In this week’s blog post I am going to talk about a whitetail deer encounter I had this past week and a bit about how hardy these animals are.

With it being may when most adult does drop there fawns I have been wondering if I would have an encounter with one. Spending so much time outside around woods with a lot of deer living around. Well I did!! Last week while at work I came across a small fawn that was only a few days old if that. The little tike still wasn’t even fully steady on his/her hoofs yet with legs still wobbly. I was on a mower cutting grass when I happened to catch fast movement and looked up to see a fawn staring at me on the edge of some tall grass. The fawn stood there for only a second or two before darting off down a ditch on its wobbly legs only to jump into the water that was surly deeper than the fawn was tall. It swam through the water like nothing and ran up the other side of the ditch on pure instinct. I am always amazed by these animals and how they act. Whitetail deer fawns can walk and nurse off of the mother just minutes after being born. So I don’t really know how old exactly the fawn was. I do wonder what happened to the mother because usually they stay around a hundred yards or so away but clearly there were no other deer in the area for at least 200 yards and I knew that because there was not really any cover. From what ive researched does usually move their fawns away from the spot where they are born within three hours because of the high probability that the smell of the after birth will attract predators. I have actually seen whitetail mothers eat the afterbirth in an attempt to conceal the fact that they gave birth at all. The fawn I seen will nurse 2 to three times daily increasing to 6-8 times a day over time. They will begin to feed on vegetation after they reach two to three weeks of age. The whitetail deer is an amazing animal and that little fawn proved that to me like I have been proved over and over again.

Whitetail deer Scouting tips and techniques

In this week’s blog I am going to share with you some tips and views I have and a few things I have learned over the years about hunting/scouting whitetails in my home state of Michigan.

First off I would like to start by saying that I have learned quite a bit for being such a young man over the years. I have dedicated a lot of my free time to studying white-tailed deer in their habitat both hunting and scouting where they live but also by researching a lot and attending seminars. I do all of this because I am fascinated by Whitetails and I have a great respect for the species and the resource they provide meaning they taste amazing! And are great for you! One of the mains things I have learned to be a successful whitetail deer hunter, particularly a mature whitetail deer hunter and I mean buck or doe. You have to put in your time and effort as many people know you can only get lucky once in a while. The past five years I have been consistently harvesting mature whitetails and have had encounters with the biggest bucks I have ever seen in the wild. The first thing I can say about how I hunt is that I do not like to hunt the same spot heavily all the time. I think that this is one of the more common mistakes people make while hunting these animals. It is fact that the more you enter an area the more scent you leave behind, whether you’re wearing a full carbon suit or not you’re going to leave scent! There’s just no way around it. I believe your best opportunity at harvesting a mature whitetail is usually the first couple times you hunt an area. The reason being is because mature whitetails are not stupid animals by any means and if you pressure them with your presence you will educate them and they will become nocturnal or just simply relocate. I like to think of it this way, every time you walk into your house or even better yet your bedroom, usually you know when something is out of place or doesn’t seem right? Well that’s how it is for white-tailed deer when you’re in the woods in their home or near there bedding/ bedroom. I take scent precautions sure, I wear rubber boots, shower before a hunt if available, I keep my clothing in bags and inside of sealed containers. I also wash my clothing with scent free detergents. I believe that all of these things you can do all add up to help your odds but one thing is for sure and that is your never totally going to beat the whitetails nose every time. I say stay clean and hunt the wind and remember persistence pays off!

North America's Most Popular big game hunting animal.

The White-tailed deer is often said to be North America's most popular big game animal.
This blog will be tell of my scouting adventures and things I learn along the way or have already learned. I hope you learn something, as I know there’s always something for me to learn from you. So please follow and comment!
This blog will be tell of my scouting and preparation adventures for hunting white-tailed deer in my home state of Michigan. This blog will tell of deer sign I come across or of certain things I have learned or learn along the way. Comments are definitely encouraged as I believe that learning about these animals is definitely a never ending experience. With that said I am all ears to anyone’s ideas about the behavior of white-tailed deer or of anything related to them in general as I post on this blog. I will be turning the age of 25 this month of May 31, 2015 I am a relatively young man. My father got me started hunting whitetails at a pretty young age (around 10). As I grew older I increasingly became more interested in the sport. When I first started I was mainly a rifle hunter. With my father being a hardcore rifle hunter it only made sense that that’s what I would be into from the start. I started playing around with bow and arrow when I was about 12. I didn’t get serious into it until I was about 19, and when I say serious I mean scouting year round and learning as much as I could. I started to notice people saying “it’s not deer season why do you care about that right now” or deer season is 6 months away! Well I have learned that to be a successful whitetail bow hunter you have to put in your time and it’s easier to do something you love and it’s my passion. I can now confidently say that I spend more time in the field scouting and studying these animals and then eventually hunting them more than most people I know or hunt with. I started rifle hunting with my father in Michigan’s Northern Lower Peninsula on a 143 acre hunting lease we still hunt to this day. As time went on I felt an increased interest in using bow and arrow to hunt deer. I feel that one must know the animal he/she is hunting more intimately when hunting with a bow and arrow. I enjoy observing and getting close to the animals and watching them act in their natural habitat, not having any clue of my presence. Throughout this blog you will see how I scout and hunt and the gear I use to hunt these animals. Thanks for reading my first post to my first ever blog hope you have enjoyed.

picture left is of a buck scrape I found in a post season scouting trip, this past winter, I never even knew that multiple bucks were visiting this area and eventually found this was just one scrape in a whole line. Scrapes are areas that deer both male and female use to leave scent either urine or fecal matter for other deer to find. It lets the deer know whos in the area and why. Scrapes are also used for territorial reasons during the breeding season . Scrapes will often be positioned under a low overhanging branch that will be used as what is called a licking branch, where further scent is deposited by deer by use of there preorbital glands on there face and from them licking/ leaving saliva.