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I was born in Montana and lived there until I was 15 and moved to Wisconsin when my Dad moved the family to Wisconsin to take over his Dad's farm. Since then I go back to hunt Montana with my relatives there. They weren't too interested the first time I suggested a good old Wisconsin deer drive, but one day they reluctantly agreed to try one. After horsing around and jaw jacking near the pickups for awhile, I got them set up in a deep coulee to push from down low to high.

While getting into position one driver jumped a 30" buck and put him down. The drive produced another two nice bucks and a camp meat dry doe. Moved the whole gang (13) over to another good size coulee. While I was walking down a small coulee to get in position as a right wing driver, jumped a real dandy, but it was out of sight before I could get a bead on it. Saw it one more time way out of range heading for the Missouri to the north. When my watch reached the start time, I began moving and about 5 minutes later heard rocks or gravel rattle around a bend, but did not see a animal. Shortly after, 5 rifle cracks were heard. At the end of the driver there was three nice bucks down. They were part of a bachelor band of four.

Every year now the boys ask "when we going to do a good old Wisconsin deer drive"? The only thing that changed is the guys got rid of their cowboy boots. LOL


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Originally Posted by Crockettnj
Originally Posted by JGRaider
[quote=Jordan Smith]What does matter is the skill of the hunter, and to hunt where the deer are.



I agree, especially with hunting where the deer are. The clowns on most of the TV's hunting shows prove that hunting great places produce results, even if you halfasss know what you're doing. I could put those mullets on my mule deer place and most of them wouldn't see a deer in a week, much less kill one.


Agree 100%. First and foremost, gotta fish where the fish are.

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X 4 and roundoak...you have to know WHERE to drive also.

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Right place at the right time.

I shot my biggest buck while standing very still on a 16" tall tree stump in the middle of a knee deep clear cut. I was staring down a doe that approached and was about to blow when I noticed his antlers heading my way. I thought for sure he would turn tail when she blew. She blew and he kept coming. I slowly raised my rifle and waited for him to get about 20 yards away. The rut was my friend!

Last year my 14 year old son shot the biggest deer anyone at camp can remember. He was on an atv, riding with his buddy, heading back to camp for lunch. Noticed the deer coming off a ridge, about 100 yards away. Stopped the atv, got off, grabbed his friends rifle out of a loud plastic scabbard, loaded it, set up and took the shot at about 30 yards as the buck approached. Dropped the deer with a .300 wsm. 21-1/2" inside spread 8 point. Great deer for down in those parts.

I was surprised to find the slug just inside the hide on the opposite side of its neck. I need to ask what bullet that was. Again, the rut causes bucks to be reckless.


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Originally Posted by Beretta_Shooter916
Deer drives are a blast!


x 1000% !!!

Michigan tradition is to sit on a bucket (or in a blind, or in a treestand) & wait for them to come to you. Been very successful over the decades doing that, fishing where the fish are. I'm a meat hunter and get my share of does. Not really interested in trophy hunting, but never said "no" to any buck the good Lord has put in front of me.

But NOTHING beats a good old fashioned deer drive! Hunted Iowa for 15 years with a group of locals in farm country with access to 10's of thousands of acres over three counties. Every one of them good old boys knew all the local farmers & got exclusive access. Man, did we ever pile them up! Every drive started by diagramming each drive like a football paly and assuring safety of every hunter. But it paid dividends! Slowest year for our group of 12-14 hunters was 17 deer. Typical years were 25-30 deer. Our best years was 42! But that requires a whole different level of skill, shooting at running deer. Iowa was exclusively shotgun back then, and you really had to know how to successfully lob that football downrange. Harold's pole barn looked like a meat locker with all those deer hanging from the rafters. Miss those days.

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You Iowa shooters must have been better shots than our Wisconsin shooters. At one time roughly half the state was shotgun slugs only for deer season until someone did the math and found that there was too much lobbing and not enough hitting. Statistics showed that there were more shotgun incidents than rifle incidents where those were permitted, so now the entire state is rifles allowed state wide.


