Unguided Deer Hunts
Unguided deer hunts within this Association means after the Association hunter parks his truck, steps out and hunts he is a self guided hunter. All else up to that point the unguided deer hunter does get guidance from the Association partners, Jon Nee and John Wenzel, who will act as the hunter's friendly point of contact and all will have a plan prior to any hunt.
The typical process is the first season hunting within the Association the hunter will talk to one of the two Jo(h)ns of where to hunt long before coming out for a scouting or hunting trip. That hunter then takes these recommendation which once getting access to the online map library are numbered hunting lease land or hunting spots so each is assured the other knows which spot is being discussed. That list of spots is typically longer than most will have time to scout and hunt. The hunter is then left to narrow down where to spend his limited time. The common approach is for the hunter to draw down his own aerial photos of the recommended farms and rank them in order from first to last where he may want to spend time. And, that is often that downfall of unguided deer hunts.
Those that rely too heavily on aerial photos will fall into the mistake of ranking farms based on the most woody cover being the best. The mistake in this approach is that in the central mid-west gain farming is king and it is due to the grain farms that we have the trophy whitetail that we do. The point of aerial surveys is then to identify the prime terrain feature of farming activity then as a second selection criteria the cover available. This cover is many times different than expected as in the central midwest tall grass and brush is the predominate cover not woodlots.
The type of farming can be rank ordered from best to worst. The best is the large grains of corn and soybean. Next is milo and winter wheat. Cut wheat is to be discounted entirely along with cattle or pasture.
The next selection criteria is a water source as deer will drink every day and in some of our local areas water is not as available as many hunters have experienced in past deer hunts elsewhere.
Then comes cover. This theme of food first and the whitetail make use of whatever cover is available is a constant in the great plains states, corn belt or as we call it agricultural land deer hunting.
Cover can be rank ordered from best to worst not based on the amount of cover but its location.
The best cover is that which is isolated from direct human observation from road, farm yard and cattle pasture. pature is lower on the sacle as farmers will check cattle frequently and typically do so intrusively on ATV, tractor or truck. It has been and always will be this isolation factor that is the prime cover selection criteria.
The worst cover is the opposite. That which is in direct observation of road, farm yard or pasture. Those areas of regular human presence.
Putting this all together the places to scout or hunt can be quickly narrowed down from best to worst by appling this criteria to aerial photos.
That process works well the first season with the Association.
Most deer hunters will quickly scout 2,000 to 4,000 acres of land before settling on 3-5 spots they would consider first choice using this system. This allows a range of possibilities that seems to do more good to prevent the hunter from outsmarting himself believing he is better at picking the spot where the trophy whitetail will be than the trophy whitetail himself. This has been proven many times over the years when we will ask if the hunter tagged off his first choice property or other and the great majority is on other than the first choice farm.
Another effect of having tens of thousands of acres to scout and hunt is the settling in process that generally takes around 3 years. Typically, by the third year of any hunter hunting in this Association he has covered enough ground and found more spots he likes better than his first year farms that by the third season he is rarely hunting his first year farms any longer. This effect typically seals most hunters from wanting to secure their own private deer hunting lease due to understand that the deer hunt is not really a hunt at all. Successful unguided deer hunts come from scouting. The majority of effort of the most successful hunters has always been spent scouting. The hunt itself is typically an exercise at scent control and shooting skills.