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Old 10-15-2018, 12:50 PM
Bushleague Bushleague is offline
 
Join Date: May 2014
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Prairiekid View Post
Hey Guys,


I am always surprised that it seems Whitetail Deer prefer to be somewhat close to roads. It seems it doesn't matter how nice the terrain, water sources and protection might be deep in the forest, the further back in you get the less deer you tend to see. I can't figure out why. I have a bit of a better idea of how to hunt the area because of your tips and also just being there and seeing it, but I don't really know how to hunt big cut blocks? Growing up it seems I remember videos of guys hunting northern Alberta and massive deer would be passing through rough cut blocks and almost swampy areas.

So 1 tag is gone, now I get to explore another zone or two!
I mainly hunt 350, and there are plenty of deer here, but they act totally different than farm deer. They also act somewhat different than they did a decade or so ago, before the wolf population got so high.

Just a couple points, deer can be found off the road, WAYYY off of the road if you want. Deer don't like roads, I've tracked deer that did practically everything in their power to NOT cross a road, they like edges and they like ridges. IMO water isn't a big draw in much of 350... its everywhere. If you have edges and ridges in close proximity then finding deer is relatively easy. If one of these two elements is lacking then you need to be a lot smarter/ luckier and cover a lot more fruitless miles to find good concentrations of sign.

As for cutblocks and pretty much any other sizeable opening, I pretty much ignore the sign I find directly on them, it is almost entirely made at night. Hunting clearings might turn up the odd deer, but for every buck that crosses a cutblock in broad daylight there are 10 others that skirt it, so those are the bucks I concentrate on. This isn't to say that cutblocks are without value, they create edges, and if one can safely assume that deer don't want to cross these huge tracts of land during the day... that can offer a very good clue as to where they are actually traveling.

The deer my wife shot in the "This is bush hunting" thread was taken in 350... probably almost on the same day that you were hunting 350, we saw 3 bucks that weekend and over a half dozen does, none of them were viewed from the truck or the road. If you go through that thread you might find some useful information throughout it.

PS. Don't take any of this the wrong way, I admire a guy who drives all the way from Canmore to hike around these Boreal foothills chasing some of the smartest deer on the planet. Just trying to help make your future explorations more fruitful. Hopefully you come back and give the Swan Hills another shot as they can be pure magic once you figure out what you are doing.
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Last edited by Bushleague; 10-15-2018 at 01:01 PM.
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