Weather tips for hunting deer and gobblers

Let’s settle the playing field first

It’s impossible for hockey players to play a game unless they are on the ice, and it’s impossible for hunters to shoot a buck or doe if they are sitting indoors watching television.

That’s settled, so what do we do when faced with inclement weather? You know: like some of what we’ve had so far this month?

East winds, northeast and southeast winds, and rain. Some snow flurries today. Copious amount of rain two or three times. Strong blustery winds. Weather that even deer dislike.

If we were to set out every evening during hunting season when inclement weather rears its ugly head, we may have been able to hunt only a few nights so far this season. The abundance of combined weather conditions has been noticeable to most hunters.

The spring turkey hunting season begins shortly, and if nature stays its course, there may be some days when the big birds hunker down and do nothing. Few birds like to move when the wind is strong.

So, what can we do about it? The answer is to go hunting anyway. Some of the animals and birds we hunt in season will move even in bad weather although they may not move very much or very far.

It’s bad weather, attitude and grit will get you a chance

It only makes sense that if critters move for only 15 or 20 minutes, the closer one hunts to the bedding area should provide them with greater opportunity to be nearby when they get up to feed.

Mild rain doesn’t bother turkeys or whitetails at all. They are out in it on a daily basis, and can’t come inside out of the weather. If it is a soft rain, they often move well. They move less in a hard down pouring rain. I hunted turkeys once in a heavy snow storm and the birds moved well. Predicting movement is not a precise art.

Deer will move on an east wind, but most hunters have few locations set up where an east wind offers them an advantage. A strong wind is much worse than a soft breeze.

Heavy winds put everything into motion. Trees, weeds, cattails and tall grasses move. Leaves (those still on fall trees) shake violently on the trees, go blowing off branches, and leaves are constantly in the wind at ground level and above. Deer and turkeys detest such windy conditions because it removes their ability to see motion because everything within sight is moving. Strong winds make noise, both deer and gobblers depend on their hearing to keep them safe.

Stands located closest to heavy cover offer hunters the best opportunity to see deer on such miserable days. The important thing is to get into a stand without being seen, smelled or heard.

Crow hunters say that these black birds can’t count. I contend that deer can’t count either, and that opens up one possibility to get into a stand even if the deer bedding area or turkey food or roost sites are downwind of the stand. A friend can drive you in by truck, park with the motor running while the hunter crawls into the stand, and then drive off. That doesn’t work well for turkey hunters because of vehicle lights at night near a roost site drive many birds crazy.

A friend of mine and his wife leased land for many years, and each of them hunted a different parcel. My buddy would drive his wife 3/4 miles back off the road to her stand, walk with her to her ground blind while the four-wheeler idled nearby, and once she was in her blind, he would jump back on the machine and drive away. Again, this technique doesn’t work for gobblers unless they are hunting in mid-day, and guess approximately when and where the birds will travel.

She often saw deer while the sounds of the four-wheeler were still audible in the distance. The noise of the four-wheeler didn’t bother the deer during daylight hours, and if anything, it gave them advance warning that people were coming. Two people get off, two walk to the blind, one walks back and drives away. Deer can’t count, and this method works well.

Up your chances for success with a few simple field rules

The one thing to bear in mind is that deer and turkeys are used to seeing cars and trucks, tractors and other farm equipment in most areas during daylight hours. Deer will run from all motorized equipment heading in their direction, but they don’t run far unless the humans talk to each another. Human voices add another annoying dimension to this equation.

Talking while dropping someone off at a blind or when picking them up should not be done. Deer also are accustomed to hearing people talk, but whether talking near a hunting stand is a good idea, I think it’s best to drive up, drop off the hunter, and drive away without speaking. Why ruin a good thing?

One thing about weather: Any time there is a storm moving in, deer and turkeys will usually move just ahead of the storm during daylight hours. If the weather forecasts a storm arriving about 4 o’clock, try to be in a good spot by 2 p.m. It can be a super time to be hunting.

Weather plays an important role in deer and gobbler movements and travel. Rather than sitting indoors and not hunting, try to incorporate some other tactics into your hunting bag of tricks, and hunters may be pleasantly surprised at how well some of these will work.

The weather, she’s a-changin’

I dream of those old-fashioned childhood winters. Hard freezes that lock the ice to the shoreline on all sides of the lake, and just enough wind to scour the snow away and no worry about pitching through when the ice caves in under my feet.

