and coyote activity. The bears seem to love messing with the cameras. Two were “roughed up” last week.

It looks like the cameras picked up 2 more unique bucks this week so the tally is up to 34 uniques. We are not sure who has departed but that can be figured out later. We hope you all are tracking your unique bucks. If you haven’t been start now. You will want that information, even if you choose not to send it in to our project at season’s end.

It also looks like the snow all but shut down all deer activity. We photographed very few deer during the snow storm (and immediately after) and not much moved until the day after it ended. This is consistent with what we have observed over the years. We have never been big snow fans in the deer woods; at least not fresh snow. We would just as soon have cool clear conditions for our hunts. Any opinions about deer movement and snow storms? What did you guys see in the snow. When did they start moving again? Check out the remote camera sites at www.wonation.org to see what those cameras are telling us as well.

This week we will continue to key in on food sources (mostly food plots and oak flats) while being careful not to bump too many deer and leave our scent all over the woods. Most of our early season hunt set-ups are food plot dependent so we will be at a bit of a disadvantage until the acorns are gone. It would be easy to make the mistake of applying too much early season pressure by “going in” after them. We’ll save that strategy for when the older bucks are up and about. At this time we have photographed 2 potential shooters and we need to keep them “home” for a few more weeks until they are a little more vulnerable.

Thanks to all of you who have weighed in on Neil’s blog at www.wonation.org and keep spreading the word. Thanks for sending trail cam pics for the website as well. Let us know what you are seeing out there.

PS: The pony and her family (lots of happy kids) were reunited last week the day after the big “round up”. We are pretty sure the whole stampede went in front of a neighbor’s trail cams. Wish I could be there when he looks at the pics.

NorthCountry Whitetails

Instructions for the Buck Tracking Exercise 2009 - Click here to download Worksheet

We are kicking off a pilot study that uses scouting camera photos of bucks to track buck movement. Over the past couple of years we have noticed what appear to be a relationship between buck activity (as evidenced by photos) and the progression of the breeding season. This year we are inviting you to participate in an exploratory pilot study that will enable us to gather and analyze more data. If you have deer cameras we need your help.

Study 1 (Unique Bucks) Individual bucks will be documented on a weekly basis by antler characteristics or other distinct body markings that allow for positive identification. A photo should be printed to create a “mug shot” showing at least one view of an individual buck. Hint, save the pic as a JPEG and use Photoshop to crop the image prior to printing. Don’t be afraid to print more than one angle of a particular buck. Multiple photos of an individual buck make the process of “uniqueing” easier. Give each buck a name or number to aid in keeping track of the individual.

For the purpose of this study keep track of all new bucks showing up on your cameras on a weekly basis. Fill out the report worksheet and email back weekly to Neil@northcountrywhitetails.com.

Study 2 (Buck Movement) If you have a little more time on your hands and want to keep track of buck movement in more detail, a second more detailed pilot study is also kicking off this fall. The buck movement study will use deer cameras to track individual buck movement. For this exploratory camera survey “unique” individual bucks and keep track of the individuals during the twelve week survey period. The goal is to track movement patterns of bucks as they come and go (at least in front of your cameras) during the fall breeding season.

Use your unique buck photo log as a comparison and document whether or not each buck was photographed during each week of the survey. Survey documents follow below.

We will tally the results of these surveys at season’s end and report back to you. We will use the results to shape a national scouting camera study we are planning to launch next year. Thank you for your help. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to email Neil.

2009 - 2010 Season

Well, it’s about time to fire up the old rut tracking machine for another year. Due to popular demand we will once again be writing our weekly deer report to keep you wired in to what’s going on at Kindred Spirits, and what is happening rut wise.

We will also be hosting a blog on the website of a new national magazine called Whitetails Only. The blog will be tracking the rut and will feature 3 live cameras operating at an “undefined” location in southwestern NY. Craig is the new Publisher of the magazine and Neil will be directing a variety of field projects for the organization. We are very excited by the magazine project and would encourage you to get involved by visiting www.wonation.org and clicking on the Whitetails Only link.

Our weekly deer report will be more “personal” than our Whitetails Only blog. Many of you are close personal friends (and that’s how we like it) and most of you have been to Kindred Spirits. The report we send you each week will have more detail than our national blog. You can check it out at www.northcountrywhitetails.com . In addition to our weekly report we will also be posting some updates and camera photos of Kindred Spirits locations on our website that will not be seen on the Whitetails Only site and will not be in our weekly report.

Now, we need your help. We pay special attention to the “unique” bucks that show up on our cameras. They seem to ramp up as the rut approaches and peak slightly before breeding time. They are great indicators of the rut. We would like you to start tracking your unique bucks as we track ours.

Start counting now and finish on Oct. 4. That is your “unique buck baseline”. Let’s say 20 uniques by Oct. 4. After the 4th count every newcomer (you might add 1 or 2 or more each week) your cameras pick up. Tally only the uniques your cameras pick up each week until Dec. 15th. Tip, you might want to copy a “mug shot” of each unique as he shows up as well as all the bucks in your initial survey. Some bucks leave early only to show up at a later date. Keeping a mug file will help you keep track of who is coming and going.

We will develop a reporting form for you as the season progresses and asking you to fill it out when the season ends. It will really be cool to keep track of uniques and this will serve as a pilot for a large national study we will be kicking off next year with our new magazine. Imagine, thousands of hunters tracking buck activity as the rut develops, peaks and ends. Thanks for your help. Let us know if you have any questions and let the fun begin!

Best regards,
NorthCountry Whitetails
www.NorthCountryWhitetails.com
315-331-6959

Fall Planting Update August 2009

The last few weeks have found us out and about doing our fall planting and maintenance. Judging by the volume of calls coming in, many of you are doing the same. Here’s some stuff to be thinking about:

The time to fall plant in the north is now! Rule of thumb, you should have your fall seed in the ground at least 45 days before the first frost and the seed you put in should be capable of producing mature plants in 45 days. In our neck of the woods that is about now. Earlier can be better, but you run the risk of late summer drought and heat killing the tender young seedlings. That doesn’t seem to be a big problem this summer. In fact, excessive rain and cool temps stunted our corn so badly that we were forced to turn it under last week. Hopefully most of you have better drained soils than we do here and your spring plantings are doing fine.

One thing for sure, the rain and cool temps really grew clover and unfortunately grass. We have been mowing our green plots all summer and they keep coming back for more. We have also been applying grass specific herbicides to keep them as grass free as possible. Broadleaf weeds and flowers have been having a good year as well but we don’t get all that concerned about a few broadleaves unless they begin to damage a plot. Many “weeds” are readily consumed by deer and are used by other species for food and cover and not all that horrible. Grass is the real enemy of food plots as deer don’t eat most grasses and some are very invasive.

