The above lament is common wherever whitetails are hunted. The trouble is, though during a hunting season most hunters see very few of the most elusive of whitetails, bucks 3-1/2 years of age and older; and depending on what a hunter defines as a “big buck” and the size of the area the hunter hunts, the above statement may actually be true but nothing can be done about it. Why? Because unless fenced in, big bucks, not humans, decide how many big bucks live in any one area. If a dozen or more were stocked in any square mile of suitable, unfenced habitat, within a very short period of time, only one is likely to be found living in that area.

The distribution of the various classes of whitetails is fairly consistent wherever they live. Take does. In forested regions does two years of age or older accompanied by their fawns and yearlings live spring, summer, fall and early winter in areas averaging about 125 acres in size (occasionally traveling off-range for a few reasons). Each range is separated by a surrounding buffer (no doe) zone. Where numbers of deer are high, doe ranges can be as small as about 90 acres and where numbers are low, they can be as large as 250 acres. Except in temporarily shared feeding areas between their ranges such as clearcuts and farm fields, does with young can be quite vicious when defending their home ranges from invasions by other does with young, including former young. In farm regions doe home ranges can be considerably smaller and even shared with other does with young until farm crops are deer tall, after which their ranges expand to more normally sized, separate ranges.

Now bucks. In early spring (after snow melts) bucks two years of age establish their first individual home ranges, typically about 300 acres in size. Two-year-old bucks seeking their first ranges typically end up traveling many miles before finding a suitable range not inhabited by an older buck (nature’s way of preventing in-breeding). Most grouchy mature bucks are not inclined to share significant portions of their ranges with newcomers.

During succeeding years, buck ranges become larger. On becoming dominant breeding bucks, typically at age five when bucks are in their prime (sometimes earlier), their ranges are about 600 acres in size (about a square-mile) and somtimes more than a thousand acres in size (up to two square-miles). In farm regions, though typically narrow, ranges of dominant bucks can be several miles in length. Normally, unlike doe ranges buck ranges overlap to varying degrees with ranges of other mature bucks. They also overlap or include entire ranges of does with young. Usually, there are 4–5 entire doe home ranges within the square-mile range of a dominant breeding buck.

Be sure to read my next related blog.

Normally, there is only one like this in a square mile.

Normally, in forested regions where deer are not overabundant, each square mile includes 4–5 doe ranges, 2–4 ranges of “lesser antlered bucks” — bucks 2–6 years of age (few live longer) that do not have opportunities to breed because they are lower in their 1–2 square-mile buck pecking order than the one big, dangerous “dominant breeding buck” of the area. There are thus usually about fifteen-plus deer per square mile in a northern forest region and twenty-three-plus (twin fawns being more common) in southern farm regions.

Therefore, if your definition of a “big buck” is a “record book buck,” though roughly 40% of bucks including yearlings in your hunting area are actually antlered bucks, it is almost certain you only have one “big buck” per ten or more does (some of which are actually be buck fawns that appear to be does) per square-mile of your hunting area. This is normal. Whitetails insist on it. If your definition of a “big buck” includes all antlered bucks older than yearlings and if it was possible for you to actually see all bucks of these ages in your hunting area during a hunting season (which it isn’t), you’d actually see 4–5 “big bucks” per ten or more does (some of which are actually buck fawns that appear to be does). This is normal, though you aren’t likely to be able accurately establish such numbers.

Keep in mind, genetics and calcium-rich water flowing from limestone account for more younger bucks growing outstanding antlers in some regions.

What all this means is, to take more “big bucks” wherever you hunt you must become skilled enough as a hunter to see more “big bucks.” Otherwise, settle for taking the usual 1–2 trophy-class bucks in a lifetime.

Only 30 minutes of patience was required to take this buck.

Patience is good while stand hunting…up to a point. Patience can also make you waste time at unproductive stand sites, eliminating chances to take deer (mature bucks) elsewhere. Nothing, not even patience, improves stand hunting success more than taking quick and quiet advantage of fresh deer signs…up to a point. Yes, this sounds like gobbledigook, but let me explain.