The memories are still fresh even though my first ice fishing trip was taken about 65 years ago. It was at North Lake near Millington in Tuscola County. Our parents owned a small lot and kept an old house trailer there, and we would visit the area often from January through March.

North Lake held bluegills, largemouth bass, perch, sunfish and some northern pike. Ice-up came quick and hard, freezing the lake’s surface, and within a week there was six to 10 inches of firm clear ice.

Not many lakes have very safe ice. Use extreme caution.

The early-ice action always featured a good bite. We had triangulated the green weed beds with three shoreline landmarks, and often could return to the same holes that we’d fished the week before. The ‘gills and sunfish would still be there, and we would lowered a six-inch sucker below the ice near the weeds, and caught some nice pike on tip-ups.

That was then and this is now. I don’t know whether everyone has been paying attention, but the last three or four years has featured much more wind from the east. Such winds often bring rain, and heavy rains make early ice treacherous and unstable. This winter is the mildest I can ever remember.

One wonders if we are in the middle of the global warming that others have talked about for 15 years. I’m not a scientist, nor a meteorologist, but I am observant. I remember things about the previous years, and I see a pattern forming that I really don’t like.

The past several years has produced rather dramatic changes in the Great Lakes and some inland lakes. The Great Lakes undergo a cyclic rise and fall of water levels over the years, and levels have been low for longer than normal. Five years ago many Great Lakes marinas had to dredge so boats could enter and leave their slips during the summer months.

Check out the Betsie River where it flows under the M-22 bridge between Elberta and Frankfort. Chinook salmon and steelhead runs have been poor in this river for a few years, and the reason is low water. There is barely enough water flowing through the channel to allow fish to run upstream.

Several years ago Crystal Lake didn’t freeze well and I did a story about three men (two from the same family) that broke through the ice. That they lived was a miracle. The ice stayed bad most of the winter.

We can take a long look at this year. The stage was set for some excellent ice. Cold weather, freezing temperatures and no wind set the stage in early November, and for a week it was making ice on small lakes.

No early winter this year. It was brown at Christmas.

Then, before Nov. 15 and the firearm deer opener, it began to warm up. It now shows little sign of making any ice after today’s all-day reasonably warm temperatures.

Bare ground is a common sight. Our opening-day snow disappeared by mid-day. The deer can roam wherever they wish, and they have easy access to green fields, unpicked cornfields, and open woodlands. There is no need for deer to yard up except in some areas that always get heavy snow, and this could result in an excellent winter for whitetail survival. What is good for the deer is good for wild turkey numbers as well.

It also could bring on an early steelhead run, and put fish in the river long before it freezes across. I’ve seen it happen, and many fish move upstream to winter over in deep holes. I remember once, years ago when I was guiding anglers, when the steelhead run was over long before the spring thaw began. People who waited until April 1 found few if any fish in the rivers and it could happen again.

The weather is changing. That much should be obvious to all, and it is having an effect on many of those who depend on winter sport for their yearly income. Bait shops will suffer if safe ice doesn’t come soon.

The snowmobile industry is facing a big loss of revenue as are northern communities that cater to sled riders and skiers. These high gas prices will cause For Sale signs to be posted on many sleds this  winter. Downhill skiing also faces tough conditions without cold and snow.

A lack of snow cover keeps winter hunters house-bound. They feed their hounds all year in hopes of having good snow, and when it comes late, bunny hunting is pretty poor.

Downhill skiers have man-made snow but that doesn’t work for hunters.

Weather patterns are changing. Will this change continue? Who knows, but if it does, the economy of northern Michigan will suffer once again as it has for the past few years. The stakes are growing ever higher now, and people can hang on only so long before being forced to close their businesses and seek other employment … all too often, out of state.

I try to avoid such doom-and-gloom columns, but the changing weather is a major topic of conversation in every coffee shop in the north. Many people long for the old-fashioned winters, and I am one of them.

Rainy weather makes for miserable driving, and anglers and hunters find little solace in a winter rainstorm.

Late-season bow hunt

A nice December buck steps out of a thicket to feed.

It is a grand experience, this bow hunting for winter whitetails, but what makes it so special is that every day is different. Every day in the woods is one of pure joy, even on those days of hard east winds.

Not all days are created equal when it comes to bow hunting. There are those special days that come along perhaps two or three days each season where we know something truly special will happen.

The possibilities of what may happen are endless. Perhaps a beet-red sun falls out of the western sky at sunset, and we set and marvel at nature’s beauty. Sometimes the wind will switch at just the right time so the hunter catches a break and shoots a buck with large antlers, occasionally more by accident than on purpose.

