I was interested how early before sunrise you like to climb into your stand?
I've always liked to error in being there early. Sometimes an hour or more before shooting light.
Depends on the hunting location for me and where the people pressure & deer locations are at time of entry. Plus, it depends on weather and if it's 0 degrees or windy/rainy etc... General time frame is to be settled and ready 30 minutes before shooting light. When I travel distance for public land with hang & hunt that still makes for a pretty early wake up...
Since I can't shoot a critter before legal shooting time, I enter the woods so I get to my stand a few minutes before legal shooting time. With the twilight of dawn, I can see enough to be much more quiet approaching my stand than I can in total darkness.
I usually have a 30-minute or longer walk into my stand in big woods, usually with no roads or trails to follow. Though I might start my trek in the dark, I don't see the value in stumbling around in the dark all the way to my stand, spooking critters as I go to arrive way before daylight (been there, done that). You might get does and fawns to come around after being spooked, but a mature buck won't be back.
Orion does exactly the way I do
I usually get into my stands 20-30 minutes before legal shooting time.
About a hour before but all I walk through are open fields
I want to be strapped in, equipment set, and seated at least 30 minutes before legal shooting time.
Im with Orion and Brittman. Twice I have snuck in to my spot (rifle hunting) and kicked leaves aside at the base of a tree only to have a buck come to investigate (2 dead bucks). Still hunt into your stand (strap on) and sneak up into it. Climbing stands have special consideration depending on how close you believe the critters will be at the time of climbing.
QuoteOriginally posted by BRITTMAN:
Orion does exactly the way I do
Yep.
I enjoy watching and listening to the woods wake up. Especially during rifle season, I'm settled in my stand at least an hour before legal time. Then when the neighbors start up their ATVs 10 minutes after light, I really enjoy hearing hooves pounding my way!
I also get In stand usually a hour before light. I like the woods to settle down from my walk in , but that's a hour more my scent has to spread.
I try to get in the stand an hour before light. This lets the woods settle down from my walk in and allows me to pull the bow several times to loosen up.
30/45 minutes? Like said earlier post if it is freezing cold? Might be later? The older I get the more sensitive I become to adverse weather!
Here in Illinois 30 minutes before sunrise is legal bow time. No matter if hunting in tree or ground, I like to be set up and ready by that time. How long it takes me to get there, depends on one thing my route to hunting area, by wind. I agree one should not be bumbling around at dark, and a good low red light head lamp works, to be as quiet as possible. Let me give you all a tip, I learned years ago, though am sure others know is as well. If you cann't get to your stand quietly in the morning, you better get in a lot earlier. If public ground, take some time and study where others are hunting, and use it to your advantage. We all know deer do not seem to be detered by white light, but keep in mind with turkey's in your area, roosting, they do and their movement, can affect the behavior of a mature deer (seen it).
Oh, one more thing, sorry. I am sure many of us learned this the hard way. If you are running late, never force rush into an area. From my experience, better to wait an hour then stalk in.
For me it depends on the time of year and what I'm hunting. Early season the deer seem to move later in the am and in the evenings to food sources. I usually get out around 8-830 and hunt til lunch or it gets to hot and I go back to camp. Once the weather starts cooling off and the acorns start falling I try to get out at daylight. Rut I just hunt as much as I can cause you just never know. My two biggest bucks were killed at 930 am and 430 pm tho. Am was running with a doe and pm was checking a food plot for a doe but found me instead.
I hunt a lot of public land. In general, I'm in a minimum of 1 hour before daylight. I have one area in particular that I call my buck honey hole that I have to be in an hour and half to two hours before daylight.
Usually 30-60 mins...unless it's a full moon. Then I'll sleep in and go in mid-morning.
A half hour there abouts before day light.
After breakfast
Where I hunt 30 minutes is legal. Never more than that and often les...depending on where I am hunting and what the deer do around there.
I try to get into my stand one hour before shooting time. In Illinois, that is 1 1/2 hours before sunrise.
Depends on the hunt for me. Time of year, stand location, weather, other hunting pressure, type of stand/blind, what I think the animals will be doing and where they will be at time of entry, and how deep in I go all have an effect on when I enter. Sometimes I'm there 2 hours before legal shooting time. Sometimes I don't enter the woods until after an early breakfast, bathroom break, hot beverage, good stretch, and goodbye kiss to the wife. I know it's a vague answer but if my experience is that deer in the area aren't moving until 1-3 hours after sunrise I likely won't show up until 30 minutes after sunrise and then slowly still hunt my way in. If my best shot is at daybreak and there's little to no pressure, no other hunters, and no odd weather I'm in location 15-30 minutes before legal shooting time and I enter very slowly. If I'm hunting a crowded area with lots of pressure and I want to go deep and reap the potential rewards of other hunters bumping deer my way as they come back in to bed, then I get there as early as I can drag my butt out of bed. I'll usually in these cases set an alarm on vibrate on my phone and put the phone on top of my head in my hat...no way to sleep through that and it doesn't make a ton of noise. I wake up 20 minutes before legal time and I'm ready to go.