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The rut is a BIG help in making deer seem stupid. Not always, but sometimes. Here in PA the rut kicks in at the very end of archery season but is over by the time rifle season comes.

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In more than 50 years of whitetail hunting I've shot them while sitting on the ground, leaning against a tree, from tree stands and box blinds. All have worked when hunting where the deer are, only shot one buck when the rut was hottest. He had his nose to the ground tracking the scent of does that had walked thru earlier. Nothing else seemed to matter to him although he did occasionally check the air above ground level. Last time he put his nose in the air I let him have a 12ga slug square in the chest, he was a DRT.

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I hunt the blue ridge mountains the secret is choke points during the rut deer are lazy and take the easiest rout use the terrain I’m also surrounded by people with loud atvs going in after daylight I’m there before hand by walking

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Originally Posted by Jordan Smith
What does matter is the skill of the hunter, and to hunt where the deer are.


Hunting where game is is the #1 factor in success. LOL


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The rut is pretty much over here in eastern Va when the general firearms season starts. Nonetheless, I've still managed to kill deer during the rut - with my truck. It does make them dumb. During the rut, you see dead bucks on country roads every few miles. But even though the rut is over by the time general firearms season starts, doe in estrus scent still works well. I killed a late December deer hauling ass up a riverine that had been shot at by another hunter several hundred yards away. It got to the scent and came to a dead stop and put its nose in the air.

I've killed the most deer sitting on the same stool I use for dove hunting behind a quick set ground blind I use for turkey hunting. I want to find a packable swivel chair as my legs and butt start to get numb sitting on that stool too long.

Still hunting has been productive for me, but I only do it on private land or on remote public land if there isn't any evidence of other hunters.

On high pressure public land, I tend to hunt the areas beyond the point where I don't see any more vienna sausage cans on the ground.


Last edited by 10Glocks; 07/25/21.
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lots of my friends in PENN would have deer drives when we were kids. I participated in a couple of them and saw lots of deer, never scored on a drive though. The older bucks will lay down flat and allow drivers to walk by them, black bears will do it also. One of the issues was making sure standers stay put until the drive is over, especially the young guys.

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If bucks are staying put when drivers come thru the drivers are walking too fast and not pausing. If a driver pauses momentarily near a laid low buck, nine times out of ten his nerves will explode and he will blast out of there.

Last edited by roundoak; 07/25/21.

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silent drives are the best IMO. 3-4 man sweeping slow and walking noisy. standers sit tight until the drivers move well past. i've had bucks sneaking back through well after drivers disappeared. happened a couple of years ago. real nice half rack came in on me but it was too close and smelled me and split.


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Couple years ago I hunted near a house where the owner would walk his lab every afternoon...on a lease and pulling that owner alone. I was set up in a ground blind as they would walk by 50 yards away. If I had a window unzipped as they approached and my scent blowing to that lab...he would smell me every time and he would go crazy wanting to come toward that scent...pulling on the lease. Now if I would have all windows closed...no scent escaping that dog would walk on past and never knew I was there. I saw this happen several afternoons so goes to show how well they can smell...and a deer can smell you better than that. Have seen them go on alert 200 yards away if they get your scent. Wonder we ever kill one.

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Deer are like humans. There are dumb ones and smart ones. I’ve seen big bucks that had to wind me, keep coming right in. I’ve seen does where I know they couldn’t smell me or see me, just know something was up and zero in on me from 200 yards. I’ve watched deer wind me or see me and blow and take off, while multiple other deer, including nice bucks watched them do it and continued on with their business like nothing happened. On the other hand, I’ve had instances where I heard one blow and then listened as deer all over the place started blowing and stomping.

I used to get really upset if I got winded or spooked a deer, now I just continue hunting. In areas with a lot of deer, there seem to be nervous nellies who spook at anything, some who will spook but they need to see and smell it themselves, and some who don’t seem to care a bit no matter what happens. When you get in areas where you see twenty or more in a day and you are somewhat selective, you observe a lot of things and see deer with individual personalities and quirks.

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