Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting How long would you hunt an unproductive stand?

That could be hours, days, all season, years? I got nothing up north this last deer season along with a lot of guys from up there. I sat the same stand that I got a buck from the two previous years, so unproductive just the last gun season. National Forest land so low deer numbers, hard winters, wolves, bears, poachers, Indians that hunt rear round, low hunting pressure... Excuses maybe, but easy to get to from the cottage and I'm well past my prime. Do you guys move stand sites often, scout for better local deer sign, have a bunch of possible stand locations, go still hunting or tracking if you don't see anything from your deer stand or would you drive to a more productive area with better hunting?

Hard to find anywhere to go around here without dropping WAY more cash than I'm willing to part with on a lease for our 7 day gun season, so I hunted a fairly unproductive tract for about a decade. I was happy just to have somewhere to go that didn't break the bank. 🤷‍♂️

It was 65 acres, and between me, the owner who hunted it off and on, and my Dad who aged/health issued out a few seasons ago, we averaged about a deer every other year off it. It started off decent, but treelines connecting it to bigger wood and water got cleared out 5-6 years back and it really declined after that. I sat out there every day of the firearms and ML seasons most years and never even saw a deer a couple of them.

It got sold this year, so I'm currently scrounging around to try to get some feelers out on something for next season. If I don't get anything lined up by spring I'll be hopping the line to hunt some public acreage in IN. Odds of drawing a tag on any public in-state within reasonable driving distance are about as good as getting hit by lightning.

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If you just like getting out in the woods and have a spot that has been productive in the past, just sit tight.

If it is a must for you to take a deer perhaps you should move to another area or maybe "still hunt" rather than sit.

To some it is about the hunt. To me, if you get one that is the " creme de la creme ".

I don't have any unproductive stands. That's what scouting and trail cameras are for. I have had some cameras in unproductive areas. But then I don't put a stand up if they cams or the sign doesn't look good.

Leaving a stand in one spot for a long time rarely works. At least on public land that I hunt. Private, where you're having food plots and building bedding area for them to come to you and stay. That's different.

This is a perfect example of why I don't have a stand in a spot all the time. It rarely works. Things change year to year. I've shot nice 8pts 2 years in a row now in northern WI on public land. Highly pressured public land. We've never shot a buck in either spot before. But the sign was there this year and last. I also don't dick up my stands by sitting them in a schitty wind or even a an OK wind. Pressured deer won't go there in daylight if you hit it on a bad or iffy wind. They just won't. Plan on seeing them at night on your camera and that's it.

Believe it or not, there area spots on public where others won't go. Go there. But have 4 or 5 of them so you can hunt one from any wind direction.

This. The one exception might be a large geo barrier deer need to navigate - some of those make for semi-consistent success IF there continues to be some sort food for them in reasonable proximity. And that's getting harder and harder to find.

With the low deer densities in the big woods, things change on an annual basis. The compounding factor in all of this in northern WI is folks dropping bait piles a couple weeks before the season in areas that are convenient for them (hunter). A lot of the sign you might have been noticing suddenly goes dry because there's a new artificial food source two miles away.

IMO, Wisconsin's biggest challenge in the national forests isn't the wolves or the litany of other things that get mentioned - IMO, it's lack of forest regeneration. Deer are pretty resilient but no food for them in combination with prolonged cold and deep snow spells doom.

SKane and tzone hit on it.

Another thing I see people (some of them friends) make is the idea that because they're in the woods and deer are in the woods - they're in the right spot. Ask "why am I sitting here?" - trails between bedding/food? Deep cover? What? Why are the deer there? Answer that, see it's productive and if a stand isn't - chances are it's because some other change has happened to affect the deer.

Also don't hunt a good stand in bad wind. Quickest way to make it a bad stand. Even if I've seen deer the day before out of that stand - bad wind, I don't sit and push it.

Spot on sir. An argument I've been having with my father and brother the last 10 years. Woods are too mature, little to no undergrowth - it's why the small game numbers are down and deer as well. We needed to log off chunks of the property 10 years ago. Bud Worm finally made them agree to it this year. I suspect in 3-4 years, things will be much better.