Back in the old days using one stand site per hunting season often worked, but not today unless you are willing to settle for an inexperienced fawn or yearling. Today, sitting at one stand site throughout a hunting season can soon become a dreadful waste of time. Whether using an elevated stand or a ground level stand site, within the first hour to three continuous half-days of hunting, today’s mature stand smart whitetails will almost always discover and identify you, more especially while you are approaching your stand. After that they avoid you. In my deer camp, our buck hunting rule is this: if you stand hunt within easy shooting distance of very fresh tracks and or droppings made by an unalarmed mature buck for a half-day but don’t see that buck, unless it was windy, stormy or unseasonably warm, that buck likely discovered you with or without your knowledge and it is already avoiding you. Unless we have a very good reason for thinking otherwise, we therefore change stand sites every half-day.

Where do we stand hunt next? Depending on wind direction (we always approach stand sites from downwind or crosswind and never cross feeding areas), during the first two days of a hunting season we hunt each half-day at different stand sites selected near where lots of fresh tracks and droppings made by mature bucks were found while scouting 2–3 weeks earlier. After that, we stand hunt wherever we discover new very fresh tracks, droppings and/or other signs made by unalarmed (not trotting or bounding) mature bucks — found while hiking non-stop (non-stop doesn’t frighten unseen nearby deer) between 11 AM and noon along deer trails previously selected for rapid mid-hunt scouting or while hiking non-stop to and from stand sites. A new discovery of very fresh signs made by an unalarmed buck often induces us to change our minds about where to hunt next. We call quickly deciding where to hunt next based on very fresh deer signs, “opportunistic stand hunting.” We never stand hunt where there are no very fresh tracks and/or droppings made by an unalarmed mature buck within easy shooting range upwind or crosswind. While stand hunting in this manner (five hours of planned patience per half-day of hunting generally adequate) — made effective by using a silently backpacked stools and ground level cover that hides our silhouettes and motions — no buck can endlessly avoid us unless it abandons its range or becomes nocturnal which doesn’t often happen where all hunters are stand hunters (like where we hunt).

Buck ground scrapes are the most misunderstood of deer signs. Very few are made or renewed while breeding is in progress. Dominant breeding bucks have little time for that then and they have run off most lesser, scrape-making bucks by the time breeding has begun in November. Made by all antlered bucks beginning after weather cools 2-3 weeks before breeding begins, most scrapes are simply visible, tarsal-musk-laden signposts of intended buck breeding ranges. They are not made to attract does.

They are “no trespassing” signs intended to warn other bucks to stay away from intended breeding ranges. Scrapes of dominant breeding bucks, victors of battles with all other bucks in their ranges, are respected and feared by all other bucks. Does do not intentionally urinate on scrapes to inform bucks when they are in heat — buck-attracting airborne pheromone emitted from the urine of each doe in heat for 24-26 hours attracts bucks wherever does are located. Does in heat do not wait near scrapes for a buck to appear. If necessary, they search for the dominant buck, easy to find because they reek with musk and urine. Only 10-12% of does are in heat on any one day during the first two-week period of breeding (in November).

Unless whitetails are seen feeding somewhere, with the exception of farm fields and forest clearcuts most hunters find it difficult to identify whitetail feeding areas — hubs of whitetail activities and the most productive of stand sites. Whitetail feeding areas are areas where lots sunlight reaches the ground.

Feeding areas will have lots of zigzagging tracks of unalarmed deer.

Deer signs that identify them are lots of zigzagging, close-together, off-trail tracks of walking deer, fresh and old, lots of droppings, fresh and old, and lots chewed off stems of various plants — green vegetation and acorns where available in early fall and stems of woody shrubs and suckers and saplings of trees in late fall and winter.

Late fall & winter feeding areas will have evidence of browsing.

Feeding areas will be littered with fresh doe, yearling, and fawn-sized droppings.

Keep an eye out for beds.

The size of clumped droppings in the feeding area will help you identify the class of the bucks that are keeping tabs on the estrus cycles of your does. (Be sure to get yourself a set of Doc’s Sign Guides.)