Each December day offers something special to deer hunters.

Some days are memorable because we see a whitetail buck that we’ve never seen before, and the animal is large enough to have been around for four or five years but has escaped detection until now.

A hunting day can be spectacular when we watch two large evenly matched bucks fight for dominance. The dust flies, there is the thunder of their hooves stomping the ground, the grunting as they push and shove in an effort to whip the other buck. Some fights end in a tie, but most reach a finale when one buck, clearly outmatched, gives up.

There is always the pleasure and personal pride of exquisite placement of an arrow, and the knowledge that the buck will be dead in two or three seconds. A touch of sadness always comes over us when we realize that we’ve taken that animal’s life for our nourishment.

Just as we feel a bit sad, we also feel a keen sense of accomplishment. The downing of a grand buck is a happening; it is something we’ll long remember, and the memory of the buck will live on forever once it has been stored in our personal memory bank.

We take pride in our skills, and we pursue deer with a purpose. Some bucks will be passed up, and some will not. Much of the time we never know we are going to shoot until the trigger finger twitches on the release, and the buck goes down.

Winter hunting is more about winter hunting than just killing deer.

Hunting isn’t just about killing nor is it about letting all deer live. There is a mental and physical balance we must maintain within ourselves, and the deer herd, that tells us it’s time to stop.

Stopping hunting is out of the question for me. I may stop carrying my bow, but I hunt 12 months out of the year. All of it, in one form or another, is scouting. I remember late-fall deer trails, study where deer bed down in the winter, and learn where big bucks live and why they are found there during the hunting season.

Hunting is a never-ending endeavor to learn and study the deer we hunt. We greet each season with enthusiasm, we scout long and hard to learn the habits of good bucks, and we put forth more than a bit of energy learning our hunting area.

It means laying down plenty of boot leather, checking food sites and deer trails, and watching deer from afar to avoid spooking them. This love affair with deer may well be an addiction but it’s not a harmful one.

This is not an easy time to hunt but it can be rewarding.

The more we watch and study deer, both bucks and does, the more we learn. The more we know about why deer do what they do, the better we become as a hunter. When we reach a certain pinnacle of skill and hunting success, we begin making each hunt more challenging.

It is, after all, the challenge between man and deer, that brings both of us together in the fall and early winter. The deer-hunting days are dwindling fast, and I can’t speak for you, but I haven’t had my fill of deer hunting just yet.

 

Weather tips for hunting deer and gobblers

A deer hunter sits in a Texas tower. A truck pulls up and the hunter climbs in

It’s impossible for hockey players to play a game unless they are on the ice, and it’s impossible for hunters to shoot a buck or doe if they are sitting indoors watching television.

That’s settled, so what do we do when faced with inclement weather? You know: like some of what we’ve had so far this month?

East winds, northeast and southeast winds, and rain. Some snow flurries today. Copious amount of rain two or three times. Strong blustery winds. Weather that even deer dislike.

The trick is to get into a blind without being seen by a deer or gobbler.

If we were to set out every evening during hunting season when inclement weather rears its ugly head, we may have been able to hunt only a few nights so far this season. The abundance of combined weather conditions has been noticeable to most hunters.

The spring turkey hunting season begins shortly, and if nature stays its course, there may be some days when the big birds hunker down and do nothing. Few birds like to move when the wind is strong.

So, what can we do about it? The answer is to go hunting anyway. Some of the animals and birds we hunt in season will move even in bad weather although they may not move very much or very far.

It only makes sense that if critters move for only 15 or 20 minutes, the closer one hunts to the bedding area should provide them with greater opportunity to be nearby when they get up to feed.

Mild rain doesn’t bother turkeys or whitetails at all. They are out in it on a daily basis, and can’t come inside out of the weather. If it is a soft rain, they often move well. They move less in a hard down-pouring rain. I hunted turkeys once in a heavy snow storm and the birds moved well. Predicting movement is not a precise art.

Deer will move on an east wind, but most hunters have few locations set up where an east wind offers them an advantage. A strong wind is much worse than a soft breeze.

Heavy winds put everything into motion. Trees, weeds, cattails and tall grasses move. Leaves (those still on fall trees) shake violently on the trees, go blowing off branches, and leaves are constantly in the wind at ground level and above. Deer and turkeys detest such windy conditions because it removes their ability to see motion because everything within sight is moving. Strong winds make noise, both deer and gobblers depend on their hearing to keep them safe.