If your clover plots are a foot or so in height, now would be a good time to take them down to about 8” it would also be a good time to kill the grass if it is threatening your plot. We use POAST or Arrest for grass control.

What to plant for fall? Most folks plant annuals in the fall. They are interested in attracting deer to hunting food plots and providing whitetails with some fall and early winter nutrition. Corn is of course out, because corn is a 90 day crop. Clover is a little slow but some fast growing annuals are ok. Most folks like to plant brassica in the fall. It grows aggressively in the late summer and does well in the cool temps of early autumn. When early frost turns starches to sugars in the plants the deer gobble them up like candy. Best of all brassica plants like rape, kale, turnip, have great nutrition. Remember brassica are annuals so they are one season wonders. If anything comes back next season, it will be of no value.

If your ground is marginal (new, weedy ground, or acidic) a stand of oats, winter wheat or rye can be a good fall attractant and place holder for a spring planting. Deer use it heavily until it gets to be 8 inches or so in height. Some of it will be back next spring which will result in use but it should be turned into the ground once deer stop using it in spring. “No plow” mixes are good in the fall and often feature a blend of oats, rye, annual clover and other goodies that are easy to plant. Yes, you should use fertilizer and they all do better on soils with as close a ph to 7 as possible.

This afternoon we will be putting a brassica blend supplemented with turnips on the 6 acres (sniff, sniff) of corn we turned under last week. We tried to save the corn twice this summer with extra fertilizer but frequent floods, cool temps and poor draining clay soil was just too much for the plants. We have had great luck with this combo in the past, just hate to loose a couple of thousand dollars worth of seed, fertilizer, fuel and time (sniff sniff again). Hopefully we will get adequate growth out of these plantings to help the deer out over the early winter. Guess the turkeys that use the standing corn heavily will just have to figure it out on their own.

We aren’t the only food plotters sniffing this year. Many of you have been weighing in all summer wondering what to do with all the rain. Short of us all starting our own church and praying for ideal growing conditions every Sunday, all we can do is hedge your bets and work with the hand you are dealt. If we were “corn only” guys we would be in a heck of a mess. Our clover did fantastic all summer (as did all our native vegetation) so our deer are in great shape. If it had been hot and droughty our chicory would have carried the ball. What we lack with the corn failure is a fall destination feeding area that will concentrate deer on our property and give them some late season nutrition. Our decision to cut our corn losses and go with more brassica than usual (we always do some fall hunting plots in brassica) is simply an adjustment that will be helped by our recent warm weather. Wish we had the warmth last month but it didn’t happen.

The trick is never to depend on a single planting or a single variety or for that matter a single anything to carry the nutrition ball. You are almost always safe with native vegetation enhancement projects and if you are running 60% annual plots balanced with 40% perennial you will always have something going on for deer.

Our cameras are out and very soon we will have a very exciting announcement to share with you on how we (with your help) will be tracking and hunting the rut and related deer behavior this season. For now, get your plots in shape for fall, start checking your stands for safety and get your cameras in the woods. We’ll be back to you shortly with the big news.

Some of you have been calling on properties. We have sold all of our 2009 properties except one (2 in the last month). The remaining property is an Allegheny Co. 100 acre piece near Neil’s home farm. We were on it last week and it is in great shape. The food plots we put in last year are producing good clover and chicory and recently mowed. Serious mud trails are everywhere and the strategic placement of the plots and set ups is working nicely. Plenty of apples and hard mast is in evidence. This property has not been hunted for the past 2 years and has some very good sign of mature deer. Good antlers routinely come out of this area and the old owner has the pictures to prove it. It is in an excellent neighborhood with vast expanses of state forest nearby (bordered on one side) which receives only light pressure.

This property has been reduced to $1,450 per acre and is priced to sell. Hunting property sales are really starting to pop again and prices will begin rising. If you have been looking for a hunting property now is the time to act. Do your buddies a favor and pass this on to them or gobble it up yourself.

We are also actively seeking our nice properties to purchase in the central to south central NY area for fix up and resale. We are only interested in good properties with good hunting neighbors in good deer areas with potential to become great properties with a year or two of work by the NCW “Deerscaping” crew. Pass the word.

Best regards,

NorthCountry Whitetails
www.NorthCountryWhitetails.com
315-331-6959

April 1, 2009 (Spring)

Last season’s “Deer Report” was a great success we heard from hundreds of you and it even wound up in Outdoor Life magazine. Many of you asked to receive periodic updates on “what’s going on with the Dougherty’s wonderful world of deer”. Well, what’s going on is, it is beginning to look like the “winter from hell” is drawing to a close and it is time to think about planting.

Many of you asked how we were able to have such terrific late season hunting last year. We saw huge numbers of deer each and every sit. A big part of that is due to the food plots we had planted. Deer are slaves to their stomachs and a key part of any property management program is planting food plots and crops.

Here are some of the keys to our success and what you should be thinking and doing right about now:

--Soil Testing—test all your locations and follow the recommendations of the lab - do it now and be ready for spring

---Planning --- we recommend that your property is 60% perennial plants (a combination of chicory and clover make a great perennial base) and 40% annuals. This keeps plenty of food in front of the deer at spring green up.

---Spraying--- many of your planting sites will need to be killed this spring. Make sure the weeds and grasses you are trying to kill are green and growing before you spray. Don’t spray dormant plants or areas with annuals that have not yet germinated.

---Planting--- it happens every year, spring hits, you get a weather break and you plant. Then it starts snowing again. A month later your seed is dead and rotting in the ground or barely limping along. Take your time and keep an eye on the local farmers for when to plant. Our rule of thumb is plant when the leaves start to break out (mouse ear size) on the hardwoods. The trees know when it is safe to grow.

---Corn--- yes we plant corn and yes it is a big part of our late season success. But, corn is a “luxury crop” which should only be worked into your program after you have established a solid green plot program that is up and running. For more info on corn planting call us.

While we are on the topic of calling us, remember we sell seed and stuff and we would really enjoy supplying you with seed this spring. We also can supply you with herbicides, posted signs and just about anything you need to develop your property’s wildlife potential. Most of all, we can supply you with professional advice and uncommon service which comes free for the asking.

One more note- Last year about this time we sent out a special land deal announcement to you, our NorthCountry family. The deal was about a special property Neil was offering next to his farm in Allegheny County. The deal was gobbled up about a half hour after the email went out and everyone is happy today.

We have another special deal to offer-- We have two beautiful properties for sale. We set them up late last year and they are ready to go now with a number of food plots, and heavy cover areas on each property. Each has hard road frontage, power and a building site. One property is in Chenango County, NY (111 acres closer to Craig) and one is in Allegheny County, NY (100 acres near Neil).

