Your Hunting Land Description????

[chokepoint]

Woods

Fairly typical scenery here


Woods,Woods,Woods

I hunt big woods in SE Canada. Very little agriculture although there are some isolated farms near here with soybeans, alfalfa, and corn. Mostly 100's of square miles of woods with very few people 5 miles outside of town. Lots of logging roads and clearcuts in different stages of regen. It is hard to find a place 0.5 miles from a road or ATV trail.

A mix of softwoods and hardwood. Very little mast except for apples around old farms etc.

Buck quality generally tops out in the 150's due to poor feed. Winterkill is a big issue. We may have lost 50% of the bucks last winter according to the biologists. 5-10 deer per sq mile at best and this is one of the best counties in the province but it is not SK.

Access is not a problem for the most part. Tracking is a favored method but we get little snow in season. Baiting has boomed in the last 20 years which I dislike. Treestands over cuts is another common method. Hunting pressure is not high at 1 hunter per sq mile and less than that in reality. Poaching is rampant.

I scouted a huge amount of land this spring. It took all my time and I still didn't do more than skim it. Sign is very sparse and difficult to read here. The bucks cover many sq miles in the rut due to low densities.

It is a very exciting place to hunt but it can be frustrating

 

[BrewCrew]

My properties are nothing to call home about but I will try and describe it the best that I can. I have two pretty good sections in rolling timber hills but for the majority of what I grew up on and what I learned to hunt on is pushing 6000+ acres of agriculture ground with a timbered ditch that runs north to south on almost every one of them. For the most part our best way to kill one where I am from is with the smoke pole. Spot and stalk type hunting with good optics trying to pick one off of a terrace mid-day. For bow hunting I like to hang over tractor crossings and fingers off of a north/south ditch that creates a natural funnel that deer like to squeeze through for a shortcut.

 

[letemgrow]

Here is an aerial of my farm, the stand sites are marked with a yellow tab...except for one that is a white circle. The blue lines are the entry routes to the various stands, the blue ovals are apple orchards and the red ovals are american chestnuts.

 

[Joey Rott]

My hunting spots vary a good amount. But i'll describe the one I hunt the most.

There is 160 Upland acres with a creek running through the middle. There isn't a lot of timber on the property.. maybe 25-40 acres that run along the creek in little pockets. The rest is Ag. What makes it good, is in the early season there is tons of cover from the agriculture and green. So the deer stay there quite a bit. In the fall and winter, it's a great travel corridor. It's the biggest timbered area in probably a 15 sq mile area... so the deer not only travel through there a lot, but most of the deer in that 15 sq mile area winter in there. But being that it's small timber there is only a few places you can hang a stand, as otherwise you'll bump them walking in. Buck to Doe ratio is about 1:1

The other spot I hunt is 220 acres of river-bottom, with about 1/2 of it being timber. It used to be full of mature cottonwoods, but all of the large ones were harvested about 8 years ago. Now it's overgrown with mostly junk trees & tons of brush piles. It's been burnt 3 times but still is really tough to walk through in many areas. But the deer really like it. Buck to Doe ratio is probably 1:7, and a much higher number of deer pr sq mile than my upland hunting areas. But seeing a mature buck is harder.

 

[Bowhunter500]

-How many acres do you hunt, how much is timber/cover or crops?

about 135 Acres... about 10% is crop... rest is timber

-Do you have food plots or does the owner not allow or too much hassle?

No. not allowed too...

-Do you OWN the land, have permission, lease it, public land, etc?

Public Land...

-Giant bucks? Lots of deer? Too many, not enough???

Many Big bucks... lots of deer... too many does...

-Do you put immense hours into stands, foodplots, scouting, cameras, etc, etc. OR do you more show up for the hunt once season hits?

Stands, scouting and cameras alll the time! Dont post pictures usually because i dont want anyone to get my hard work! ha

-How many treestands, blinds or spots do you have?

7

-What's the hunting pressure like on the land and in the neighborhood?

Um... slow... occasional hunters come through but nothing big.. Neighboring land during shotgun season is ridiculous.. Shots going off almost all the time.. but the neighboring land is about 6 miles away

-How do you feel your hunting land stacks up against other pieces in Iowa or elsewhere?

Um... Pretty good for public land... Private land is hard to find where the owner doesnt bowhunt... so im loving public land!

-How long have you hunted the land and have you been satisfied with the hunting?

Ive been hunting the land for 4 years. Completely satisfied... Gets better and better every year!

-Hunt it with buddies, alone, with family, etc?

Sometimes alone... but more often with My stepdad