Yep that's a good point. That's not WI specific either (as you know). Any national forest has this for the most part. I have notice this year while grouse hunting in far northern MN, there was some logging taking place in the Superior NF. That surprised me a bit.

That can be said about northern Michigan as well. This frustrated me to no end in the northern UP where winters are (were) severe, no agriculture and low deer density. I loved roaming the woods in the 70s until baiting was allowed and became an accepted hunting method.

Just as I thought, you guys have been working at it harder than I have been these last few years. I've got to realize that a woods isn't a museum and that things change. Lots of mature soft maple up there and anything over about four feet high is pretty worthless to a deer. Given that, I generally look for cut over regenerating poplar sections because the browse is lower to the ground, but those trees all grow about two feet a year. I never found a single rub or scrape in there last fall and when I take a buck out of there, he isn't there the next year. There is still isn't tracking snow up north to help find some new areas, but that's on the agenda when it happens. We do take all the public paper mill, state and federal land for granted up here in the north.

The only time that I've seen baiting work real well was when dad and his friend were selling off a bunch of land that they owned up north. A buddy from work told me about a picked squash field that still had a lot of squash left over and we were welcome to get some. I took a pick up truck load up there and dumped it on that land and a week later it looked like every deer in Marinette County was living there. Sold the property real quickly after that. Baiting isn't legal in Forest County, but that doesn't seem to apply to or stop the locals from doing it from what I've seen. It sure turns deer nocturnal here. I throw half a dozen apples out in the yard every night here at home and about 2 am nine of the resident deer show up on the trail cam.

I generally don't give up on a stand location until I've gone a few seasons without sighting anything. If a given venue is unproductive, I'll just let it go for the year and come back the next. Most of the venues we've given up on were ones that we tried early on, but turned out to be zilches. The majority of the venues have been in place for a decade or two.

What makes them unproductive? Generally speaking, two mature bucks are on the property at any given time. They move off and go somewhere else during the rut and what we see during season are several other bucks that have gone roaming themselves. What's stable are the doe herds. We make them happy and they stick around and act as bait. If the matriarch of one of those herds gets a bone up her butt about a stand, the other deer will avoid it like it was poison. This behavior will last multiple seasons. In the worst case, the curse was permanent. We set up a stand within sight of the old site, and could see deer avoiding the cursed tree for a decade. My sons are now using the new site, and our new guy, Foxtrot Charlie got a doe out of it this past season.

On the other hand, I've seen two instances where solitary doe have ID'd a stand and come every time I was out. They learned to bring pesky bucks by the stand. This behavior lasted a couple of seasons each time.

What makes me bail for a season? If I've had a few sits at a venue when I knew it should have been productive and wasn't, I'll bail for the year and hunt somewhere else. If that goes on for a few seasons, I'll seriously start to question the sense of maintaining the venue.

Not long, no patience

If you want to kill a deer, you’re wasting your time hunting where they ain’t, unless you just happen to be there on the lucky day one happens by. By all means, go someplace else, even if you have to stay in a motel for a few nights or camp, if that’s something you’re equipped for. Now is a great time to scout, leaves down and maybe even some shedding going on. If you’re going to do that, don’t put it off. Get an app like On-X and the maps for your state so you can narrow down the good places before you go. Works best on a tablet for pre-scouting as the details are easier to see. The spots you mark will transfer to your phone.

You didn’t mention (or I missed!) what your stand consists of. I, with the “help” of the state land-management folks, gave up hunting from trees this past season and acquired a good tripod stool with a seat 21” high. Weighs two pounds, less than my safety harness, I think. Straps to my pack or goes over my shoulder. Lets me adapt to the wind or other factors instead of being trapped by a fixed location. Really paid off for me, and no worries about falling out of a tree far from help. Wish I’d done that years ago instead of limiting myself to fixed locations. There are limited options for still-hunting on the small WMA I hunt, and I’m nursing a bad knee, so sitting is what works best. Fortunately, that WMA is only 20 minutes away from home.