In order to help you get started and keep your cash outlay to a minimum we are offering a free 3 year food plot maintenance contract with each property. Buy the property now and we will do all of your food plot work for the next three years. You will not need to purchase any equipment to get started. This will save you thousands of dollars and remove all the headaches out of owning a new property. Just sit back and count deer. Now that’s a deal

The plots are already installed but now you will have the pros at NorthCountry Whitetails to keep then up and running for the next three years. The seed is on us, the equipment to do the work is ours and we worry about when and how to get it done. Forget about buying equipment until 2013. Spend your money on land. It’s a great place to park your cash and have the property you have always dreamed about at the same time. And by the way, we can even help you with the financing.

October 18 (Opening Weekend)

The long awaited (and seemingly delayed) NY opening weekend finally arrived with Neil and Craig opening their 19th season at Kindred Spirits. The weather was great, gentle breezes from the west-north west and morning ice on the windshield. Picture perfect!

All sits yielded sightings and confirmed what our food plots and
9 scouting cameras had been telling us. We are covered up with deer including 20 unique bucks photographed so far.

We set our cameras on food plots in order to keep track not only of unique bucks but deer behavior and movement. Keeping track of buck doe ratios on camera and behavior (feeding vs. chasing) helps us better understand rut timing and pin down when we need to be in the woods.

Most of what we saw in the last five days was typical feeding behavior. No serious chasing behavior was observed or recorded on camera. A couple of yearling bucks made some unwelcome advances that sent the does scurrying but nothing that could even be called close to rut like behavior.

Most of the bucks observed were young ones (we seldom see older bucks till 10 days or so before breeding). The majority of older bucks we observed have been moving comfortably through the woods intent on getting somewhere but not trailing does or even attempting to locate them.

Feeding has been interesting. No feeding is occurring in our hardwoods as our acorn drop has been light. They are not browsing (leaves or woody stems) much either. This weekend we observed intense food plot feeding pretty much like we have been observing all summer. Interestingly, much of this plot feeding is occurring within yards of acres of standing corn. Yes, they are in and out of the corn but the major draw is still the clover, brassica, chicory and some fall planted oats in some late season plots. We’ll look for them to use the corn more as the season progresses.

They are also working soft mast sources. Our apples and pear trees are dropping fruit hourly and the deer are doing a good job of keeping them cleaned up. Hawthorn fruit, rose hips and dogwood berries are also being worked heavily.

Next week’s game plan will be to continue to hunt food sources located on the edges of our core hunting areas. We’ll keep the pressure off the core areas until we start seeing reckless behavior from the big guys then move in for the kill.

A couple of arrows were launched but not by Craig or Neil. A guest took a doe (one down, many to go)) and his son took his first deer ever, a fat 1 1/2 year old (remember, youngsters get the green light at Kindred Spirits.

Speaking of green light, Craig had a special treat Sunday night when a buck ( aptly named high and white) he reluctantly passed a few times last fall showed up a whole bunch higher, wider, and longer than last year. He put on quite a show working a scrape, rub, urinating and tearing up an apple tree with some good looking horns. The green light is definitely on this year. We let him go and boy did he grow!

Weekend #2

Weekend # 2 was pretty much a washout (if not a blowout) with only one sit recorded (Sunday night) but we had all kinds of time in the woods leading up to the weekend.

The weather all week was almost ideal-- mornings frosty and winds calm. We saw most of our deer in the evenings which is par for the course at Kindred Spirits. Food plots were hot with high numbers of deer sighted on the plots. In a weeks time 25 bucks were sighted with well over 100 does and fawns.

We hunted 27 hrs. to run up the tally concentrating for the most part on food plots. Neil has been working on a couple of bears that have been in our standing corn and Craig has been spending most of his time hunting brassica and clover. We each gave the hardwoods a shot but keep coming back to our core food sources.

Food is definitely the key to these early season hunts. All our plots are loading up with deer nightly. Our only “single sighting sit” occurred away from our food plots on a ridge known for buck movement. It would have been a tough week were it not for the food plots.

Once again, the deer are working the green plots much harder than the corn and very little woods browsing was observed. Pears and apples were also a big draw this week.

Most of the bucks sighted on the plots were young (1 1/2 yr. old) with a handful of 2 ½ -and one 3 ½ thrown in for good measure and keep the binoculars clean.

We saw some “chasing” (hate that term) behavior on and near the plots which was more like “flushing” behavior. That is, a young buck would take a quick run at a group or single doe and the “flush” her. A brief “chase” might or might not ensue. This behavior seemed to pick up as the week went on with the doe groups leaving (under pressure) the plots earlier each evening.

Our food plot cameras told a similar story as our observations. As the week went on we photographed more and more bucks on food plots after dark. We also are photographing more walking deer than a week ago when most of the deer were photographed feeding (before and after dark). Seems as though the boys are taking over the does hang out and the does are getting uncomfortable with all the unsolicited attention they are beginning to receive.

We have not seen any “trailing or driving” behavior with sustained chases occurring to the point of panting, open mouthed deer that obviously have been running a good distance. We have also heard little grunting. It has been mostly spot “flushing”. We expect “trailing and driving” to pick up later this week and next. This often occurs in our woods and on our ridges adjacent to our planted food sources.

We also expect to see some older aged bucks start showing up in the next week or two. The cameras are showing quite a few new and unique bucks arriving almost on a daily basis. To date, we have photographed 24 unique bucks on Kindred Spirits. He started “uniqueing” individual bucks in mid-September. Five new bucks showed up last week.

The hunt plan for this week is to stay on the plots (hoping for Mr. Big) to take advantage of more use by bucks but be ready to shift onto known buck travel areas (ridges and edges) when the older animals start cruising and showing up on film.
We also have to start harvesting does which will be done away from the food plots in the mornings.

We are still in “hunt-scout” mode waiting for the big boys to get moving before we put on the face paint and get serious. We are trying not to put too much hunting pressure on any one area and are staying out of our core hunting areas so as not to alert the big boy’s bucks to our presence.

The trick is to be in the right place when the switch is thrown and things are really hopping. We have yet to hunt our best “killing stands” .You can only sit a stand once or twice before it goes “cold”. Being in the “right place” too early in the season only serves to shift mature bucks elsewhere.

Given what we are seeing we’re looking at about 10 days till it’s time to paint our faces and suit up for “game day”

Note: Neil’s cameras also picked up the “big guy” I sighted last Sunday. The green light has turned to “yellow” but I’ll be taking a good hard look. Hate those cameras!

Weekend #3 (Oct. 26 - Nov. 2)

Weekend #3 saw some subtle changes in deer behavior and significant changes in where deer are spending their time. All week long we observed does and fawns “trying” to use food plots but being run off by young bucks. By weeks end the does had shifted from “lounging’ around the plots to feeding briefly and moving off the plots to quieter places. The net being, fewer hrs. logged watching feeding deer and more hrs. logged watching squirrels and blue jays.