Being obvious deer signs, well-used deer trails are popular stand sites of hunters. Most are made by repeated passages of small deer herds — does trailed by their fawns and yearlings — becoming silent-to-use tunnels through cover. The odds of seeing mature bucks on such trails are relatively poor. Typically, doe trail openings are too narrow and low to allow silent passage of mature bucks with wide antlers and human hunters as well. Except where openings of trails are two or more feet wide and five feet high, while making or renewing ground scrapes along frequently used doe trails after mid-October or while trailing does in heat in November, older bucks travel off-trail up to 50% of the time. Add to this the fact that depending on wind direction, needed cover while returning crosswind or downwind on the way to downwind areas after feeding before turning toward their bedding areas and the fact that mature whitetails quickly discover trails and sites currently being used by hunters, whitetails therefore have at least a dozen different routes to use when travelling from one place to another.

While unclumped, these are very large droppings made by a trophy-class buck on a trail within sight of an important feeding area.

The odds of seeing a mature buck on any trail far from hubs of whitetail activities such as feeding areas, watering spots or not-advisable-to-hunt bedding areas are poor. The closer a trail is to a currently favored feeding area, the better your odds for success will be whatever class of deer you hope to take.

Fresh deer tracks of unalarmed whitetails (walking or feeding), especially near or within feeding areas, always have great hunting value. They not only reveal kinds of deer that made the tracks (via measured lengths) but reveal vicinities in which they are located right now or likely will be later today and/or tomorrow morning (if not alarmed by hunters meanwhile). During hunting seasons, don’t count on such predictability at same sites after three half-days have passed.

Fresh droppings of unalarmed deer also have great hunting value for the same reasons as fresh tracks. They are most common in feeding areas, aiding in identifying current favorite feeding areas — hubs of whitetail activities.

Lengths of whitetail beds reveal kinds of deer that made them but have dubious hunting value. Though deer may often change locations in which they feed and travel during hunting seasons, whitetails with safe bedding areas (deliberately avoided by hunters) where all hunters are stand hunters generally remain in their home ranges during hunting seasons, maintaining predictable habits at predictable sites during predictable hours. Whitetails that lack safe bedding area soon abandon their home ranges.

Freshly made antler rubs (damp with damp fragments of bark on the ground beneath them) antler on tree trunks three or more inches in diameter adjacent to well-used deer trails are signposts of breeding areas made by older bucks, likely the largest in your hunting area. Trails thus marked are most traveled by these bucks during the 2–3 weeks before breeding begins (during archery hunting seasons). A rare rub found freshly made in November is likely to be visited and possibly renewed by the buck that made it within a few to 24 hours.

Two or three weeks before each deer hunting season begins, my sons, grandsons and I spend considerable time scouting off-trail in search of secluded bedding areas of mature bucks. The first clue that tells us we may be near one is a newly made antler rub, bright and easily spotted over a considerable distance.

There are three kinds of antler rubs. One kind is made on small diameter tree trunks or clumps of woody shrubs by bucks about September 1st to strip deteriorating, insect-attracting velvet from their then fully developed antlers. These are usually made within or very near their bedding areas.

More commonly seen are single rubs made on larger diameter tree trunks adjacent to well-used deer trails after weather cools in mid-October. These function as visible, musk-laden signposts of intended breeding ranges.

The third kind is made off-trail by mature bucks in their bedding areas during the two weeks before much anticipated breeding begins, a means of releasing pent up energy and aggressiveness by via mock battles with tree trunks. Where one rub of this kind is discovered (commonly within 100 yards of water), several more are soon likely to be discovered within the surrounding acre or two — the usual size of a buck bedding area. Six to twelve rubs are most common. Some older bucks will make thirty or more.

Wherever several off-trail rubs in a small area are discovered, we then search for deer beds in fallen leaves or deep grasses, 45–56 inches long for bucks 2-1/2 to 6-1/2 years of age (few live longer). They will all be the same size because older bucks generally bed alone at this time. We also search for and find lots of droppings, commonly clumped, 5/8 to 1-1/4 inches long, because whitetails generally empty their bowels upon rising from their beds.