Stands located closest to heavy cover offer hunters the best opportunity to see deer on such miserable days. The important thing is to get into a stand without being seen, smelled or heard.

Crow hunters say that these black birds can’t count. I contend that deer can’t count either, and that opens up one possibility to get into a stand even if the deer bedding area or turkey food or roost sites are downwind of the stand. A friend can drive you in by truck, park with the motor running while the hunter crawls into the stand, and then drive off. That doesn’t work well for turkey hunters because of vehicle lights at night near a roost site drive many birds crazy.

If possible, drop hunters off at the stand. Let the vehicle scare them away.

A friend of mine and his wife leased land for many years, and each of them hunted a different parcel. My buddy would drive his wife 3/4 miles back off the road to her stand, walk with her to her ground blind while the four-wheeler idled nearby, and once she was in her blind, he would jump back on the machine and drive away. Again, this technique doesn’t work for gobblers unless they are hunting in mid-day, and guess approximately when and where the birds will travel.

She often saw deer while the sounds of the four-wheeler were still audible in the distance. The noise of the four-wheeler didn’t bother the deer during daylight hours, and if anything, it gave them advance warning that people were coming. Two people get off, two walk to the blind, one walks back and drives away. Deer can’t count, and this method works well.

The one thing to bear in mind is that deer and turkeys are used to seeing cars and trucks, tractors and other farm equipment in most areas during daylight hours. Deer will run from all motorized equipment heading in their direction, but they don’t run far unless the humans talk to each another. Human voices add another annoying dimension to this equation.

Never talk when getting out of a vehicle, and never slam the truck door.

Talking while dropping someone off at a blind or when picking them up should not be done. Deer also are accustomed to hearing people talk, but whether talking near a hunting stand is a good idea, I think it’s best to drive up, drop off the hunter, and drive away without speaking. Why ruin a good thing?

One thing about weather: Any time there is a storm moving in, deer and turkeys will usually move just ahead of the storm during daylight hours. If the weather forecasts a storm arriving about 4 o’clock, try to be in a good spot by 2 p.m. It can be a super time to be hunting.

Weather plays an important role in deer and gobbler movements and travel. Rather than sitting indoors and not hunting, try to incorporate some other tactics into your hunting bag of tricks, and hunters may be pleasantly surprised at how well some of these will work.

Take common sense into the turkey woods tomorrow

Cathy Beutler with a nice gobbler she shot while hunting with me.

Turkey hunting mistakes and the shotguns we use don’t necessarily go together, but in many cases, they may come together whether we like it or not. People with much better eyesight than me can get along just fine, thank you, with just the bead on the front end of a shotgun.

They believe there is no reason to trick out their shotgun. That doesn’t work for me or my wife. I use a scope while she uses a Bushnell Holographic sight. Each one works well for us.

My 3-inch magnum 12 gauge shotgun wears a scope with crosshairs. It more than allows me to aim with confidence at an incoming gobbler. A well identified gobbler can be seen with the naked eye but the scope helps me pick a hole in the brush through which I can positively identify and shoot my bird. It helps reduce wounding of a turkey as well.

Hoping that today’s weather holds for tomorrow’s turkey opener.

Kay’s Holographic sight has a red ring that can be placed on the gobbler’s head and neck, and the brightness can be turned up or down to match her needs on a bright or very cloudy day.

They were both sighted in a month ago, and we’ll add new batteries just before our second-season hunt begins. We are fine as long as we don’t fall or bang the scope or sight off a tree limb or a big rock. I once fell while hunting in southwest Texas, and knocked my scope so far out of kilter that I couldn’t have hit the inside of a barn if I’d been standing inside it.

Several states are under my belt when it comes to turkey hunting. And even though the Michigan turkey season will be opening tomorrow, anyone who ventures out for wild turkeys this spring  should have some type of checklist. It certainly will help prevent forgetting some key element that is needed. I made that mistake once, got into my position well before the dawn, and reached  for my shotgun shells and they weren’t there.

I then remembered leaving them sitting on the table as my coffee was hurriedly quaffed. My hunting vest was pulled on, my empty and cased shotgun was picked up, and out the door I went. It was a wonderful morning, and two longbeards slipped in to within 35 yards even though I wasn’t calling and there were no decoys set out.

I sat still, watched the birds without spooking them, and still had a wonderful time. But hunting is not quite the same without a bow or loaded shotgun in hand.

In the heat of the moment, it’s easy to forget where items are or which pocket they were put in the turkey vest for safe keeping. I generally go through a mental or written checklist the day before a hunt, put everything in my car, and it stays there until I finish hunting that season.