This week we observed 43 does and fawns and 17 bucks from stands in 30 hrs. of sitting for 2-2 ½ hrs. morning and evenings. Total deer sightings were down with fewer deer seen per hr. but buck sightings as a % of total sightings was up dramatically. Bottom line the girls are starting to get scarce and the boys are starting to show up.

Does and fawns are still hanging together but large groups of does and fawns are less in evidence. It is basically mom and one or two kids. Not mom two aunts and four cousins.
Bucks are working solo coming together to do a little dominance bluffing and sparring occasionally in food plots.

Most of the “harassment” is being done by young bucks and is still for the most part, random flushes of doe/fawn groups followed by brief chases. Some extended chasing and trailing is being observed with more and more does” bouncing” in and out of plots and wooded areas. Haven’t seen any deer come by out of breath and obviously running hard. Few bucks have been sighted nose to the ground, “beagling” through the woods. We are beginning to hear more grunting by bucks but no real “tending” behavior has been observed. We have observed only 2 chases involving 2 ½ yr old bucks. All others have involved yearlings.

The food plot harassment has shifted some of the activity to wooded areas and locations where few deer were observed just two weeks ago. Our woods sits and cameras have been much more productive as the deer have spread out from being concentrated on feeding sites.

We photographed 6 new bucks this week making the total 30 unique bucks thus far. Of the 4 new bucks photographed 3 were 2 yr. olds or older which suggests some movement by older bucks. One 2 ½ showed up that had been hanging on a neighbor’s place (we share photos) ½ mile away. Our buck sightings so far have been 1 ½ = 60%, 2 ½ = 27%, 3 1/2 = 10%, 4 or better 3% and we expect to see more in this class as the season progresses.

At this point we have not seen a significant up-.tick in mature buck sightings. The young guys are doing the majority of the moving and the old boys are still for the most part sitting on the sidelines or at least not showing up on cameras and in stand locations.

We’ve noticed some browsing in the woods but that is largely due to deer being run off the plots. As usual, they will eat what’s handy and if they have been run off the plots leaves and twigs start tasting pretty good. Overall, they are still feeding in food plots and corn but not for extended periods of time like earlier in the season. They are in “fast food” mode; in and out of the plots.

As the week went on, our food plot sits became less and less productive as did our camera surveys. We believe we are now in the “calm before the storm” see each year. Most years the calm is over by now, but the cameras and observation dada don’t lie and the facts are the facts.

Our hunting strategy for the week will be to hang back from the core areas of the property and give the food plots a much needed rest. We’ll hunt observation stands for a while and monitor feeding areas from a distance. We will hunt close to core areas but be extra careful not to “queer” an area that will be productive next week or so. We will also keep an eye peeled, for fresh aggressive rubs on big trees, new scrapes showing a 2 ½ “ track or better or evidence of a violent chase or even a fight in the woods.

We expect to see some hard chasing, aggressive grunting, and maybe even some tending behavior by older deer sometime near the upcoming weekend and into next week. We’ll know it’s “time” when we begin to photograph 3-4 yr. old bucks on food plots after dark. Typically they will be visible by day 3-4 days after they show up at night. At any time a “hot’ doe could show up and then all kinds of action will break out but right now things are moving along the path prescribed by nature.

We’ll stay the course, stay calm and let things unfold as they always do. It’s important not to “over hunt” at this stage and put too much pressure on the property. The high drama days lie ahead and they will come. This will be a good week to give the binoculars a good workout.

Note: “Mr. Big” from opening has been photographed again. The light has gone from yellow to green. Stay tuned.

Weekend #4 (Nov. 3 - Nov. 9)

Week 4 started pretty much like week 3 ended but by week’s end things had really started to happen.
Our food plots were quiet all week. Fawns came early and worked the plots but few does showed up and when they did they were in and out in a jiffy. Young bucks were in and out of the plots but not as disruptive as earlier weeks. They mostly walked through resigned to their fate as second class citizens. Early in the week our cameras showed mature does using the plots mostly after dark along with bucks of all ages.

This week we observed 27 does and fawns and 16 bucks from stands in 21 hrs. of sitting. Total deer sightings per hr. continued to decrease with buck sightings per hr. increasing again this week. The trend of fewer deer but more bucks started opening weekend and continues through weekend #4.

We also observed many fawns this week without does in attendance. Lone does were observed in wooded areas and out of the way spots they normally don’t frequent. It would appear that the doe family units have been disrupted by the constant harassment by bucks the past few weeks.

Early in the week it appeared that the young buck “harassment” had taken it’s toll on the food plots with fewer and fewer deer using plots. That, coupled with unseasonably warm temperatures had some of the guys waving the white flag of surrender.

Food is increasingly becoming less and less important in the hunting scenario as the breeding season progresses. Mature bucks and does appear to be grabbing a mouthful here and a mouthful there as conditions permit. More and more feeding is occurring in wooded areas and areas of dense cover.

But, the cameras don’t lie and as the week progressed they began to tell a different tale. We were beginning to see more and more 2 ½ + activity by bucks, especially after dark. By Thursday they were “on the march” and more interested in walking than feeding.

The weather changed Saturday and so did our sightings from the stand. Two out of every three bucks observed were 2 ½ or older. Our stand observation data for the weekend showed almost two bucks sighted for every doe or fawn. Bucks were on the march and a good bit of buck doe ‘interaction’ was observed. Almost all of the action was away from the food plots as the does were using the woods and heavy cover to stay ahead of the bucks. We saw some good chases over the weekend as did others we spoke with.

We photographed 3 more unique bucks this week bringing the total to 33. More to the point, most of the bucks photographed this week were 2 ½ +. We also started seeing some 3-4 yr. old age this weekend from stand locations.

Bottom line, its game time at Kindred Spirits. The face paint is coming out and we’ll be hot after ‘em. We will stay off of food plots and hunt travel and transition areas. We will move into our core killing areas in hopes of catching a mature buck with his guard down. If we have a good one, this is probably the week we will see him. We’ll hunt most of the day and expect to see a good buck any time we are in the woods. We will still try to hunt low impact but this week the press is on. We’re looking for a good week here till Saturday’s gun opener then all bets will be off for a while.

Weekend #5 (Nov. 10 - Nov. 19)

We entered the week with high expectations. Our last week’s report (weekend #4) reported buck activity seriously ramped up and we were ready to put on the full court press. Despite a slightly “slow” start to the week (warm weather) the week #5 met and even exceeded expectations.