Now this might seem strange, but the main reason we search for buck bedding areas while scouting preseason today is to avoid them during following hunting seasons. Before 1990 I made it a point to hunt near bedding areas of older bucks (with limited success) after breeding came to an end on November 17^th because at that time it was the only spot I knew of where such a buck could be counted on to show up after feeding in the morning. My studies after 1990 convinced me this was a terrible mistake.

As I had noted earlier, bucks I didn’t take, that discovered me stand hunting near their bedding areas, with or without my knowledge (tracks discovered later in snow revealing what had happened) not only abandoned the bedding areas they had been using spring, summer and fall but abandoned their entire home or breeding ranges until well after the hunting season ended. In fact very few ever used the same bedding area again during following years.

As further studies finally revealed, most mature bucks that have safe bedding areas throughout a hunting season will generally remain within their home or breeding range throughout a hunting season, or at least until becoming alarmed enough by hunters to raise their tails and flee with all possible speed, after which most quickly abandon their ranges and/or become nocturnal.

Today’s mature whitetails recognize preludes to hunting seasons & differences between hunting & non-hunting humans.

Like last year, a big buck with especially large antlers and drop-tines spent spring, summer and early fall feeding, watering and bedding within or adjacent to my longtime Wisconsin hunting partner’s forest home. Often viewed with yearning and discussed by local deer hunters, weeks and even months before the firearm hunting season began the region surrounding the buck’s range rang with hammer blows and motorized equipment used to prepare stand sites, post lands, clear trails, create shooting lanes and offer generous quantities of baits such as apples, corn and growing clover or alfalfa. Contrarily, my partner deliberately avoided disturbing deer inhabiting his own wooded property throughout the year, but again, that canny buck was nowhere to be seen during during the 2016 firearm deer hunting season.

Such a tale is common wherever whitetails are hunted, one reason being, experienced whitetails that have survived three or more hunting seasons recognize preludes to deer hunting such as scouting, preparations of stand sites, discharges of firearms at targets and game such as grouse, waterfowl and black bears during earlier hunting seasons and an increasing frequency sounds made by off-road vehicles within their home ranges. They then realize it will soon be time to begin taking the evasive actions that enabled them to survive previous hunting seasons.

Mature whitetails also quickly recognize differences between hunting and non-hunting humans. When harmless humans they have often observed throughout the year suddenly don blaze-orange clothing and begin sneaking into their ranges, often halting to peer about and listen, or when humans form long lines that attempt to drive them toward waiting lines of downwind humans, they instantly begin taking previously effective precautions. Though conservative at first, as soon as it becomes obvious it will thereafter be difficult to avoid short-range encounters with hunting humans, they readily abandon their home or breeding ranges for extended periods, not uncommonly taking refuge several miles away on posted property or in habitat seldom invaded by hunters such as wooded swamps. Older wolf-country bucks I have studied were knowledgeable of safe sites in areas as large as a township (36 square-miles). Many experienced deer simply become nocturnal when threatened by hunters, stubbornly refusing to leave their secluded beds within their home or breeding ranges during daylight hours.

Now you know some major reasons why such deer are so difficult to hunt.

Whitetails are generally active in only about 10% of their home ranges on any one day. Typically, this 10% is long, and shaped like a skinny, lumpy donut with a secluded bedding area and current favorite watering spot in two parts and one or two of several feeding areas in other parts. To be productive, therefore, a stand must be located somewhere within this donut. This 10% is easy to distinguish, being well marked by often-used deer trails, fresh deer tracks and droppings and other very recently made deer signs. The trouble is, depending on wind direction, needed cover, currently available foods, known locations of trails and sites frequented by hunters and hunting methods used by hunters, this 10% can change in location, shape and size as frequently as twice daily during a hunting season, confounding efforts made by hunters. For this reason, preseason scouting is generally most rewarding during the first 2–3 days of a hunting season. After that, most hunters must depend on luck.

This is only the beginning of this lesson on deer hunting.