You can't kill deer if your hunting where there's not any. It's very easy to change a deer's pattern and turn them nocturnal. Deer have more common sense than man and the ability to smell humans hours later. Most hunters do their best to educate the deer and don't even realize what they're doing. Wearing camo and walking the woods with a gun doesn't make one a hunter.

The OP is talking about big woods hunting - not moving 75 yards to a new "venue" where you can still see the old "venue" on the same patch of ground.

One of the problems around here is you can move a few miles and still usually see the old venue most of the time. Trees aren't particularly abundant (and becoming even less so rapidly as more keep get cleared for city folks' retirement McMansions and ag acreage consolidation), and the terrain is a pancake 😜

Absolutely.

Now take that same area and fill it with mixtures of mature popple stands, soft maple, swamp and no agriculture - and, likely about 2-3 deer per square mile (some areas actually void of deer) – that's the OP's dilemma. And it's a sucky one without a lot of time and effort - OTOH, killing a big woods buck is about as cool and rewarding as it gets.

tzone made it work this year and I swear every time I talked to him this fall, he was boots-on-the-ground in northern WI, preparing for the upcoming season.

The one other note about hunting the gun season in northern WI is unlike many gun seasons in other states, it's pretty well post-rut – maybe a little lingering but that's it. Taint for the faint of heart or those used to seeing deer on each sit.

Yeah, I cut my teeth hunting a lot of pine swamp/popple/willow in northern MN. It was whole different ballgame than hunting here.

Access has become the real killer down here, it has become almost entirely pay to play over the past couple decades.

I have 2 very productive locations, but I only get to hunt either of them a handful of times a year. Not because of time, but wind. I didn't hunt either the 1st 2 weeks of the season because the wind wasn't right. In my youth I would have spent all day, regardless of wind. Now I pick and choose my days and am so much more productive.

My stand is a folding chair and a pair of shooting sticks, chair weighs 2# sticks are my cane, rifle 7 1/2 # pt a couple of water bottles in my coat pockets with a candy bar and i'm ready to go if there's no Deer sign don't sit there and pray for rain! I can hunt any where depending on the wind, never have been a fan of box blinds and we have a bunch of them, i don't sit in a box blind unless the weather is terrible. Rio7

I have a tripod type stand on the edge of one field that's been historically good. Like, dead deer or opportunity for one every other day (on average) in the season for the past 25 years.

Outside of that - it's all climbing tree stands for mobility and/or what you have, a folding chair behind some cut balsams and a small bag with gear. We don't have a single "stand/blind" that has a roof or door or anything.

This is 100% accurate IMO.

I have 2 good friends that I hunt with. They sit the same spot year after year after year. No matter what. Maybe shoot a buck once every 4-5 years and it will be a fork. Why? it's easy to get to and there are 1000's of pics of deer every season. But they're all at night. They claim "one will come through in daylight." Yep, once every few yers lol.

They'll sit them rain or shine, south wind, north wind, east wind...don't matter.

Go scout now. It's perfect. The woods looks just like it did in November. You don't need snow. Drive your car around and look for edges and it doesn't have to be much of one either. You see one, get out and walk it. Hell, it can be 2 types of pines that make an edge. One thing I've been noticing now that I've had OnX for a few years and mark where I see sign...Deer like contours too. And it doesn't have to be much of one. If you're in a swamp and you have "ridge" that is 2 feet higher than the swamp, they'll run it. Find those, there will be sigh on them, book it.

Deer are herding animals.
If there aren't any deer where you are at, you won't see any.

How's that for a Yogi Berra-ism?

If you are hunting a morning stand and don't see anything by noon, definitely get up and start still hunting.

Help me out here?

That's why they're productive though. You don't dick it up.

I do love the big woods. SKane is spot on. There is nothing like getting a buck there. You've earned it, no matter the size. Deer numbers were way, way, down this season up there. I think I saw 7 during gun season, 3 were bucks.

If you don’t have fresh sign I wouldn’t hunt there. Simple as that.

Agreed about big woods deer. Those are the ones I remember the most and I've never taken anything near in size to what some of you fella's show, but man are they special.

