Tips for the unfortunately corn surrounded

I’m going to college and have access to hunt a farmers property. I have my stand up and no intentions of moving it this season. As the title reads – I am completely surrounded by corn and in a small 20-30 acre section of woods on a river valley. There are deer trails down to the mud and lots of sign on the edge of the field I hunt.

I would venture to guess there are still hundreds of acres of corn up within the few square miles. Within the past month I have been seeing more bucks on my trail-cam than does… which is not a good sign. (but keep giving out those doe-tags DNR! )

I’ve been doing your average rattling, grunting, bleating sequences. I sat Monday and Tuesday evenings without seeing a SINGLE deer. Does anyone have any tips? Time and patience for this stand is running out….

Edit: Actually now that I think about it… it’s been weeks since i’ve had a doe on cam.

The first thing I would figure out is where the deer are bedding on the property that you hunt. If you can figure that out, sneak as close as you can with a doe decoy to the bedding area and call with some bleats and grunts. More than likely deer are bedding in the corn would be my guess. Maybe I am wrong….if so, a buck decoy and rattling would be my go-to tactic. The deer are using that woods as a runway to get from a to b by the sounds of it-the same thing happens on the woods that we own-surrounded by fields. But the deer tend to use it as an area to look for does and bed down. Use the decoys-especially if ANY of the corn comes off, and try to sit on the ground for an ambush. Hope this helps!!!

One thing I forgt to mention-if you can scout out a place where the deer have knocked corn down because of feeding, get into the field in this area about an hour earlier than you would usually get to your stand. Take a few cornstalks and break them off about three feet up, creating a type of blind so to speak. Then it just becomes a waiting game…I guy I know had the same type of problem, and he did this an arrowed a 150 class 9 point he had never seen before on camera.

Good luck!

Are the deer that you are seeing on you cams traveling in front of you stand? Expanding on that, are up still seeing fresh sign traveling by your stand? As mentioned above, find out if they are bedding in the woods or just traveling through it. If they bedding there, you may be spooking them out whne you go into stand.

I personally like to sit in the corn field rather than in a stand.

Yea, my cam is almost right under my stand. Half are during shooting hours, half are not. I don’t know where they bed yet… but i’m guessing corn.

The signs i’m seeing are numerous scrapes and rubs all associated to the edge of the corn field.

Recurring theme on sitting in the corn… great idea but i’m a little spooked about the bear that frequents my camera. He is VERY curious and won’t leave my camera alone. I have videos if him “malling” it about 5 or 6 times.

Maybe i’ll sit tonight in the wind and see how things go…

Sounds like you need to spray down your camera
Last rifle season I was surrounded with corn. Saw 2 yearlings in 5 days. I tried sneaking through the corn with no success. Bummer year! 9th day I heard shooting quite a ways off, then closer, then closer, then closer, finally heard trampling leaves and a 6 point and a doe came running through full tilt. Too funny the poor things had there tongues hanging out.

Sat tonight again without seeing a deer. All the scrapes on the way out were freshened up within the last 24 hours.

I’m lost.

We have the same problem down here with standing corn every year, they don’t leave it until its picked. Maybe find the heaviest traveled trail that leads from one field to another with fresh scrapes nearby and sit there. It sounds like you’ll just have to wait it out. Id use a doe in heat call and not a grunt. It sounds like the bucks already have does closeby and thier waiting for them to come into estrous so Id try a doe in heat call. It sounds like a few all day sits are about the best you can do if very few are are coming out of the corn during the day and changeing cornfields or going to water.