During any one day during the course of a hunting season, where are deer right now? Unfortunately, If you’ve been making drives or wandering dark to dark through your hunting area, they’re likely somewhere else, perhaps miles away. At the very least, most mature whitetails in or near your hunting area are now nocturnal — active during darkness only. If you are a skilled stand hunter, however, one who does not ordinarily alarm deer while hiking to and from stand sites, beginning on day three of your hunting season, mature whitetails are likely living fairly normal, predictable lives out of sight and safe distances from the trails you use and your stand sites. Their current locations are clearly marked by fresh tracks and droppings of walking or feeding deer.

How to find and recognize these signs without spooking deer and how to successfully take advantage of such signs are book-sized subjects — soon-to-be published in my Whitetail Hunters Almanac, 10^th Edition. I plan to touch on these subjects piece by piece via blogs during coming months. Recognizing deer tracks and their meanings is now well covered in my recently-published, $4.95 ebook entitled Dr. Ken Nordberg’s 2016 Pocket Guidebook to Whitetail Tracks Fall and Winter which can be downloaded to any device.

Apple iBooks version of Track Guidebook

Amazon Kindle version of Track Guidebook

If you see some deer in your hunting area during a hunting season, it is natural to assume you are capable of seeing all deer there. Within suitable whitetail habitat, however, it’s impossible. There are 15–30 deer per square-mile in your hunting area and about 40% are antlered bucks. You’d have to be exceptionally lucky, very knowledgeable about whitetails and their habits, very skilled at hunting and have lots of time to hunt to see half of them during the course of a hunting season. The seen half would include many inexperienced fawns and yearlings and the unseen half would include most of the mature bucks and many of the mature does. The luck part is best where few if any hunters wander about on foot from dark to dark (“Stirrin’ ‘em up,” as they typically like to say with a grin).

It’s also natural to imagine the stand where you took, or nearly took, a big buck last year will be a great place to take a big buck this year. Though I’ve hunted whitetails 71 years, I still waste opening mornings at such sites, hoping it’s true. It rarely turns out that way, however. There are lots of reasons. Big bucks do not make the same serious mistake twice. In fact, during hunting seasons they rarely use the same trail twice in several days and they travel off-trail more than 50% of the time. Sites where they once encountered danger from hunters are routinely avoided and checked for danger from a safe distance downwind as they pass, year after year. This is basic survival behavior for whitetails that have survived three or more hunting seasons. Stand sites that were once productive, or nearly productive, inevitably become unproductive because mature whitetails are better at figuring you out than you are at figuring out them. Moreover, younger deer imitate their actions, thus learning to avoid you before before they’ve ever encountered you.

Previously productive stand sites can be productive soon again soon if a passing intended quarry (and all other deer) do not realize a hunter is near, or the intended quarry is successfully taken. It may take a couple of years for a mature buck to find and adopt the home range of mature buck that was taken by a hunter or died because of old age during the following winter and begin using sites and trails favored by the previous buck (usually for good reasons). Once this happens, a once productive buck stand site can become productive again (made evident preseason by annual scouting). The changeover from buck to buck can be rapid where deer numbers are great or slow (take two or more years) where deer numbers are low.

Where stand sites are overused, becoming productive again can take years. I know of two stand sites that once enabled one of my sons to take big bucks (half for the wall) two sets of five seasons in a row (ten in ten years) that are still unproductive 14 years later. If any whitetail, antlered or not, becomes alarmed enough by a hunter to quickly abandon a stand area successfully, trotting or bounding with its tail erect and/or snorting, the stand site is likely doomed for one or more hunting seasons.

Not uncommonly (for my sons and I), a new stand site that has all the characteristics of a dynamite spot to take a big buck will turn out to be a dud on opening morning. It isn’t likely because the hunter was mistaken about the site. There are lots of reasons why older bucks may be temporarily spending time elsewhere, accompanying a doe in heat a mile away, for example. Rather than hunt at the same site for an entire week, using the same trail to get there once or twice daily, almost certain to completely ruin the site for hunting, my sons and I have often been rewarded by abandoning such a stand site after one day of unsuccessful hunting and then trying it again 4–7 days later (it worked for my sons John and Dave this past season).

