Originally Posted by mike35549
On the 900 acres I hunt we normally have pictures of 4-6 mature bucks every year, and a 20-30 immature bucks. Would normally average seeing 8-10 deer a day when you hunted. Very rarely maybe 2-3 times a year would you hunt and see nothing. This year only had pictures of 1-2 mature bucks and maybe 8-10 immature bucks and sightings went to seeing on average 2-3 a day and probably 25% of the time seeing nothing. Green fields normally 1/2” tall by now are 6”-8” tall and have corn piled up under feeders which has never happened. Not sure if they moved to Florida, aliens got them, or Covid killed them. Very odd year and disheartening.


I hunted the last 5 years right next to you. Got out this year do to having a baby. I saw this trend happening on 3500 acres, with very few deer being killed off of it. Really, the last 3 years it hit a downward spiral.

On our place, I attributed it to two things.

1. Weyerhaeuser raped all of their land in the area. They made up about 75% of our lease and almost all of it was clear cut in the last 3 years. It also looked like most of their lands in a several mile radius, got cut all at once while they had loggers in the area. Clear cuts are great for holding deer once they thicken up, but with wind rowing and helicopter spraying, they are a desert for 4-5 years. That really depleted the holding capacity in the area, plus allowed hunters to stake them out with rifles.

2. Corn being legalized. We had several small landowners joining us, that really started piling up the deer. When every joe blow with 5-50 acres is killing a handful of deer per year, it doesn’t take long for the population to nosedive.