Sometimes 75 yards is all it takes. I put in one stand the first year I was at the farm that truly sucked, but everything looked ideal. I had the right structure and the right sign. After zero encounters the first year, I moved about 100 yards up the hill and occupied a tree that had an old 2X4 nailed 10 feet up. It became my best treestand. I took the camp record from it. My last big buck from there was just 2 years ago. Last year, I nailed the best buck in a decade while he was standing 50 yards from the stand. I shot him at 200 yards from a nearby ground blind.

The one my son's have so much success from is only 75 yards from my old "Garbage Pit" stand. The latter was on a trail that cut across the base of a wooded peninsula. After the doe we named "Madge" put the curse on it, it was a no-go for 5 years. We moved the stand out to an island at the tip of the peninsula, and got good results again. The name, "Garbage Pit, comes from the fact that the previous owners dumped trash into a sinkhole near the tip of the peninsula. The sinkhole made a chokepoint for entering the woods. Now the deer travel between the peninsula and the island.

I went back and looked at the OPs original post. I didn't get the same conclusion as you. Besides, I've hunted the same 200 acre plot for 20-some seasons. I think about things in that way. Bottom line: pulling up stakes and moving to the next county, in my experience, has never been a necessity. Sometimes small changes bring big results.

My advice to the OP is to scout around a bit and try and figure out what, if anything has changed.

One big bugaboo for us has been the acorn crop. This year, the acorns dropped a good 2-4 weeks later than usual, probably due to the warm, dry weather this fall. The whole herd disappeared; they were munching acorns all night and never showing up during the day. For us, it is a temporary thing. We get this maybe every decade or so.

I'm always a little reluctant to go walking around during the gun season because invariably I'll jump something up and get it killed by some other hunter. The best stand sites that I've ever found were from snow tracking a big set of deer tracks and setting up a stand the next year somewhere along that route that gave me an advantage. Topography does funnel deer movement. I was talking with Greg Miller at a deer seminar and he told me that he has left hunting Price County because it was too big and too flat and the deer could go anywhere. Another thing I'd heard and already mentioned in this thread was that if you want to shoot a big buck, you need to hunt where one lives. I think that I've morphed into hunting like tzone's two buddies. We only get a 9 day gun season and opening day is sacred. The deer have to be there somewhere and they can't all be down wind. A stand site for me will take advantage of the prevailing north west wind, but I'd still probably hunt a good stand in a wrong wind. Back in my youth I'd hunt high enough in a tree that it didn't seem to matter much.

Shaman, I think that a minor move should be in order. Last season hunting the only decently large stand of regenerating poplar trees within miles, I got the feeling that it was like being in the right church, just the wrong pew. The only shot that I heard close that made for coyote, crow and raven gut pile scavenger noise was on the other side of that stand of poplar. That stuff grows thick and visibility is pretty limited, but I'd read that it will hold like 13 deer per square mile. Way more than that mature maple.

If I sit a place twice and don't see any deer there I am done unless there is fresh sign they are using the area. We have a high population density where I hunt though.

Walking around aimlessly through the woods will push deer to them, yep. Still hunting where you have scouted and know there is sign, with the wind in your favor, it hunting.

Those deer leave sign when there isn't snow too.

Jeff, tzone is leading you to water here – now, whether you choose to drink......

Yup, that's why I read here. Long ago I decided that I was too clumsy and impatient to still hunt or try to "Benoit" one. When I hunted the NW part of the state where tzone hunts, the woods were bigger and the deer were less pressured. It was a case of waiting for a big enough buck to shoot. Mid week was just as good as opening day because there weren't any hunters and the deer were moving naturally. NE, WI. isn't that same way. There they get rousted by small game hunters, bow hunters, ATV riders, snowmobiles, bear hunters and berry pickers. After opening weekend the deer are border line paranoid. Lots of the time you see one because someone bumped it into you. Trophy hunting in that area has turned into brown is down if it has legal antlers. I've got to do the work to find a seam when I hunt there where guys don't or won't go. In years past that involved boots on the ground, scouting, packing in and camping, crossing water, climbing higher and going in farther. Being gray around the muzzle into senior class like lots of the forum guys here, has landed me into that stage when those deer and shooting stuff isn't quite as attractive as it once was.