Generally, though we still find it difficult to avoid using a stand site on opening day where a big buck was taken or should have been taken the year before, we each begin each new hunting season with several new stand sites: many never-used-before (generally best) and some that haven’t been used for several years (all near fresh signs made by mature bucks). We also each begin with at least three different bucks to hunt. Doubtless these are major reasons we are successful at taking our agreed-on limit of four mature bucks per hunting season (to prevent overhunting of bucks).

“Boy, that’s a frigid northwest wind,” I silently complained. By carefully reducing the size of the window on my left and moving my stool back away from the opening, it began to feel warm inside. “There, that’s better. Now I can watch the entire end of this clearcut where we’ve been finding all those fresh deer tracks in real comfort. That’s certainly different. I’m glad I’m not sitting in a tree stand this morning. Keeping out of a cold wind is something I didn’t think about when I decided to try using one of these things (a camo fabric covered, tent-like, portable ground blind).

“It sure was easy to set up. It practically set up itself when I pulled it out of the bag. I wasn’t impressed by the size of the stakes that came with it, but they are definitely keeping this thing pinned down just fine in this breeze. Despite using a couple of ropes provided to tie to adjacent brush and trees in stronger winds, it’s rocking a bit, but no more than the surrounding grass, shrubs and trees. Now if it will only fool bucks and other deer into thinking it is a normal part of this landscape…”

“Hey, that’s a deer over there by that big boulder. It’s kind of dark yet. I can’t see if it has antlers. Better take a look at it with my scope. Nope, it’s a doe. A good decoy though. There, it’s looking this way. It doesn’t seem to be bothered by what it sees. Now it’s feeding. This blind has just passed its first important test. Can’t wait to see how a big buck will react. For me, that’ll be the most important test.”

Unfortunately, during our past hunting season I did not see any of the most elusive of wolf-country whitetails in our hunting area — dominant breeding bucks. Until I see one up close and acting as if my blind is a harmless bush or tree, I cannot honestly suggest such a hunting aid fools much experienced older bucks.

Though hopeful, I’m not sure a boxed-shaped object in the woods, whatever its colors, can be counted on to do this. The outline of my portable blind is mindful of a six-foot-tall spruce tree, but it doesn’t have the colors and design of a spruce tree on it, making it somewhat out of place in the woods as well. The most advantageous functions of a portable ground blind are: 1) hide a hunter’s silhouette, otherwise readily recognized by today’s mature, stand-smart whitetails, and 2) hide a hunters movements (while scanning for deer, stretching during hours of sitting and preparing to fire at a deer), otherwise also readily spotted by nearby whitetails. Though turkey hunters have been enjoying great success while using portable ground blinds without regard for using surrounding cover to disguise their blinds, my long experience with studying and hunting mature bucks convinces me this would not be advisable when hunting a buck that has survived three or more hunting seasons. In my opinion, to be effective for hunting such deer, portable blinds available today need to be masked by more than camo fabric. Because of their distinctive and unnatural shapes, they should be at least 50% masked by surrounding natural cover. I also believe the failure to do this will inevitably enable mature whitetails to quickly recognize and avoid portable ground blinds, just as they eventually did with portable tree stands. Meanwhile, though these hunting aids may or may not make older bucks easier to hunt, I do believe skillfully disguised portable ground blinds will prove to be effective for taking most other whitetails.

In this location the ground blind sticks out like a sore thumb.

This photo is from a different angle, in the same spot, with the blind staked down so it is more upright. However, it still sticks out. Instead, if the blind is moved back and to the left about 10–12 feet, it looks like this.

In essence, I am trying to hide and disguise my camo blind. This will reduce your shooting window, but will improve your odds of seeing a big buck.

Don’t fold you window flaps outwards like this.

Notice how the material reflects light in an unnatural way.

Instead, fold the flaps inside like this.

Notice how human skin is very visible inside of the blind.

You should always wear gloves and a camo face mask.

This will help to make you less visible inside the blind.