Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Virginia mountain boys

I would say flats for myself and just off the downwind side of them preferably where it drops off steep, not so much dead on the flat. And real subtle ones on skinny points make a great crossing place for them and they’re still small enough a bigger deer will utilize it. Convergence of multiple terrain features in a small area is the real winner. Secondary points running off into/around a flat really perks my interest. Hard to put it in words sometimes, you walk off into a place and you just know it’ll happen there by how it sets up. I love big public ground….something about it gets in your blood.

Oh yes you are exactly right! bears have ruined several of my favorite deer hunting spots. They are a curse on the land!.....Hb

My place is in Carroll Co Va. The last 2 weeks of July I had pics of 7 different bears. Deer would be in the same spot within minutes. They don't seem to care.

Let bears chit all over the place at some dropping white oaks and see how many deer show up....Hb

Same here , have seen them with in 15yds of each other .
In the mountains and east in Louisa county , Greene county, NOVA , deer population is high in both places .
Besides bear meat is good eating if you trim it right and fix it right .
Kenneth

If your going to eat one make sure to cook it very well as 95% of black bears are infected with trichinosis...I wouldn’t eat one of the nasty dumpster divers If you paid me but to each his own....Hb

We are loaded with bear where i live along the the shenandoah national park or atleast we were before the mange killed off a bunch. During hunting season ive had bear and deer around the stands a lot. Fawns dont last long in the spring around bear. We try to kill a bear or 2 every year. Bear can be great eating or nasty as hell. Depends what they are eating. A bear thats been eating dead turkeys is not much good to eat. We have turkey houses all around us.

DWR has let the bear pop get out of control.
In just 5 years[or so] we've gone from maybe seeing one on occasion to seeing 4,5,6 different bear regularly from our porches.

For deer hunting:
Funnels, ridgetops and pinchpoints.
especially if the above lead to or are producing whites
Scanned some whites yesterday and it appears like a fairly good year for nuts in my area.

I'm not a "mountain boy" as I'm trapped here in the flatlands of Richmond and surrounding suburbs. But give me 2-3 hours, and I'll be there!

I'm one of those sad case hunters you've always heard about from the Metro areas... 9000 deer hunters on any given Saturday! Freakin' place has so much blaze orange once the sun comes up, it looks like a pumpkin patch! Those nearby WMA's within close proximity to metro Richmond are a total joke! Pfffffftttt... everything instantly turns nocturnal when hunting season comes around. That's why I don't mind the drive or a sleazy roadside motel for the night, just to get away and hunt where it's way more spread out in the GWNF.

What county[s] in GWJNF?

Is there a test for that?

Theres a new motel /air bnb coming on rt 60 at oranoco in the near future

Have you hunted the various state forests? I've hunted Cumberland and some further east. Not bad hunting at all. I think a lot of folks just go for the WMAs and forget about the state forests.

I've been to Cumberland a few times. Not too bad, but (in my opinion) waaaaaay too many deer hounds. Sorry to be talking like that, but day-um, you know?

They don't care. I'm in Dare Co. NC several time a month and see bear and deer eating within yards of each other on almost every outing. Deer always has his tail up if he knows a bear is nearby. If a deer has a bear pegged, deer can get away.


A Virginia DWR study from a few years ago showed bears are the #1 fawn predators in the Virginia mountains. No doubt they are anywhere there are bear.

Yeps, and it doesn't get any better the easter you go. I was part of a hunt club many moons ago but got tired of it and quit. Many of the clubbers are slobs. I've gotten pretty good at picking off deer that club dogs are moving. They tend to head to the thickest, greenbriary places near water they can find. When I hear dogs moving, that's where I head. I know damned well the club hunters ain't going into that stuff. They do seem a little put off when you drag a deer out from an area their dogs are working/ That's the type of hunting where a 12 gauge with buckshot still works great.

I try to hunt weekdays. That's why its hard for me to get to Big Levels. I typically take most of my time off during the week in the later half of the eastern season when many huners have given up.

I have hunted the dog counties in my youth not for me I have a weekend neighbor from Amelia now and he loves the west side hunting life been doing the dog running for 60 years

Monday through Friday, until about noon on Friday, (and never on a holiday) are the best times to hunt the eastern WMAs if you want to minimize hunting when there are hounds in the woods. After noon on Friday and on Saturday (and now on Sunday) the slob clubbers are running their dogs and hunting from the roads. If you can hunt on a mid season Monday or Tuesday, you may have the WMA to yourself, or danged near it.

What someone wrote already, on the eastern WMAs, everything goes nocturnal after the general fiream season opens. If you want to score a deer on any sort of regular basis, you need to hunt the thickest shyt you can find. Super dense stands of young pine and devils walking stick are good areas.

I’ve got 200 acres of mountains to myself and my kids on the west side I’ll stay here

If I had that, I would too.