We observed a number of older age bucks standing over bedded does with 3-4 “lesser” bucks in attendance. We observed glassy eyed bucks licking does flanks and we witnessed aggressive “I’ll have my way with you” head high, full sprint chases by branch antler bucks. We didn’t see the number of “wandering” bucks we had seen during the earlier week but most of the bucks we did see were “all business” and by weeks end pretty well “doed up” and not covering a lot of ground.

By weeks end we began to see does come back to the food plots and the re-establishment of family units. Bucks weren’t working the plots as hard as the last few weeks and some does seemed to be relaxing a bit. The does were still working the clover plots and corn but more and more browsing was witnessed in wooded areas and brush.

This week we counted 96 does and fawns and 39 bucks from stands in 55hrs. of hunting. This represented an increase in deer sighted per hr. from last week. The increase is mostly due to increased use of food plots by does. Buck sightings per hr.stayed about constant with last week but, buck sightings were less constant per hr. That is we had more “buckless” hrs. this week than last but also observed 3-5 bucks at a time with “hot’ does.

We photographed 13 more unique bucks bringing our total to 47 unique bucks for the season. The new bucks photographed were: 8 yearlings, 4-2½, and 1-31/2.

This week we also photographed numerous bucks mid-day. This is a marked departure from earlier weeks and supports the notion of hunting mid-day during the rut.

The plan for the upcoming week is to set up in out of the way areas of dense cover where does and bucks are breeding while keeping an eye on “intercept’ locations like funnels and ridges.

We will also keep a sharp eye on the weather. We have already seen our first snow and the weather man is predicting a hard drop in temps later this week. When temps. drop, carbohydrates become king and the deer are likely to go on a feeding binge. This is especially true as more and more does are bred and both bucks and does are back on their feed.

Carb loading at Kindred Spirits means acorns and corn. The acorns have been cleaned up for a month so we’ll be keeping an eye on our corn fields. It might be a bit early, but before long we will be aggressively hunting food sources again as breeding behavior starts to taper off and food once again becomes key.

We’ll hunt hard and long this week and be sure to spend plenty of time in the woods. They are hot after it, and you could catch a shooter almost any time of day as he moves from doe to doe or if your really lucky be part of a “breeding party” attended by a half dozen or so bucks. It’s time to be out there.

One final note, its gun season at Kindred Spirits which means we’ll be hunting low impact and do nothing to harass deer off the property. No motorized vehicles until after dark, no walking around “still hunting” no chasing young deer off the property to get shot by the neighbors. Hunt quiet and let them filter into the food and cover you worked so hard all year to create. In two weeks time the deer population at Kindred Spirits will double as pressure from surrounding properties sends them our way.

Weekend #6 (Nov. 20 - Nov. 24)

Last weeks report can be best summed up as “gun season syndrome”. The deer using our property and that of the neighbors are well aware of the presence of hunters in the woods. Road traffic has increased, ATV’s are crawling along every mountain trail, chainsaws are running and humans are showing up where they haven’t been in 11 months. Oh yeah, occasionally a rifle shot reminds those whitetails that have been lucky enough to reach maturity that things are not well in their world. Most readers of this report are also in this situation.

With this as a backdrop, most of the deer we observed were feeding. In fact, our sighting numbers are up dramatically with some serious feeding activity going on. Note too that winter hit hard last week with snow and overnight temps in the low teens and we have very good late season food plots and native vegetation.

We observed little in the way of bucks “working” does (at least on food plots) as in prior weeks. Doe family groups are being re-established with far fewer lone fawns and does sighted. Most of the bucks sighted were also feeding with little interest in does feeding nearby.

Our cameras revealed no new unique new bucks this week. Our unique buck remains 47 identified on 500 acres since early fall. Most of the behavior caught on camera was feeding behavior; fewer bucks walking, less daytime activity by bucks and more doe groups intact. We only were able to check 50% of our cameras this week as we are in “super stealth” mode here at Kindred Spirits. During gun season we are reluctant to visit certain internal property locations unless we can do it undetected due to stormy weather or other factors. That opportunity did not present itself last week.

In 29 hrs. of stand hunting (we don’t count deer encountered while going to and from stands) 174 does and fawns and 27 bucks. Our deer per hr. count is up dramatically but our buck sightings are down especially mature buck sightings). Bottom line the does and fawns are back together and using food plots heavily and bucks (especially older ones) are still not using food plots heavily. They appear to be “laid up” in areas not readily observed by us or our cameras (“gun season syndrome”).

Our hunting plan for the upcoming week and for that matter the rest of the season will be to stay out of the dense cover areas and the internal areas of our property. With gun season upon us we can not risk “bumping deer” and running deer out of the secure areas and sanctuaries we have created on our property. We will “peck away” at the edges and wait for things to get back to “normal” in the deer woods.

From this point on, food will be “king” and deer will be slaves to their stomachs as they attempt to stockpile nutrition for the winter ahead. We hunt fall-winter food sources almost exclusively and wait patiently for mature bucks to “hit the food” during daylight hours. We expect this to occur as breeding activity subsides and neighborhood hunting pressure declines. From here on in we will be spending a good deal of our time hunting near our most preferred food source--- corn, with its, high heat, high energy, fat producing carbohydrates.

Our clover chicory plots are covered with a couple of inches of snow but are still being used. We only expect them to produce deer food for a few more weeks due to snow cover (8 in. generally shuts them down) or winter dormancy. Our brassica plantings have been long since eaten up but our corn is still going strong. Our woods have some scattered acorns and we have excellent winter browse and cover for the deer using our property to prosper.

We will try to harvest does away from the core of our property and our most attractive food plots. We expect to see mature bucks returning to our food plots shortly as breeding behavior winds up and pre-winter feeding activity ramps up.

This is the time of year when property layout really matters. The right combinations and arrangements of food cover, and access pays huge hunting dividends. This is especially true when you are hunting “small” properties (under 1,000 acres) surrounded by deer hunting neighbors.

Our deer sightings are up dramatically on plots located within the “core” of our property while plots closer to boundary lines are producing far fewer sightings and fewer “relaxed” deer. Cameras located near food plots closer to boundary lines show much less daylight use than nocturnal use. Neighborhood pressure is clearly taking its toll on the outskirts of our property yet few deer are being taken.

The weeks immediately following a high pressure opener is often a time of high frustration for hunters who “aren’t seeing any deer”. If you have food and cover hunt “low impact” and stick with it; hunt late fall and early winter food sources and allow pressure around you to move deer onto your property. If your deer hunting property isn’t seeing many deer it might be a good time to start making plans to change things for next year.

Weekend #7

Last weeks report marked the beginning of a behavior pattern which we refer to as the “frequent feeding syndrome”. Does and fawns are once more united in family units. Bucks are starting to hang out together and spending more time feeding than fighting and chasing does and food is once again king as breeding behavior subsides and winter survival becomes a priority.