If one knows there’s a buck in the area the longer on a stand improves the odds of seeing it.
I don’t do a lot,of moving around, not a lot of land.

Been wanting a shack/stand our property for years, never have been able
to figure out a place that's worth the time/effort/money.

Partly due to trying to figure out that one permanent site, partly
because i don't like stand hunting.

It's boring, confining, and isn't hunting.
Hunting is a verb, implying action.

Being in a stand is sitting or standing, looking, maybe shootingsomething that
walks by. Oh, and staying awake. Something I struggle with on a stand.

Found out Dad wants a shack, a mobile one is limited for us so it's gotta be permanent. S-I-L to be and I are gonna build him one.
Probably waste of our time, he can't walk in anymore and refuses to drive his stupid show truck where a leaf might fall on it. Only hunting if one of us drives out truck in, and we both are work limited. Oh well, we will do our part. How much he gets to use it is up tohim.

I have hunted Price co. Wis for 35 gun seasons and it is the hardest place I ever hunted deer. I saw a buck this gun season and before that was 2009. It took 14 gun seasons to see a buck. As for hunting the big woods, I just hunt along the S. Fork Flambeau River cause I have river frontage. There is more sign along the river , perhaps cause it is one of the only places with a ridge . There is a trail along the river that runs for miles. Other than that , the trails are so faint that you can hardly tell they are there and very hard to hunt deer in wolf country cause deer dont follow trails much cause if they follow trails, wolves pick up the pattern . As for hunting a stand in the big woods, I hunt it a few times a year and that is it . They are just too remote to put up with much human scent.

I feel for the cheesehead brethren in NE Wisconsin. I have hunted all around the Crivitz area starting in the early 2000s until about 2015 or so. We used to hunt around Thunder Mountain, Nicolet NF, and Governor Thompson State Park when it first opened. We used to have a blast and were quite successful, but each year it kept getting worse and worse. The last year I hunted up there, I saw my first deer on Wednesday of the gun season? I’d love to get out there again some day as I truly love the people, the land and having thanksgiving dinner in a supper club!

Windfall, have you ever thought about an out of state trip? There’s some great opportunities south of border here in FIB territory if you can flip the cost of a tag? We have friends that come hunt public from Wisconsin and do well.

To answer your original question, my hunting time is way to valuable to waste and I try to avoid unproductive spots before I even sit in them! I have been on a public land kick lately and basically I am scouting during bow season and when gun season comes, I put it all together and set myself up for an opportunity on a mature Buck. So far, it’s worked really well.

Matt

Ihookem yes, a buddy and I bought a trailer and hunted Price Co. several years east of Phillips in the NF. We had some good spots over there, got a few nice ones, but moved on for the same reason Greg did. At least we weren't saddled with a permanent camp there. I tried that Flambeau river bottom one year and was able to cross it with chest waders which was kind of a surprise as dark and deep looking as it was. That river stopped everyone with Sorel boots though and I had it to myself. Other than Buffalo County., Price and Sawyer County were #2 & #3 for B&C bucks in the state, but that has probably changed by now with lots of bigger bucks farther south in the farming, private property areas.

Swag, yes I've hunted the U.P of Michigan and the Minnesota deer seasons because they open earlier than our Wisconsin gun season and catching the tail end of the rut made lots of difference in seeing deer and not seeing deer. I know that Illinois has some king size, well fed bucks down there, but I thought that it was shotgun only and all private and I'm a rifle guy that is kind of stuck in the public big woods by the cottage. Wisconsin guys that want to shoot big bucks would do better hunting the southern part of the state. My step-sons shoot really nice ones every year bow and gun on their dad's family owned land in the SW part of the state. The wife is talking about selling the cottage and if it wasn't for the accommodations there, I'd be somewhere better for the deer hunting.

That makes sense Windfall. There used to be real big bucks there , but a tired rutted buck likely is wolf food when the snow gets deep. There are a few bigger bucks on the cam , but only the first half of November, then they disapear and I cant find them by gun season. Next gun season is Nov. 24 , the latest possible date so the rut will be mostly done. I hate deer hunting up there, and I am strapped with 7ac. and a cabin. I love it up there , love my cabin I built when I was 26 and now I'm 60. It's hard to just sell something like that , just to put money down on land somewhere else to find other problems on the new land. I am done running and gunning in a clomber when it's 0 degrees in the morning... I agree , that an earlier season , you will see a few more deer, and have always wanted to hunt da U.P. This fall, it will be 8 days earlier.