A mistake made on opening day several years ago.

I write occasionally about turkey hunting mistakes. Here is one of mine. I took off one morning, drove to my hunting area, got there long before sun-up in preparation for a half-mile hike to my chosen hunting area, slipped on my turkey vest and reached for my shotgun. It wasn’t there.

It had rained the previous day while hunting, and I took the shotgun in the house to dry it off, clean it up, and forgot to put it back in its case and in the car. So, by the time I drove home, the sun was well up and another great turkey-hunting opportunity had been wasted.

What should this turkey hunting checklist contain? Obviously, it should have everything you’ll need for turkey hunting. Once pulled together, leave all gear locked in the vehicle to avoid a problem like mine.

We’ll start with the bare essentials. This would include

• camouflage clothing
• face mask, boots
• camo cap
• gloves
• turkey vest
• bow or shotgun

Don’t forget the shotgun shells and rain gear if needed. Of great importance is your spring turkey hunting license. It must be carried with you while hunting. Don’t leave it in the car or truck.

Next comes the less obvious but very important items. Anyone who checks many places for bird sign, and has patterned turkeys in several areas, should have a map showing these locations along with details of where birds roost, travel at dawn, move during the day, and how they return to their roost site. A handheld GPS unit can store a bunch of turkey hotspots, and it doesn’t take up much room.

Decoys have become an important part of a turkey hunter’s gear, and don’t forget them. Some people roll them up and stuff two hens and one jake decoy in the back of their hunting vest. I don’t because if they stay folded for too long, it’s a pain to heat them to pop the decoy back into its original shape.

Hen and jake decoys are important items for many hunters.

My old decoys have newspaper rolled up and stuffed inside the body and neck cavities. It makes them a bit slower to move on the stake during a breeze. A fast-moving decoy tends to scare approaching gobblers. I also cut several arrow shafts, glue in an insert and use a target point to stick it into the ground. The opposite end that goes through a decoy that has a washer that fits against the inside hole for the stake. Another target point and washer is placed at the top of the decoy, and the point is screwed into the insert. This allows the decoy to move. Paint these washers black. Just remember that a stiff breeze can still blow them around but there is a cure.

Two stakes are cut from old aluminum arrow shafts, and have a target point screwed in. These stakes are used to prevent a decoy from spinning completely around on a breezy day. It allow the decoy to swivel 12-14 inches in one direction and that much in the other direction, and this provides the best results for me. It provides some decoy movement that can help sell the deal.

Make certain any box calls are wrapped in an old dark-colored washcloth with one layer of cloth between the lid and box of the call to prevent unexpected squeaks. Keep all strikers for slate calls rubber-banded together to prevent them from clicking together in your vest. Know where each call is in your vest, and it doesn’t hurt to bring a brown towel to lay on the ground. Place all calls to be used on the towel next to your leg for easy access when needed.

Common sense and hunter safety must be practised while turkey hunting.

A Hunter Orange cap or vest can be worn when walking into and out of the woods, especially in the predawn darkness. Once you get to the hunting area, take it off. It adds a wee bit of extra hunting safety to your day in the woods.

Touch up any shiny object with brown, black or green spray paint. Carry shotgun shells, one each in different pockets, to prevent them from clicking together and making an untimely noise.

Carry a cell phone but turn the thing off. Carry a topographical map of the area if one exists, but stow it somewhere so it doesn’t crinkle and make noise as a gobbler approaches. A handheld GPS unit can mark your vehicle’s location, the best place to set up, and tell you how to return to the vehicle when hunting strange land. A flashlight is always handy, as is a good compass.

A foam rubber camouflaged butt pad is a luxury, and I carry one in the back of my vest. The small foam pad that folds down to be used as a seat is left up and in place and used to cushion my bad back.

I’m still dithering about taking my Ten-Point crossbow or my shot. Bow hunting for turkeys is legal from a treestand, and I’m thinking of trying it tomorrow.

What else? Anything else that you may need. I carry a turkey wing to slap against a tree or pant legs to simulate the fly-down sound of a bird coming out of a roost tree at dawn. A candy bar, cookies or a sandwich, and a bottle of water, are handy on an all-day hunt but pack them so they make no noise.

The last two things a turkey hunter should take into the woods on opening day is a combination of common sense and optimism. Go forth with common sense telling you what to do or not do, and the optimistic thought that this is the day you’ll take that husky longbeard. Think positively, and good things can happen.