Speaking of survival, the deer using Kindred Spirits and neighboring properties have been hunted for the past 7 weeks and it shows. The old does are extremely wary, the mature bucks are coming to food plots during the last few minutes of legal shooting time if they come at all and it doesn’t take much more than one foot stomping doe to run a whole herd of deer out of a food plot. Not only have the neighbors been hunting hard but we have taken numerous does as we attempt to keep the Kindred Spirits population under control.

With that as a backdrop, last week we observed 18 bucks and 71 does and fawns in 13 hours of hunting. The majority of these deer were observed on food sources with corn being the major draw. Corn is a high carb, weight gaining food which is sorely needed for the long winter ahead. Acorns and beechnuts are equally sought out as valuable pre winter foods.

For the first time since early fall no new unique bucks were recorded by our game cameras (we only checked 50% last week). Our cameras indicated more nocturnal activity by bucks and less ‘walking around” during daylight hours. The daytime walkers we photographed frequently over the past months are probably dead as taking mid-day strolls in gun season is definitely a “season ender” for any buck foolish enough not to stay put during gun season.

Cameras located in close proximity to “high impact” hunting neighboring properties (deer drivers, ATV runners etc.) recorded few deer photos and clearly told the tale of neighborhood hunting pressure. Cameras internal to the property revealed a different story, plenty of photos of deer activity a sure sign that many of the deer in the area have been driven into the food and security of Kindred Spirits.

A high point of last weeks hunt was the return of a “bachelor group” of 4-full racked older aged bucks to a corn field. Reproductive rivals for the past month, these bucks were willing to tolerate each other in the name of a pre-winter feeding frenzy. For a magic 20 minutes at the end of the day every time the binoculars came up they were looking at a full head of antlers.

Another mature buck even occurred a few days later when an apparent “shooter” appeared at the far end of a cornfield in the middle of a days end snow squall. This guy was “on the muscle” marching about, head high, telling everyone in the area he was in charge of that end of the field. The lesser bucks left in a hurry, not at all interested in a face to face stare down with Mr. Dominant.

He got a “poor visibility pass”, and was issued a rain check for the “early bird corn special” next week. We are looking forward to getting a better look at this buck next week as he just might be the one we have been waiting for.

Our strategy for the rest of the season will be to camp out on high carb food sources to take advantage of the late season feeding frenzy which is ramping up rapidly. Hard charging bucks have lost up to 25% of their body weight chasing does and fighting with each other over the past month and Mother Nature is telling them to pay attention to their stomachs or die.

In past years, extreme temperatures late in the season have forced mature bucks to feed during relatively warmer hours of daylight. Mild temps have allowed them to remain nocturnal. Sorry, but we’re hoping for severe weather till season’s end mid-December.

Particularly attractive will be high carb food sources located near dense thermal cover like spruce, pines, and hemlock thickets. We recovered a doe in one of these areas last week and it looked more like a barnyard than anything you would ever encounter in the wild. Hunting pressure and early winter conditions has reduced deer movement dramatically, so any time you can find early winter thermal cover and high quality food in close proximity it is bound to be a hot spot.

This is definitely the time of year when a well managed property comes into it’s own. Corn, clover and brassica located in close proximity to thermal cover and security doesn’t just happen it’s created. Perfectly located stands where deer can be observed without putting undue pressure on the hunting site are designed to work that way. Properties that “attract’ deer when other properties are “deerless” are created, not found. Management matters, especially this time of year.

Weekend #8

The hunting season in NY and for that matter most of the northern states is gradually winding down. Gun seasons in most states have begun and in many cases ended. Deer have been hunted hard and most herds have been thinned. Most states offer late season deer hunting opportunities which can be challenging but in the case of mature bucks very productive.

Last weeks observations was pretty much a continuation of the week’s before which we dubbed the “frequent feeding syndrome”. The deer at Kindred Spirits are returning to food plots in droves making for some pretty interesting sits. The deer are still wary, and while feeding heavily, are a long way from being relaxed.

They are on constant alert and bolt at the slightest provocation (real or imagined). Mature does that two months ago fed with heads down and tails twitching now stand motionless, sentinels, to feeding fawns. Young bucks wander aimlessly in and out of food plots, not sure why they are there. Mature bucks are hard to see and come to wide open food plots only under cover of darkness or when severe weather drives them to feed during daylight hours.

Most deer movement is along prescribed travel routes between secure areas and food sources. Deer are starting to browse along these routes and are beginning to utilize all sorts of browse species. Our ‘brush’ species (dogwood, wild rose, berry bushes, etc.) are being browsed more heavily than our “woods browse” (oak, ash, maple). This is largely due to the dense cover afforded by the brush vs. relative openness of the hardwoods.

Last week we observed 31 bucks and 207 does and fawns in 27 hours of hunting. Our deer count per hour is up to almost 9 per hour which is largely due to the deer returning to food sources and a concentration of deer on our standing corn plots. They are using our green plots some but they have been covered with snow for some time now and standing corn makes for easier pickings. Our buck to doe sighting ratio has dropped from earlier weeks due in part to fewer bucks on the property and older age bucks making their selves scarce.

Absent were the older age class bucks that started using our plots a few weeks ago. We have no reason to believe they were killed but ample reason they were away from the plots “holed up” with a “late estrus” doe or two. We will look for their return when the breeding is finally finished and feeding and staying alive has their total attention. The question being, “will hunting season end before they return?”

Our cameras have revealed no new unique bucks for the second consecutive week (we only checked 50% last week). Missing are many bucks that we have been photographing on a regular basis all fall. It appears that neighboring properties have taken their share (or even more than their share) of bucks. We know of 15 confirmed buck kills by neighbors most of which were yearlings. A few 8’s and a 10 have also been reported but no kills of fully mature bucks. We are hopeful that most of the older age buck class is still with us including a mature buck or two. Gun season coincided with the height of buck movement this year which drove the neighborhood buck harvest up considerably over past years.

We will continue to hunt food sources (standing corn) for the remainder of the season.
We’ve taken all the does we needed to meet our management goals but still have some room on our tags for a mature buck or two. Our best bet for a shooter buck will be on food as that is where the majority of deer on our property can be found.

Hunting pressure has made older age bucks extremely wary. They do not want to venture into any open spaces including food plots and standing corn. It will take a heavy snow storm, an extended period of severe weather or a little carelessness caused by breeding activity to produce the targets we have been holding out for all season. We’ll keep hunting pressure to a minimum and hope for Mr. Big to show up one more time.

As the season progresses we once again see the hunting benefits of managing property for whitetails. Many, sits produce dozens of deer sightings coupled with an equal number of turkeys. The key to late season hunting success is plenty of food, plenty of cover and low impact hunting.

