What type of land do you hunt? Size, situation, etc.

[Sligh1]

Wanted to do a poll. I’m a little long winded after re-reading so sorry & skip to poll if you’d like . Or please chime in with your thoughts!!!
We all hear “the dude with 3,000 acres can’t relate to guys on public or hunting a 160”. WHATEVER. We hear different versions of it. Some of it factually stated and sometimes it’s whining. Which, I tend to agree on factual side, how a guy hunts 5000 acres is largely different than a guy that hunts 50 acres. More so on which STATE you are saying u hunt in to start. But then there’s the guy with permission to 12 farms of varying sizes. So hard to compare it all. There’s NEVER going to be a one size fits all we all hunt same way & have same access or farms - clearly impossible & been like that for eternity & always will be- good or bad. How to compare from a guy with a private 80 to the the guy that has 20 public Tracts that might be able to find 5-6 areas that don’t get hunted much. It can’t really be compared as there’s so many moving dynamics & issues at play there. Make sense?

There’s a discussion around “what works for this guy may or may not work for that guy”. Understanding those dynamics and how u personally maximize or change things based on that is a constructive discussion. “Hey, I hunt 2 iffy permission farms, what are the steps to get better access & more opportunities”? Those are discussions I love seeing guys have.

The other discussion “well I hunt public so I can’t relate to guys hunting private or large private tracts”.... I get it but there’s a line in that discussion that IMO, gets off taste. Literally guys that envy or don’t like the guy that does own his 100 acres of private. Or guys complaining they hunt public but won’t do a thing to fix it or knock on doors. You know the line I’m talking about? Clearly this may offend some. Not my intention. I’ve hunted JUNK public in MI to great iowa ground so I’ve seen it all. I’ll admit- maybe I was a bit envious when I was younger & hunted CRAP. The whining or hunter hating hunter part probably crosses the line for me though. There’s zero wrong with hunting public or a giant piece of private. Or owning a farm. Or knocking on doors. Or the guy that says “I don’t like hunting over hunted crowded land so im changing what I do...”. Just don’t wanna see guys get negative based on what choice they make for themselves or that others make.

here’s a COMMON ONE i don’t buy.... & I know this will touch a nerve, not my intention & I am happy to have a fun & civil debate..... “hunting is a rich man’s sport”. I’ve heard exact statement since I started hunting at 14 in 1993 or so. It’s not. I’ll stop here. If u do think it is..... let’s discuss.


I wanted to include a poll here..... click as many choices that fit your situation. what’s the predominant situation or land you hunt on??? Want folks to get a view of the types of hunters on here and diversity of them. If your poll answers have changed in the last 5 years - why and what did u do to change them?
of the guys you PERSONALLY KNOW.... the ones who consistently shoot the most mature deer- what’s your feedback on what type of situation they are in here or what are they doing to accomplish what they do?

again- unlimited choices that fit u & any comments surrounding that are great!
*your contribution/poll is anonymous to all.

 

[gunrunr]

Lately there seems to be a trend to downplay and degrade bucks shot on private land as if a Public land buck is worth more.
We have huge tracts of public land around here and many monsters are taken off it every year.
Nothing makes me happier and more satisfied than shooting a nice buck on my own land.
I hunt 100% on my own land and leave the public land completely alone for others.
IF that is wrong or has less value in someone's eyes, then we will have to agree to disagree.

 

[CurtisWalker]

I hunt by permission. Have hunted a tiny piece the last 3 years and harvested 3 awesome bucks on it. Terrifies me that I’ll get a no every fall when I ask. I give props to guys who get it done each year on public. Drives me insane when I set up to have guys walk in 20 min after shooting light and set up 50 yards from me.

 

[ReinertsonTaxidermy]

I own 16 acres and hunt 160 acres permission that only I can hunt.

 

[Sligh1]

I hunt by permission. Have hunted a tiny piece the last 3 years and harvested 3 awesome bucks on it. Terrifies me that I’ll get a no every fall when I ask. I give props to guys who get it done each year on public. Drives me insane when I set up to have guys walk in 20 min after shooting light and set up 50 yards from me.

The end is why I quit hunting public & high pressured private. I didn’t care that older deer were less common. It all came down to people issues... I got TIRED of having hunts ruined (like getting in hour before it got light and 30 mins after light some jack-wagon sets up 40 yards away or a million other examples). Or the drama or issues. Whatever, countless things.

