Brian and I went into the area we hunted the first day. We decided to give it a whirl and see what happened. I think I set a record by seeing four different spikes. I don’t usually see a lot of spikes in the Midwest, but it seemed to be spike alley today. I also saw a 6-pointer chase a doe past me and a few other little guys. It was an eventful morning, but nothing big seems to be moving.
In the evening, I went back to a spot I hung a stand the first day. I figured I would go in and see why there was no action on the cell cam I put in there. There’s usually a lot of action in the area, so I figured I would look into the reason. Upon getting down there, I found a guy setting a tree stand up, which I figured probably led to some of the issues. I also found where someone had put aluminum foil on trees as reflective markers. On top of that, when I got to my regular trail camera, I was disappointed to see that eight different people had been past it in the last five days. That explained everything I needed to know. I was waiting for the right time to hunt the area, but it appears the right time is going to be influenced by quite a few other hunters.
I walked out with two guys from North Carolina. One of them was the one who was setting the stand up when I went in. The stand was a very short distance to the one I had hung. Although I would never stay in an area where a stand is, I guess everyone is a little different. I’ve never felt comfortable hunting near someone else. I’ve always preferred to go elsewhere and find a spot where I don’t have to deal with any potential confrontation or distractions. I was a little surprised. After learning that he had no intention of hunting in a different spot, I decided I would not return. Although I set the stand for our entire group to rotate through, I decided I would not return. I just prefer being away from people and pride myself in finding places to set up where other people aren’t already hunting. There’s so much land to look over and find different places, there’s absolutely no reason to join a party. I’ll never understand why people feel the need to hunt on top of other people on public land. It’s not that hard to find other places to hunt. I guess it goes back to hunting ethics and a silent understanding. Unfortunately, far too many people just don’t get that part of it. I get it. It’s public land and we all own it and can use it at our discretion. People moving in on me over the years is probably the biggest factor for my continued success. I’ve learned to quickly find other quality areas because I like to be away from people. Too bad others don’t thing the same way. Then, I wouldn’t have to be moving around so much.
Nobody saw much this evening, but the wind was howling, too. Actually in the area Brian went to scout out and hunt, he said he saw nine deer and had a good one go by him that he couldn’t get a shot at. I took video of a really nice 10-pointer that rubbed a fencepost in front of me. He was there for a long time., even with the guy from North Carolina sitting about 60 yards from me. I could see him in the tree. I will not return there tomorrow, but I’ll send Doug or Jeff there because they might have an opportunity to shoot that nice buck I saw tonight. My nerves can’t handle walking into the area again, especially after learning the other hunter has no intentions of finding another spot.