Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire $240 to Build a Deer Blind

I've been planning on building a 4x8' shed for a deer blind. This would be out of 2x4's and 2x6's (floor) with plywood sides, floor and roof. Gun slits and a door. I think I've got all the screws I need along with some old composite shingles (actually new ones that have been laying around here for thirty years). I think all I need is the lumber. It looks like it'll cost me about $240. Of course, better figure $300 as you always have some more stuff to get. I've got two questions. First, is it practical to figure I can put two big eyelets in the roof and then chain this thing to my tractor loader, lift it, and move it where I want after building it? Will it all fall apart or will the eyelets lift it okay?

Second question is should I embark on this project or can I just buy a similar blind for not much more money. I looked at one at Academy, but it is significantly higher (if I don't figure my labor-which I won't). The Academy one would be about $1100.

Why not just get a portable pop up job. It goes where you do. Not the other way around

I don't know for certain, but I would think that if you put the eyelets into the frame, you might be ok. I might recommend putting 4...1 in each corner, so that it doesn't tip or sway too much while moving this.

Could alway get an old pop-up trailer frame and wheel it in to where you want it to be. Have the floor or frame of the trailer be the base for your floor?

I have a neighbor who builds 4x4 blinds and then uses his tractor to lift them up where he chains them into trees... he is a 20 something guy... still thinks he is immortal... though come to think of it I haven't heard from him in a week or so...

You thinking ground blind or elevated stand?

Had a cousin build a frame out of 2" pipe with the box-blind on top. He put pins in the frame to where he could attach it to the 3-point on his tractor. Made moving easy for sure.

not sure size of your tractor or it's lifting capacity but we move my neighbors 4x4 stand that is 12 ft tall with a orchard tractor we slide forks under to lift and we have 55 gallon drum on back for counterweight

Ground stand.

Oh I have a big enough tractor. I'm just concerned the thing might come apart when I lift it.

Just off the top of my head, maybe build it using a pallet for a base. Then just a set of forks on the tractor to left the build and move it.

Run your 2x6"s long ways, one on each edge and one in the middle, and you can use the bucket on a tractor or better yet, forks if you have them to pick it up to where you want it. Ours held together fine.

My blind is like my second home...

If you build it with the intent to lift it with eyelets in the roof you should be fine. Run the siding down the outside studs and overlap the rim joist so that the whole thing is one complete unit. If the roof is going to be flat, just use some mechanical conections other than just nails to attach the roof framing to the top plate of the walls. You can run large eye bolts through the roof and down through the wall plates and use washers and a nut to connect. I would think that 3/4" threaded eye bolts would be plenty. Lifting from the top will limit how high you can place it and using forks on the bottom like others are suggesting may be a lot easier. Good luck.

Around here Lowes sells an OSB panel with a waterproof coating in mossyoak camo on the outside guys use to make blinds out of, roof and all. A few pieces of that and some 2x2 furring strips and you got a blind. I think it would be much cheaper than $300.

This sounds very, very good. I will have to check it out. It appears that a Lowe's up in Kansas City has it.

I would build it on 8 ft 4x4's and than you could pull it with the tractor, just cut the ends w/45 deg angles, drill holes in the end to put a pin thru and pull it.

I built one and bought a little cheap trailer axle from a salvage yard for 30 bucks and u-bolted it to the floor. Then ran a pipe welded to the axle to the front with a simple pin hitch. I drag it out and use a high lift jack to put cheap walmart jack stands under each corner for stability. During the off season I pull it under the carport to keep it out of the weather. Just slingin ideas at you.

6x6 welded wire mesh.
T stakes.
Some 1/2" OSB.
Tie wire.
Blind burlap.

Get a roll or two of wire mesh, cut it to size, make a circle in a suitable spot, stake it down with t-stakes. Throw some OSB on top, cut to size with jigsaw.
Wire everything together with tie wire. Cut your openings where you want, then wrap with burlap, use more tie wire to hold burlap to wire mesh. Cut your openings in the burlap, and you're in business..

Repeat as necessary..

Super cheep, super easy to make, and take down and reuse..

My brother and I are building ours (or his, I should say, it's going on his lease). Yes, we're real late, due to me moving and him having an achilles injury. We're hauling it in the back of a pickup, and will tilt it up with a rope, which is how I've raised them before. We'll see how it goes this weekend

It's all built of plywood with the corners reinforced, and screwed & glued construction, so it should last a long time. We probably have close to $500 in it. I questioned not buying one of the $1000 jobs, and the buzz he'd heard is they only last a couple of years before they fall apart due to wind & weather.

Cole, listen to my fellow Missourian... and farm boy, I suspect.

If this thing is never going to be anything but a ground blind and you won't be pulling it over basketball sized rocks seriously consider the 4x4 runner routine.

Folks have been building cabins, bases for feeders, and all kinds of crap that may need moving on a fairly regular basis that way.

Building an upper frame that would stand lifting and movement from an eyelet or two would require much more engineering and materials than a simple runner approach.

Hey Bart... just noticed your new signature line... Mine just seems way too polite for our current crop of them...

I'm thinking something like maybe, "Hey Rick... we really do need a troll zapper feature... willing to chip in for lawyer/insurance fees".

Sounds good to me...