If you don’t have concentrated late season food sources, scout to identify areas deer are using and watch for a second round of intensified buck breeding activity which should kick in shortly (roughly one month later than it occurred earlier his season). This can be a productive time to hunt travel areas frequented by bucks as they seek out receptive does.

Weekend #9

Week #9 marks the end of deer season here in NY. We will still be monitoring cameras (to do a post season census) but will not be logging any time in deer stands till next fall.
We will be doing a “season in review” report next week and are very interested in your “take’ on the hunting season cycle as well. Please keep the reports coming in.

We will also be sending our periodic “habitat” updates throughout the winter and spring to remind us all that it’s all about habitat and good habitat means good deer hunting. Feel free to circulate these reports among your hunting buddies. You don’t have to own land to “think habitat” and we are always happy to answer any questions you might have about white-tailed deer, or whitetail property management.

This week we observed 48 does and fawns and 6 bucks in 6 hours of sitting. Our hunting time decreased but our deer sighted per hr. continued to be very high. We did not check cameras last week so we have no new information on unique bucks sighted. Our buck sightings this week were all on immature bucks. Also, 2 of our 3 sits ended early as we were in doe harvest mode. Like so many of you, we are sure Mr. Big was just about to step into the open just when we touched off on that “hawky” doe that had been blowing at us all season.

All of our hunting this week was on food sources. Once again they were working corn heavily with some browse and green food plot feeding thrown in to balance out the corn overload. We had about 6 in. of snow all week so the deer had to do some digging to get at the clover and chicory. The brassica is long gone. We observed numerous deer pawing through the snow to feed on half frozen clover with standing corn just 40 yards away.

Behavior wise, we have only observed deer feeding or traveling to and from food sources. The young bucks we observed had survival on the brain which means filling their stomachs. Most of the mature does observed were still on “alert” as neighborhood hunting pressure continues. Doe-fawn groups frequently showed up, fed briefly and left the food for the security of close by cover only to return 30 minutes later. Some mature does hung up at the edge of the plots only to retreat for no apparent reason into the security of protective cover. Fawns without does in attendance still haven’t figured things out and are content to stay put and feed aggressively. Clearly, the old girls know what’s up and act accordingly. We can only surmise the same is true of our more mature bucks.

Those of you still hunting will do well to hunt winter food sources in the weeks to come. There will probably be some isolated breeding related activity but you have to play the percentages and concentrate on food sources this late in the season. Green plots will produce less and less as winter conditions shut them down. Native vegetation (browse) will be used more and more as winter conditions continue to develop.

Those of you with standing corn, soybeans, or even brassica will have outstanding opportunities to see deer if you have the best groceries in the neighborhood. Those of you who don’t, will wish you did.

The smart old bucks will not be all that eager to show themselves during daylight hours and, since night hunting is frowned upon by the authorities, your best bet may be to “hunt the weather”. By that we mean the nastier the weather, the better your chances of getting that shooter buck in front of you during shooting hours.

Extreme cold forces mature bucks to feed during daylight hours (warmer) to conserve energy. Deep snow and 2-3 day storms can do the same. Bottom line, if you have late season food sources and the weather stinks, climb into your warmest gear, get out there, and gut it out.

Our next report will review the entire season and address many of the questions that you have been asked all season. We will also be asking a few questions ourselves in our never ending quest for the “perfect” deer hunting property. We will be sharing what we have learned this year and our strategies (hunting and habitat) going forward. Stay tuned.

Post Season Analysis

        The day after deer season ended everyone asked “How was your season?” The answer was always the same
“Not sure yet”. Not sure, how can you be not sure the day after the season ended?

You’re sure of what you harvested (13 does and 0 bucks) and you’re sure of what you saw from the stand and what your cameras caught (48 unique bucks during season) but you really can’t be sure of the outcome of the season until some time later. You have to let the dust settle and take an inventory after the shooting ends.

We pulled our cameras last week after shooting over 80,000 pics and were delighted to have photographed 22 unique bucks after the season ended including 3 we had never photographed before. We also have it on good information that 3 good bucks that we saw during the season are still using the property even though the post season cameras didn’t pick them up.

The surviving buck brigade looks like this: 4-spikes, 5-4’s, 1-5, 3-6s, 2-7s, 4-8s, 2-dropped (probably 160’s), 1-2pt.

Not exactly the Outdoor Channel but this is how it sorts out right here in the heart of NY deer country. We are pleasantly surprised with the post season results as the neighbors hit the bucks hard this year due to an early gun season which hit during a high buck activity period. We have plenty to work with for next year and look forward to getting some age on those deer.

Sure we would have liked to take a big buck this year but he just didn’t show up. We passed up a couple of mid-130 3 year olds but we have steadily raised the bar over the years and we were looking for something in the 4-5 year age class. Every decent buck we photographed presented itself for a shot during the hunting season this year. Our setups were good, we were just lacking age.

The “trophy” of the year was caught on camera. Not a book buck but a common poacher dragging a button buck out of our property. Twelve terrific action shots of the %%&#@ sneaking out with a little guy three days before the end of the muzzleloader season. Charlie A. couldn’t have shot the picture clearer or posed it better but so far no positive I.D. The pictures have made the rounds and one thing for sure-- the neighborhood knows the Dougherty’s are watching and someone is getting a nervous tic.

We have kept 4-5 year old deer every year on our property now for at least 10 years but not this year. We’ve been logging our property heavily for the past two years. This summer the loggers concentrated their cutting in some of our best sanctuary areas. We have concluded that big bucks don’t like skidders showing up in their bedrooms.   Over the past two years we disrupted most of our sanctuaries and believe the older age class deer just didn’t tolerate the disruption. We shut the loggers down Sept. 1 and saw a quick rebound in buck numbers but the old boys had dispersed and to our surprise never returned.

The logging was extremely well done and a huge habitat success. Future Forest Consultants left our woods in great shape and the habitat will be terrific going forward. Bottom line---you need to break an egg to make an omelet. We have been at this for nearly twenty years. Disruption is an ongoing part of property management and we are looking forward to rebuilding our age structure and having things get back to normal.

An interesting by-product of the lack of older age class bucks on the property may have been changes in buck movement patterns. Buck movement in past years has been very constrained. They seemed to stay in prescribed areas and seldom entered certain other areas. This year saw more buck movement across the entire farm than in the recent past. Bucks were showing up everywhere and anywhere. Could it be that in past years the old boys kept them in their place? Or at least out of their place? Opinions or observations anyone? We’ll keep an eye on it going forward.

Many of you have written or called asking about our high numbers of late season deer sightings. We averaged sightings of almost 9 deer per hr. by seasons end while most hunters were lucky to see 8 deer in a week.

The answer is pretty simple--- a “tuned up” property and low impact hunting. Kindred Spirits has been pretty much “in tune” for a number of years now. Our deer numbers are in line with our habitat and our food plots and native vegetation enhancements are able to supply year round nutrition.

