Weakest link

[Hawthorne]

Lack of information where a big buck is now. I know the general areas they are in.Probably need more scouting and observation than just going in for a kill. Time is a factor also. Sometimes I think you need to be out there everyday scouting and observing

[Grizzlyadam]

I am still spending too much time waiting for deer to come to me. I need to work on being less reluctant to take what I percieve as risky, aggressive, impulsive moves. I've always been a stick to the plan kind of hunter, even when I'm sitting it out when I have no confidence that I'm going to be on some action. I need to up the intensity of my in season scouting.

I have however gotten much more flexible and better at knowing when to pull up anchor and move on when I'm in a spot that doesn't have what I'm looking for as far a sign goes, or if the wind is doing something funky.

[Matt Gill]

I feel like my weakest link as a bow hunter is post rut and post gun season hunting in December. Here in WV there are no crop fields where I hunt and it is typically hard to pattern deer in hill country when you don’t know where they are going to feed. Therefore I need to focus on more scouting during this time frame to indentify what natural food sources deer are targeting to get on a buck late season

[Jmitch]

Confidence, scouting, and time. They probably all three go hand in hand but I feel like my lack of confidence gets me most. I'm not a normally confident person so its very easy for me to play head games and second guess myself almost constantly. I know success will be huge to get the confidence up on public but that brings me to scouting and time. I don't spend near enough time scouting in season or post season mostly due to time. With a wife and 2 young kids it's hard to get more than a few hours of free time and after you drive to the spot and back it doesnt leave much time to actually dive in. Find most of my public hunts are blind hunt based on map scouting which had been mixed results to say the least. Need to get more areas dialed in this winter. Hopefully that will help the confidence level especially on public.

Also trying to expand my horizons a bit and hunt more marsh and river bottoms from mostly hill country but just couldn't make myself to dive in blind during the season this year when I had good private that was readily accessible to me. Part of me wants to force myself by giving up my best private stands in order to force me to work a little harder but I'm not sure I'm ready to ditch the security blanket yet if that makes sense. Feel like that would make me a better hunter but would really damper my success especially short term.

I could write a whole paragraph about being too passive or a list of other things but I'll leave it at that

[Tennhunter3]

I'm still lacking some of the finer details with my scouting.
While it has improved a great deal the last several years I'm far from perfect.

This year I've stumbled upon several buck bedding locations I did not previously know existed. In areas I had been in several times. This really hit me hard of how much I still do not know about the areas I hunt.

I need to do a better job of scouting every inch of properties and figure out which properties hold less hunter pressure and mature buck activity at the right time of year. I'm noticing alot more swamp bedding in swamp -hill mixed areas I'm guessing due to pressure on ridges. Pressure has been extreme this year making me abandon areas I had previously hunted. I have no idea where those hunters went or wind blew too which I felt had bucks on high alert, made them change routines or they became nocturnal as cams showed.

It really amazing to see beast progression over the years.
This being beast year 4 has been a great learning year so far with a success. In a way most bedding has become predictable They catch on fast areas dry up and change more then I expected.

[stash59]

MY health! Got tons of time because of it though!!!

[Rob loper]

I over think everything and im almost too careful. Im super aggressive but im careful when i am.
I really dont know if you can be too careful chasing these animals .
I really took a step back this year to focus on just a few areas. Not up and down the whole state like i did Last year and early on this year.
I actually chose 2 state forest spots and a couple of marsh spots and im gonna focus on those and really try to learn whats going on.
I rescouted a few of the the spots and realized
( with some help and suggestions from fellow beast).
They are really using eyes snd wind too nose to their advantage. ( Like ive said b4 “ wind right for deer not right for hunter”)I had a pretty good idea that this is going on so im planning on attacking a bit differently.
It simplifies alot. Making me not over think things.

[kamcgraw]

My weakest link without question is letting the stress of being successful get to me, which in turn makes me overthink things. It’s a tough one to fix!

[Robbo]

For me it’s just being lazy and not doing in season scouting!

[nsmith253]

At the beginning of this season I would have said confidence, after a lot of time to reflect on why I am not confident in my setups it all comes down to my scouting and experience. When I don't feel confident in my scouting, it makes it a lot harder to stay in the game mentally, to go further and stay longer. Then when I do have confidence in my scouting, I don't trust my experience to read hot sign, to know where to set up, and be confident that I can get in there quietly.

How much movement can I get away with? How much sound can I make? These are things that I am just going to have to learn by doing. As Dan has said, I'm not going to know how close is too close until I start bumping bucks out of their beds. My best opportunity this year I was set up to shoot to what I thought was the edge of his staging area, but when he came in at last light I realized I was about 10 yards too far back--"the edge" was further in than I thought. I feel like I have the fundamentals down, now it's time to pay my dues and learn through trial and error, and doing that will build my confidence.

[MN_DeerHunter]

Not having enough time has been my biggest handicap this fall. But that should be less of an issue as time goes on. Another thing I’m realizing is I really need to make opening week a priority. For 2020 I really want to have a target buck/s located well in advance of opening day.

[Dewey]

My weakest link currently is just not having a decent amount of good bucks to kill locally like seasons past. I need to travel more and get in better areas. Fixing that next season by heading to Iowa. I expect my buck sightings to increase dramatically.

[Hookslinger]

As a newbie to the beast, I have had many weak links over the years. Probably my biggest downfall was burning up the areas I hunted. I would have a few pre set stands and hunt them over and over again. Then I would sit there and wonder why I wasn't seeing good bucks

[wmihunter]

Not hunting where the big ones are moving. Not hunting the right parcels and the right spot on those parcels? This is due to lack of scouting, trail cameras and due diligence. Hunting the right spots increase as your opportunities many times over

[elk yinzer]

I'll do a top 10:

1) Time
2) Time
3) Time
4) Time
5) Time
6) Time
7) Time
8) Time
9) Time
10) Time

Ha. I really do feel that is my only barrier to being as successful as I know I can be. I always say my #1 goal every hunting season is to remain employed and married, everything else is icing on the cake. So far, so good, but the wife is fed up with hunting for the year with one more weekend to go.

Especially not being able to do out of state hunts, it kills me. I fall into that trap sometimes, "how the bleep can 'that guy' spend 3 weeks in midwest state X, and I get flak for going to camp for a weekend?" Oh well.

When my kids get a little older that should get better, I think. My job is decently flexible, but at some point I'd like to be able to just take 3-4 weeks off in bow season and still have a week left over for family vacation.

Someday, retirement. By then I'm sure I'll be at an entirely different chapter in my hunting journey and won't have the drive I have now. But at least I'll have the time and freedom.