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Farm questions

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How important is your property distance from your home? My first place was 2 hrs, second is 30mins. 2hrs was "ok" because I was new and excited...now 30 mins feels like a drag and I wish I had something down the road. Hauling machinery gets old right? You guys 3+hrs and out of state are probably laughing :)

Would you rather have one big property or multiple smaller ones. Would your opinion change if you owned the ground or just hunted them?
 
We are an hour from our IL farm but we only own it to hunt and have it rented for farming. If I was doing the work I wouldn't want to be more than 30 minutes away. I drive anywhere from 20 minutes to 3 hours for hunting now, have no problem with that, but then again I am only going to have fun!!

Kratz
 
I'd much rather have 5 good 20ish acre places scattered out than one good 200 acres. I feel like having a mature deer to hunt would be easier that way. And more options for winds and just not burning out one spot in general.
 
I'd go with many smaller parcels. Doing this gets you into different deer families which increases the odds of having a stud on one of them. Also, activity on one parcel might be dead, moving 30 minutes might be a complete 180 difference. I've seen this across three parcels I hunt. Also, for me, one big parcel would need to be a square mile or more to feel I controlled enough area, LOL.
 
That is a hard question. Small parcels are nice to jump around and hunt based on wind direction, different deer, etc... But one big farm affords the luxury of better overall management. A real key is your neighbors, on one farm that I own--my neighbors are cows--(pasture with few trees) and that helps make my farm more attractive with the food and good cover.
 
I used to have farms 2.5 hours away. No way could I keep up with it. If I wanted it done right (because I'm particular) - I only wanted to do the work myself. which created way too much driving. That was a decade ago+. I had farms close to home and farmed them & scattered in 5 counties - all were a reasonable drive though, sounds like a vast area but it really wasn't. That also got to be impossible to manage - the tractor rides alone between em wore me out. just an immense amount of work and headache.

Hypothetical made up example.... 800 acres in one tract or ten 80's all over - my "made up example".... You'd likely have more big bucks over all on ten 80's.... But the work on 800 vs ten 80's... OMG.... Ok, all those locations alone would make the ten 80's almost impossible. So, likely compromise there would be two 300 acre farms and a 200 for EXAMPLE.

Now, I'm close to home, few larger farms.... Ok, still an insane amount of work. Ok, nevermind - I have no good answer. I guess my answer is, I don't know, I do love what I have, it's a lot of work and I'm dang glad it's close to home. One dynamic that REALLY changed things for me.... Having kids and the schedule just getting filled to the max with work & fam stuff, etc. So, simpler = better. Now, if time & work wasn't an issue & say $ wasn't an issue - if all a guy's goal was: to have as much ground to kill giants..... Several giant farms, the more the better, would OBVIOUSLY be the way to do this. Is it a reality for even 1% of people? No. It's nice to have different spots, different deer herds, different scenery for sure though. XYZ farm will always have years with "no shooters", maybe EHD hits, you need to spread pressure out, etc. Even one gigantic farm could have a guy having a difficult season if all the eggs were in that basket and things were bad that year. So many variables on $, time, work, headaches, etc. Close drive to home, for ME, is a must though, but that's just me.
 
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This will be the 2nd fall of me living within 10 miles of where I'll be doing the majority of my hunting. I've got farms 1 hr away that I can still hunt and honestly now that I'm 2 hours closer, I still don't think I'll hunt them much just because the stuff down the road from my house is so much more convenient. Being able to get out of work a little early and jump in a stand not burning through vacation is going to be awesome! Also not having to worry about places to stay, worrying about if you make a bad shot and have to leave a deer lay overnight, worrying about getting someone to help drag, etc; all things that would bother me when I was making the 2+ hour drive down to these parts.
 
Property distance is a good ?. My own farm is 197 miles from driveway to driveway. Takes me @ 3.5 hrs one way. My uncle owns a good 160 acre piece 15 miles from my house that I can hunt. Last yr I helped my dad and uncle with plots and stands but never thought of hunting it myself. I also have a property that is 720 acres in three different parcels, mostly made up of timber. This 720 acres is 55 miles from home (less than an hr). I've hunted this farm for last 23 yrs.
Now, the part my wife can't understand, I will still get up and leave the house on Saturday mornings at 2 am to make it to our property by sunrise. For me it boils down to enjoying what I bust my arse for, not to mention the quality of the area. The thought is always in the back of my head to sell and buy closer to home, but their was a reason I wanted to buy where I did. Great neighbors, low gun pressure and quality of the herd.
 
Depends how old you are. Older bucks like fishbonker and me need our hunting ground right out the back door. And flat walking.Driving didn't bother me before but times have changed and with no cabin anymore or more ground lost it's nice and easier to get a meal with ground close. Sorta like shrinking your core area besides other things.
 
My farm is 800 miles from my house , I live in Maryland and have 88 acres in Illinois . I never get everything I want done and very difficult to keep things up but I manage. Love my farm and wouldn't trade it for the world worked my whole life for the opportunity to own a piece of good whitetail ground. Hope to retire there. I use to own several 40 acre spots it was nice being able to keep pressure off and bounce back and forth that was a plus.. but moving equipment and stuff was a pain. I now have it all at one spot as well wake up walk out the door and I am hunting. A lot of people think I am crazy but they never have hunted the mid west. I say do what fits what you want and not what others think you have to be happy. I appreciate the time more out there because I don't get much of it..
 
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I used to hunt 2.5 hours away in some great deer country. Over the years the farms that I had access to changed hands and things got tougher. The other big change was having kids. Now I hunt 15 min from home. I can get out there and shoot a turkey and still make the soccer game. Heck my boys can get out with me and shoot a nice bird or buck and then spend quality time with mom at home.

Not sure our ground has the quality potential that the other farms had, but the convenience make it all worth it for me.
 
Its a personal thing, but I kind of draw the line at an hour. I have two farms at that distance right now. It's about all the farther I want to go constantly hauling a trailer with tractor and equipment. It was take one hell of a "deal" to get me past that. Even then, that wouldn't be a property to have long term. It's just all the more time away from family in what is already 365 day a year obsessive passion.
 
IowaBowHunter1983 said:
Its a personal thing,
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Exactly. For sure no "right answer". Stage of life, ur personality, goals, what u wanna do to a farm, how often to want to go - agree - no right answer. Heck- walking out my Door to tend to things still has its headaches. Yep- million things to weigh out.
My goal in 5-ish years.... I wanna buy a farm in KS somewhere - be a 2-4 hour drive for me. But- be change of scenery and could do early ML season or maybe nothing is happening in Iowa so I could go to KS. I just always loved it there and down the road - want to go back. That ain't a short drive. Be cool though.
Longest drive I've ever done for semi-consistent hunting was when I was in college and we took some 10 hour trips. Lot of monkey business but was a blast. I wont be repeating that like back in the day but at the time it was great.
 
I don't mind the 7 hour trip to hunt in Iowa, it has some advantages. One, you are not on the farm every day, so the whole thing is less pressured. Change of scenery, good get away. Disadvantage of keeping an eye out for trespassing, etc... For me it is important to have cash rent crop, so I do not have to monkey with food plots, etc... good income. Easy to access stands. Lots of cameras.

My home farms in MN, are all within an hour now. I had one 4 hours away, and that was getting to be a burden for food plots, etc...
 
Living where I hunt is great. Between work and family my free time is limited, being able to get to my furthest stand in a 15 minute walk is great.
If money were no object, I'd have one 300-500 acre farm here in NE Iowa that I lived on, and 100-ish acres in Missouri with a cabin just for a change of scenery once in awhile.
 
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