IL opened things up for some rifles this year. Single shot or magazine plugged rifles, straight wall and a few certain bottleneck cartridges that meet the specs, 30 cal or larger. I poked one with my CVA in 300 Blackout this season.

Land access has gotten very expensive unless you are lucky enough to pull a tag on a public zone. Public hunting areas make up less than 2% of the state's acreage.

I can’t sit a stand if I don’t have full confidence in seeing deer. There are specific reasons I hunt the spots I do (time of day, WIND direction, food sources, etc). If you are limited to the amount of time you can hunt, use a cheap trail camera and set it up at a stand location and hunt another location. You will be hunting 2 spots at the same time/cover more area. In the morning hunt bedding areas and in the evening hunt food sources. Don’t hunt a stand if the wind is blowing in the direction that is NOT favorable to you/ where you thing the deer will be coming from.

Also, some people leave the stand around 9am. That is when I usually start seeing deer. I see them a lot around 11AM and 12PM too. Good luck!

Also, get in there after it snows and see where those deer are coming from and going to. You can learn a lot!

I agree. I don't see a lot right away in the mornings. Sometimes I do, but not usually.

Dang. I thought I had it bad because I didn't see a legal buck this year and the only legal buck last year was a 5 point. But 14 years! 😳

"... don't see a lot..." Heck I don't see any! This gun season I spent 32 hours some days dark to dark watching an empty deer woods. If the kid wasn't coming over for dinner tonight, I'd be up there right now scouting out some areas that I found on Google Maps now that the snow is melted back some. I had a lot better area before I sold my place one county over, but I don't want to drive that far from the new place to deer hunt. I'd best nail down a few more good stand sites rather than just hanging out at a stand where I've shot bucks before.

Moosemike, that is a lot of the problem deer hunting up north here and ihookem is like a lot of us hamstrung with a low density, public land deer area because we have a cabin/cottage there. Northern WI. is beautiful with big tracts of woods, streams and lakes, but the woods are getting too mature. Minimal industry and a low tax base, so the area is depressed economically. More poaching, harder winters, a four month bow/crossbow season, doe seasons to get more hunters up there and predators. 14 years does seem excessive though.

Exact same problems in northern PA where my Camp is. 2-3 deer per square mile and maturing forests. Most days I don't see a deer.

when i started hunting, i went to my grandfather's camp in Coburn, PA. i'd see a group of 14 - 15 deer per square mile in big woods. then when i 15yo i hunted behind my house and i would see 15 - 20 deer at a time (the woods were small, 200 acres is considered a big woods). i go to game lands in Bedford, Somerset and Westmoreland and i would see 15 - 30 deer at a time.

then the bonus tags came out and a year after that, the deer numbers went way down. from 15 - 30 deer at a time to 1 or 2 deer a day. and there was days it was 0 deer. now, behind my house, it is 10 -15 doe that stay there. the bucks come in for the rut and they go to different spot afterwards.

in Bedford County, i hunted in Woodbury Gamelands and State Gamelands 41 near Maria. they used have 20-40 deer per square mile, but after the bonus tags and their CWD program, it is less than 1 deer per square mile. i have not hunted it for long time.

in Westmoreland County, i hunted in private lands against Linn Run State Park. the 20-40 deer per square mile and then they over hunted it, so now it is down 5 - 7 deer per square mile. i have not hunted it for 12 years because i am disabled.

I've gotten too old and comfortable to be out running around, punishing myself. A comfortable chair, warm environment, hot meal and a quiet day is OK by me. A critter to shoot at is a plus as long as I don't have to track or drag it. My stands are heated, with office chairs, food, a port-a-pot and a great view. If I shoot it, I go get my truck, attach the game hoist, then field dress it.

With age comes wisdom .....for some of us!

My pics are too big, I need to figure out how to shrink them.