The operative phrase here is “year round”. It is not enough to plant a few summer and early hunting season food plots and call it done. From a hunting standpoint you need to plant plenty of late season food sources to attract late season deer. We use a combination of green plots (clover chicory, brassica) and corn to keep our deer well fed through the season and beyond.

We also are fanatics (well, Neil is at least) about “low impact” hunting. No ATV’s no pickups only electric carts and “shanks ponies”. We sneak into the woods and sneak out through designated approaches. No “bushwhacking” across country, no still hunting and absolutely no deer “pushes” (quiet or otherwise). Believe it or not well over 80% of our 500 acres is “off limits” during gun season. We move a bit more during bow season and never, never hunt a stand when conditions are wrong.

If you had a rough second half you need to seriously consider creating more late season food sources and adopting low impact hunting strategies. Neil stays busy all winter working with clients on improving both. Now is definitely the time to get in the woods and get your plan in place for next year. Once spring comes things start happening fast and furious and before you know it you are up to your ankles in dirt. If you need help give us a call at 315 331 6959.

The Rut

The highlight of the deer watching season is undoubtedly the “the windup and wind down” of the rut. Many of you noticed that in no time of 8 weeks of deer reports did we mention the word “rut”. This is for good reason as in our opinion a great deal of confusion surrounds the rut; particularly in defining the terminology typically associated with the rut.

We deliberately avoided labeling behavior we and our cameras identified and chose instead to describe. We stayed away from “calling” the rut in favor of describing what we observed as accurately as possible. We learned from your emails and calls that one man’s “chasing” was another man’s “seeking” or “trolling” and almost everyone had a different understanding of what is meant by “breeding” while almost never observing any “breeding” at all.

We also learned that rich descriptions of behavior foster communication and shared learning. We received hundreds of responses like “we are seeing exactly what you described” or “we haven’t seen that but we are seeing this”. This was great stuff. Instead of arguing about stages or phases of the rut (“the rut is on, I just saw a buck chasing a doe” or “the rut’s over I haven’t seen a buck all weekend”) we were sharing observations and fostering communication between thousands of whitetail watchers.

What We Reported

Our observations and descriptions followed a fairly predictable pattern that has been established for some years at Kindred Spirits. Other “tuned up” properties pretty much seem to report the same.

The season opened in mid October with 4-5 deer sighted per hr. Our deer were using food plots heavily with does and fawns moving in well established family groups. Young bucks were all over the plots with an occasional older buck coming by to advertise his presence at a scrape or licking branch. The youngsters were already interested in does and would occasionally take a brief run at a doe/fawn group who would scatter like a covey of quail and quickly resume feeding.

Many of you reported similar behavior and a few called “an early rut” (hate those labels). Those of you without food plots to concentrate feeding deer typically saw fewer deer per sit than did food plot hunters. Food is definitely the key to understanding early season whitetail behavior.

As the season progressed we observed more and more aggressive behavior by young and older bucks alike. Doe and fawns began to disappear from the food plots as food plots were targeted by bucks “on the muscle”. Our deer sightings dropped to roughly 2.5 with our doe/fawn count dropping and our buck sightings rising. We gradually pulled off the food plots in favor of “intercept” stands that keyed on wind currents and topography.

The pace gradually picked up as did the buck sighting ratios. Immature buck sightings gradually were replaced by older buck sightings as more and more older age class bucks were out and about. Aggressive “chases” were frequently seen as “racked” bucks took over the property. The younger bucks almost seemed to pull back from the core of the action becoming more observers than participants. During this “magic time” we photographed 13 new unique bucks that probably had been laid up in our sanctuaries or on neighboring properties. Our “magic time” fell on the week of November 11-19th. Most of the action fell during 11-15th.

Then someone threw the switch. Mature doe sightings fell off precipitously as did mature buck sightings. Our camera photos were down 60% the week of Nov. 20-27th . We picked up an occasional chase here and there but our sightings from the stand dropped to 2.4 deer per hr. The food plots were for the most part populated by nervous fawns and young bucks acting stupid but the real action wasn’t happening on the food.

Many of you reported “rut over” around this time (once again labels not serving us well). Was the rut over or is something else going on?   Yes, we had entered into the first week of the gun season but the simple answer is the “rut” was far from over. We were in “lockdown” the mid-rut period every year where mature bucks and does alike virtually disappear from their regular haunts. It generally coincides what many describe as the “peak” of the rut or “breeding period” but since we don’t know what a “peak” looks like and never see any “breeding” we are reluctant to use these labels.

We think we know what is going on back in the dense sanctuary areas (does hunkered down with bucks near by waiting for a breeding opportunity) but our low impact hunting approach does not lend itself to crowding the participants. We hear the occasional crashing, grunting and raking so something is going on but most of it is behind closed doors in the thick cover. What do you think?

Gradually, during the next couple of weeks we began to once again see more deer. Doe/fawn groups once again assembled and returned to feeding behavior bucks started to show up on food plots again and our deer per hr. sightings climbed to almost 9 per by season’s end. Back to normal but more deer than ever. All this with a backdrop of ATV’s, deer drives and rifles going off.

Unfortunately not all of you saw this “return to normal” pattern of behavior. Some of you succumbed to the “rut over—game over” syndrome packed it up, and headed home. Others experienced the same excellent late season as we did and enjoyed a full season of quality hunting. The common denominator--a well tuned property and low impact hunting. The deer drivers and big woods hunters were done weeks ago.

We have observed this predictable cycle ever since Kindred Spirits reached a point of “fine tuning” 10 or so years ago. We have heard from many of you who experienced the same cycle as well. Some of you use different labels and terms to describe the cycle but the sequence of events seem to remain constant. Let us know what you think but please use descriptions rather than labels as labels mean many different things to many different people.

In our opinion, the quality of your late season hunting is what separates good properties from the not so good properties. Most hunting properties are good in the early season and almost all hunting picks up during the “rut”. Only great properties have great late season hunting. Now is the time to address this issue by taking a good hard look at your property and developing a plan.

Next year will see some new food plot locations (away from the core of the property to reduce hunting pressure in the core areas) and the beginning of regeneration of most of our woodland areas. We will invite the older age class bucks back into our sanctuary areas with peace and quiet and lots of high quality food. What will you be doing differently?

We have really enjoyed producing this newsletter and hearing from so many of you. If the weekly reports were a success it is because so many of you took the time to report what you were seeing in your neck of the woods. We are definitely planning to do them again next year and look forward to your help.

Many of you asked questions which we were unable to answer in our updates. We plan on producing a Q & A publication every week or two. If you want to receive it and weigh in with us just stay tuned. If we are bothering you, let us know and Sharon will take you off the mailing list. Thanks again for your help.