Some day in my life I hope to kill a deer as cool as that one. Very awesome buck, congrats.

Rattling has by far worked the best for me. Location and wind direction are important for all calling in my opinion.

I have never had much luck at all with that dang can call.

great buck! nice job!

The trail is through dense sumac that grows right up the the field so it is instantly pretty nasty to cut a trail next to it. I have decided to use it this year and walk very carefully and try to spray down as much as i can and not touch anything.

For next year, the guys and I have decided to get the chain saw out and cut a nice trial right down the fence line that we can ease into the stand with. I think the deer will prefer to still use the old trail that is about 20 yards into the sumac and over all will be a better situation. I appreciate everyone’s input. It is always frustrating knowing where the deer are and not being able to get into a position to hunt them

Typically it is an evening spot, i never bump deer in the afternoon because they bed a good distance away from the trail. In the morning i have bumped them, like you guys said, the best way is early, like really early at least 1.5 hrs before light, they feed their way through the beans early in the morning and come by the stand to bed down.

I think i’m going to try to spray down as much as possible before walking on it, prob try to find a nice cow pie to stomp on.

my buddy hunted it this morning and said there were 10-15 scrapes on the 250 yard trail

Birds were definitely down and hunting was tough. Our group got 11 Saturday and 9 Sunday in about 3 hours.

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Did the same as Kooty took the weekend off from hunting with the crappy weather but did manage to get an old monster ladder stand up for shot gun season. It is an old stand and a beast to get set up, took 3 guys to get it done and we could have used 4. It is in a sweet spot that I turkey hunted this spring and saw quite a few deer from, cant wait to try it out when gun season opens.

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Wow, that’s a big one. Enough room to lay down and nap if you wanted.

I was out in SD pheasant hunting, the birds were down and we ended up averaging about a bird per person a day. We found this sad scene yesterday, it smelled pretty bad so i didn’t do a ton of investigating but it looked like a bow kill that go lost. Too bad, had a lot of potential. In SD there were a ton of rubs and scrapes everywhere.

Last week in SE MN there were plenty of rubs and scrapes emerging. I think my first day in the stand this year will be Wednesday

Also, it is still fantastic hunting

i have been going out there for 15 years or so? not every year, took some years off through college ect. My uncle married into to some very good land out there. I drool when I see the deer out there too. The land sets up just like you see on hunting shows, i’m so used to hunting bluff country and only being able to see a deer if it is inside 50 yards…..too bad out of staters can’t get a buck tag in that county

Hoping we have a little sanctuary spot this weekend. Leaving tomorrow night and hunting out by woonsocket.

I agree 100% with the guys that said breath is very important.

I’m not a scent control freak, maybe i should be, I have tried various products and while i think they help, i have never had any encounters where i was convinced a deer didn’t wind be because I used a certain product or whatever.

I have had encounters where deer go down wind of me after i have showered good, washed my clothes the night before, didn’t wear them in the truck, sprayed down in the field, didn’t sweat getting to the stand yada yada yada and have gotten busted big time.

Other times i have been running late, booking to the stand, sweaty and i know i stink and have deer walk down wind of me and not bust me…not saying they didn’t know i was there, but they definitely didn’t spook.

I think all the things mentioned above help to some degree and certainly don’t hurt (i do much of what is stated above for that reason), but by far the overwhelming factor is just don’t let deer get down wind of you. I know sometimes you can’t help it or winds change, but i just flat out don’t rely on anything to cover my scent, i just hunt the wind.

my $0.02

I just picked up a new one this year, moultrie M-880 and i really like it. Very small, runs on 8 double A’s, 8 megepixel pics, fast trigger time and i especially like how easy it is to pop open and access the the SD card or even remove the batteries. I have several older moultries and they are reliable which is what i like, i have tried the cuddy backs and have had really bad reliability with them.

Beautiful buck! Love the camera footage and the pics from the blind, definitely helps paint the story. Congratulations!

Congratulations man, way to stay dedicated and keep working when many of us have quit (me lol). Great character on that buck!

I’m still working at it in SE MN as well. The neighbor just picked his corn on the ridge about 10 days ago and i have two prime stands covering the main routes to it but they just have not been moving during shooting hours I have never done much late season hunting but this year i have not killed a deer yet and i’m ready to take a doe just to get some meat in the freezer (plus i have not killed a deer with my bow in a few years)

Yeah i heard about this last week. Tick’s me off how vocal some of these Eh-holes get. I’m with most of you guys, awesome trophy and if I knew it was legal I would try to fight off the shakes enough to drop him. Then give those tree hugging PETA losers the bird as I registered him.

That may be the heaviest looking deer i have ever seen

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9 days in deer camp with not being able to hunt the last 8 of them would not be the same…..

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I’m not a “deer camp” guy, so maybe I don’t understand this….if you are spending the season in deer camp and you paste a buck or doe opening day, why do you need to stop hunting? If I remember correctly you can buy several doe tags in either state, so why do you need to pack it up and go home if you can’t shoot a buck? To me, quitting hunting because you can’t kill a buck is greedy.

APR affects people differently and I can understand some of the view points. But in my case, APR is good thing for where I hunt. Sorry to be selfish, but I vote for what is better for me where I hunt.

Also, someone brought up moving the gun seasons back to later in the year, I would vote for that.

Looks like someone dumped a can of read paint all over the place! Beautiful deer.

I personally like APR for several reasons, but I can understand the argument about more government regulation as well as certain mature “cull” bucks being illegal to shoot. I disagree with the argument that it does not protect 1.5 year olds.

I hunt a large farm in SE MN and I would venture to guess that at least 70% of the 1.5 year olds that i see and have on camera would not be legal to shoot under APR. The majority of the remaining 30% would be very difficult to tell if they were legal if you didn’t get a good look at them. Most of our neighbors drive heavily both first and second season and I think APR also forces them to get a better look at what they are shooting at rather than just flinging lead at everything that moves.

What. A. Horse. Dang.

Congratulations! More proof that in november, any time of day is a good time to be in the tree stand. Great buck.

#1 for me. I have hunted 13 years and never killed a deer over 140. I’m still learning every day, I hunt good land and have lots of it but I just don’t get very many opportunities at big deer. If it took 5-7 years to put a 160+ down I would surely lose focus. In my experience if you go for #1 you do have opportunities at #2.

Giant. Nice job on a buck of a lifetime!

Very cool old deer, he was a scrapper, congrats!

Congrats on a great mature deer!

Nice job!

I have heard of the hind legs being eaten over night, but never the whole thing. That really sucks, sorry to hear that.

I shoot G5 strikers and have had good luck with them, they fly straight 30 yards no adjustment and I have had good penetration with them. My buddy shoots shuttle T-lok and they are pretty awesome, he killed a buck a few years ago and put it through the shoulder blade, i was pretty impressed.

Have had pretty good movement in SE MN area. Some younger bucks cruising while the larger bucks seem to still be waiting a bit. I have had good success rattling in the last couple days. Rattled in a couple decent bucks but all in the 110 to 120 class 8’s. Last night two 8 pointers came in together scent checking a ridge when they got a little wiff of me, i was pretty surprised to see the two together. This weekend should be blast off for MN shotgun season like usual.