There was a day when I had maybe 6 places I had permission on from door knocking and kissing butt. & some public.... I eventually got so tired of the issues, ruined hunts (when amount of days I could hunt was precious & still is) - I took one spring & yanked down any stands i had up and totally pulled up anchor. Started over 100%. At the time & still Today I thought “I’d rather chase a 150” deer without all the headaches vs a 190” deer with people problems thrown in”. Stand by that. I killed most my deer to date on small farms or permission farms. Changing with time of course but still the bulk.

the most successful guys I know spend countless weekends gaining access on multiple farms. Hunt a handful of states & usually comb through a variety & # of farms to somehow locate the 3-4 needles in a hay stack and hunt those deer. They are excellent hunters & somehow, these guys take the number game & tag 1 of the 3-4 big ones almost every year. These are guys with array of deep public land, lots of permission and they have built up countless options of land to hunt. It’s a ton of work. Not really anything I’d want to do. But props to them- for everyday dudes- connect with giants as good as anyone I can think of.

 

[2.5YR8]

I own 22 acres, lease 40 acres, and hunt public. The owning and leasing were new to me this year. Every year previous to this was exclusively public. The only reason I'm leasing is because it borders what I own, and I would like to buy it when the guy wants to sell in a couple years. I still hunt public despite owning due to the worry of burning out my place. Plus, I enjoy finding out of the way pockets on pressured public, and the quality of deer I've had encounters with on public is too much to forget about.

My wife and I are proof that this doesn't have to be a rich man's endeavor. we gross just under $100k combined and are in our 30's. We both have bachelor's degrees and after buying our 1st house in 2011 we were around $200k in debt between student/vehicle loans, and our mortgage. Since then we've dedicated ourselves to paying off loans while making improvements to the house. We paid cash for all the improvements and I did the majority of the work myself. We sold that house last January for $70k more than what we owed on it. We used that $70k to pay off the last of our debt, and used the rest for the down payment on our new place.

For us having a place of our own was more important than vacations and having a new vehicle in the driveway every couple of years. Sure it wouldn't have taken us 9 years to make this happen if we were "rich", but hard work and having personal responsibility can still get you a long ways. This is still America after all.

 

[sep0667]

I hunt two private places by permission.

One exclusive. Its 18 acres, only about 10 actually huntable as the front half is the owners house/yard and pasture. Other side of the creek that divides the front from the back is all short timber/brush. The area use to have a ton of deer, but urban sprawl I think is the culprit in lowering the #'s. I still see some good deer there and find some nice sheds in the area. Most of the time though the bigger bucks I spot out in the wide open picked fields/terraces that I don't have access to hunt. One guy has permission on the 160 acre chunk on the south side of it, mostly all open crop ground and he has two stand set up on property line of the timber/brush I hunt.

Other property is 50 acres, but it is a great 50 acre piece. I see tons of deer. Nearly every single time I hunt not only do I saw a good # of deer, but I have deer in bow range. It lies on the high bluff side of a river corridor. It also has a creek that cuts through the property dumping into the river. It is nearly all timber so no food source on it or really near it either. But the deer really move through it. I wish it was mine as I would really like to do some tree clearing or hinge cutting in parts and add some food. Nearly no matter where hang a stand you have to cut a lot of saplings to create shooting lanes. On the forest floor it is largely open with not much brush, but it is thick with wrist to calf size saplings (wish I knew what kind of tree it was) with larger trees all over as well. Really not much bedding cover and I think the deer mainly just travel through it. I'd love to try and get some food in there. Good turkey #'s there too. It has great topography and feels a lot bigger than it is. I really think if some trees were cleared in some spots to help get some more sunlight to the floor and get some brush and also plant some food in there it could really help to hold some deer in there or at least keep them close and spending more time there. Really awesome place. My father and I both hunt there, we get on week a fall to hunt and usually can get a couple other weekends to go out too. The landowner lets a couple other guys hunt there too so it does get some pressure. This is the exact type of property I would love to own.

I've hunted a couple public spots as well and have found that if you get back a ways I didn't have to deal with to much in the means of other hunters, but have still had hunts messed up by others occasionally or some idiot riding a dirt bike through.

For a while I was strongly considering seeking out a lease, but I have thrown that idea to the wayside. I'd rather just hunt where I hunt currently and continue to save and not pay for a lease in order to help save money to put down on my own piece of ground. Hoping to have something soon, should of had a piece bought just a couple weeks ago, but I was to hesitant.

 

[203ntyp]

I own 10 and hunt the neighbor's 40 acres that boarders mine. Not the best location but it beats hunting public! It's more challenging but during the rut they will show up and I'm starting to see older deer and better genetics then I've seen before.

 

[Buckhunter92]

My in-laws own 23 acres 10 of which is timber other is crp only I can hunt it. Otherwise I'm all public. That's what I grew up hunting still fun. The equipment now days makes hanging and hunting so much easier. Hopefully one of these days I'll get my own place

 

[Hardwood11]

I have 300+ acres now in Iowa. Smaller farms in MN, 40,50, 70,160,148.
Sure take pride and in all of them! ...the most fun for us is habitat work, tree plantings, CRP, so far a few does and only one buck total for our family but he was nice!