How Far to Food?

[fishlips]

I have a spot that I have been checking out lately where I suspect there is good bedding. However, the one thing that I keep running into a mental block is that it is a way from a stereotypical food source (ag field). Do you guys frequently find good bedding areas that are a ways from food that are used regularly throughout the season?

[Bucky]

I have a spot that I have been checking out lately where I suspect there is good bedding. However, the one thing that I keep running into a mental block is that it is a way from a stereotypical food source (ag field). Do you guys frequently find good bedding areas that are a ways from food that are used regularly throughout the season?

2 miles is nothing to a deer... where is nearest ag field?

[JoeRE]

Browse can be 100% of a deer's diet so keep in mind they are not necessarily even going to the crops.

If they are going to fields, I routinely see deer travel more than 1/2 a mile every night to ag fields from bedding back in the thick stuff. I think telemetry studies have shown they often travel a mile or two each night. Some of my best buck bedding spots are like that, nobody else goes way back in there because they think all the deer must be closer to the fields.

The buck I shot last October was 3/4 of a mile straight line distance from the nearest corn field and had a belly full of corn when I cut it open. I don't think that was exceptional, doubt anyone was baiting.

[fishlips]

I have a spot that I have been checking out lately where I suspect there is good bedding. However, the one thing that I keep running into a mental block is that it is a way from a stereotypical food source (ag field). Do you guys frequently find good bedding areas that are a ways from food that are used regularly throughout the season?

2 miles is nothing to a deer... where is nearest ag field?

About a mile with a number of barriers in between. Guessing I am over thinking it

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[dan]

I find great bucks a mile or two into the middle of a cattail swamp on a tiny island... If you find good bedding, it means a deer beds there...

[msailor]

Deer ate a lot more than crops before we came along. They still do, many areas of the country don't have row crops at all and there have crazy high deer densities.

I have found myself struggling with similar mental blocks before. I stopped speaking in absolutes and stopped ruling things out without ground truthing. I have been suprised by the results more than once.

[fishlips]

All good points. I think what I need to do is just get in there and hunt it and see what I find out. I always get stuck thinking that some of these "far" off bedding areas need some pressure to push them back there. They may be dynamite from the outset.

Spot does look great from overhead and there is a great approach that will make it tough to get picked off. Have to make time to hunt it this fall.

[Zona]

Don't dismiss the power of the acorn.

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[whitetailassasin]

I find great bucks a mile or two into the middle of a cattail swamp on a tiny island... If you find good bedding, it means a deer beds there...

Absolutely nailed it I hunt a lot of flat ag ground, that has swamps and cattail marshes around it. The mature bucks in my area have no problem bedding a mile or two from those ag lands. Yes I see a lot of active sign around acorns, but because guys pressure them so hard, its made mostly at nighttime. I instead feel like its more imperative to focus on security and solitude bedding. I too am not concerned with younger deer or does, it's nice to see deer, but when your after a true mature whitetail, you have to be in his domain. Food sources can be fickle imho, they mislead a lot of hunters into thinking deer just show up in daylight hours all the time. I backtrack a lot of good bucks early spring from food sources to where they are bedding. There are always exceptions to the rule, but in my experience the better bucks, are in the harder to reach places and overlooked places, regardless of how far the food sources are. They have no problem at all finding them in the dark and traveling far greater distances than most would like to admit or think.

[hunter10]

I often lose most of my deer off the farms I hunt once late season comes as they head miles to the best food sour es

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[Hawthorne]

Absolutely nailed it I hunt a lot of flat ag ground, that has swamps and cattail marshes around it. The mature bucks in my area have no problem bedding a mile or two from those ag lands. Yes I see a lot of active sign around acorns, but because guys pressure them so hard, its made mostly at nighttime. I instead feel like its more imperative to focus on security and solitude bedding. I too am not concerned with younger deer or does, it's nice to see deer, but when your after a true mature whitetail, you have to be in his domain. Food sources can be fickle imho, they mislead a lot of hunters into thinking deer just show up in daylight hours all the time. I backtrack a lot of good bucks early spring from food sources to where they are bedding. There are always exceptions to the rule, but in my experience the better bucks, are in the harder to reach places and overlooked places, regardless of how far the food sources are. They have no problem at all finding them in the dark and traveling far greater distances than most would like to admit or think.[/quote]

I like reading you and singing bridges posts. Good write up

[ Post made via Android ]

[Hawthorne]

I find great bucks a mile or two into the middle of a cattail swamp on a tiny island... If you find good bedding, it means a deer beds there...

Absolutely nailed it I hunt a lot of flat ag ground, that has swamps and cattail marshes around it. The mature bucks in my area have no problem bedding a mile or two from those ag lands. Yes I see a lot of active sign around acorns, but because guys pressure them so hard, its made mostly at nighttime. I instead feel like its more imperative to focus on security and solitude bedding. I too am not concerned with younger deer or does, it's nice to see deer, but when your after a true mature whitetail, you have to be in his domain. Food sources can be fickle imho, they mislead a lot of hunters into thinking deer just show up in daylight hours all the time. I backtrack a lot of good bucks early spring from food sources to where they are bedding. There are always exceptions to the rule, but in my experience the better bucks, are in the harder to reach places and overlooked places, regardless of how far the food sources are. They have no problem at all finding them in the dark and traveling far greater distances than most would like to admit or think.

Your posts are cool to read. Gives me hope hunting the heavily pressured public swamps in Michigan. Im used to hunting farmland were they always bed right on the edge of food. The deer have no choice. AG is everywhere. No cover bigger than 60 acres

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[whitetailassasin]

Mature bucks will bed in the best bedding that gives them the advantage. Sight, sound, smell. I think if the pressure wasn't as heavy, mature bucks would bed more frequently near the ag fields. Early fall and summer they do. I've glassed many bucks laying in the fields and also close. But we have early youth season and also doe. And those edges and fields are where 99% of the hunting takes place. Does are out with young fawns and bucks are still bachelored up. So it drives deer deeper, and by bow opener deer are in there safety beds. Overlooked beds. Which can make it tough on a guy scouting a food source and seeing a good buck using it then he goes ghost on it in daylight. This caused me to start hunting deep first day, and it's paid off a time or two

[ Post made via iPhone ]

[stash59]

When I was a kid my dad was talking with a friend about deer hunting. This friend lived kinda on the edge of agriculture and the big woods. He shoot a buck one year back in the deep woods. The buck had corn in his belly. As the crow flies it was about 4 miles to the nearest corn field. From where the deer was shot.

[whitetailassasin]

When I was a kid my dad was talking with a friend about deer hunting. This friend lived kinda on the edge of agriculture and the big woods. He shoot a buck one year back in the deep woods. The buck had corn in his belly. As the crow flies it was about 4 miles to the nearest corn field. From where the deer was shot.

I always open stomach up to see what food deer are eating. Very good point Stash

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