I try to get on stand one and a half hours before sun up. I have my trails already cut and marked to get to my stands in the spring and try to maintain them until season opens. I hunt public land and this is standard procedure if you want to hunt deer that others aren't willing to get too.
Steve Jr
Hunting public land/mountain terrain - if I found good spot on a good day I want to be sitting for 1/2 hour before light. That can be a challenge if the hike in is long. I usually have a 40 minute drive from the cabin, then a 1/2 hour to 1 hour hike in. Then climb the tree. In early season the days are so long that I can't hunt all day after one of those early mornings. Some day I will have a cabin closer to my hunting area.
I don't usually hunt mornings on the few acres I have at home. If I do I would want to be seated 1/2 hour before shooting light. It's suburbia hunting. You get 1/2 in the morning and 1/2 hour in the eve when deer are moving.
In the morning, I like to be settled in my stand or blind 1 hour before legal shooting time.
The afternoon varies. Sometimes its 2hrs before dark, and sometimes its 4-5hrs before dark.
Bisch
I used to always be religious about getting in an hour early but after reading a post from Ryan rothaar about entering after light, it made sense to me. I still will get to some spots early but it depends on the set up and location. I've bumped deer out of the area tripping over branches in the dark and have seen my best numbers after sneaking in late.
QuoteOriginally posted by Bowwild:
I want to be strapped in, equipment set, and seated at least 30 minutes before legal shooting time.
+1
If I can get there earlier, I will. I start getting frustrated when I feel rushed. You can ask my hunting buddies. :) I'll "shoot the bull" on the drive to the hunting location, but once we're there, I'm all business and working to get myself in the stand as quickly as possible. I like to be settled in before there is any hint of gray in the sky. Just a personal preference.
QuoteOriginally posted by Cyclic-Rivers:
I used to always be religious about getting in an hour early but after reading a post from Ryan rothaar about entering after light, it made sense to me.
I'm interested in reading that post. Got a link?
I like to get in at least a 1/2 hour before first light. I've got an 1 1/2 ride to my spots and a 15 minute walk in to my stand. And if I'm using my wedgelock I give myself another 10 minutes. most of the time though I don't start seeing deer until at least a 1/2 hour after sunrise at the minimum.
Anymore unless I know that spot for some reason has deer in the area at daybreak I am setting in at grey light. Walking in just barely able to see without a headlight.
QuoteOriginally posted by jonwilson:
QuoteOriginally posted by Cyclic-Rivers:
I used to always be religious about getting in an hour early but after reading a post from Ryan rothaar about entering after light, it made sense to me.
I'm interested in reading that post. Got a link? [/b]
I'd like to read that also..
In the mornings, I have shot more deer after 9:30 than before 8:00, especially during rut. I have also seen many deer bailing out of an area when the other predawners are goose stepping in or driving in as far as they can. Some think that driving all of the way to their stands in the dark doesn't scare deer. I suppose it's that old thing if we cannot see them they are not there and cannot see us. There is a reason that deer can be nocturnal, they can see in the dark way better than we can.
Me I go dark thirty. I have set in a stand for 16 hours before it happened though. I do hunt bear the same time as our deer season with the stick and string.
In my ground set and ready for action approximately 15"s before shooting hours.
Anywhere from 20 minutes before shooting time till just at daylight. One stand they never get there till about 30 minutes after daylight.
If I hunted mornings I'd go with Orions answer. I seldom hunt before mid afternoon.
Hey Charlie!!! I remember 1 particular morning, after a night of "overindulging" & a HUGE breakfast... We didn't get in the woods untill 9am... EVERYONE saw Deer!!!
Chuck, I wish I could remember that morning, perhaps I overdid it too much? Lol. It was a spectacular morning, only problem was the 8 point was too close.
As far as finding Ryan's post about slipping in after the first group of does and intercepting bucks , I cannot find it but it's here somewhere
30-45 min usually. But sometimes I've just got too far to hike in the morning so I'll come in later. Learned the hard way that off-trail is a no-go in the dark if it's more than 100 yards or so.
Great thread. Making me reconsider my habits. I'm usually ready to get up and move around by 9:00 - 9:30 since that puts me sitting down for 3-4 hours by then. I may opt to try a later arrival and longer departure this year based on the experiences many of you have shared. I could use an extra hour of sleep anyway.
I've found over the years that there are A LOT of variables to this. Here in the midwest, I PREFER to be in my tree and ready about a half hour before first light (I'm talking November rut here), but often I'm hunting tiny woodlots that are surrounded by agricultural fields. If I'm hunting a 20 acre woodlot that is completely surrounded by flat ag fields it can be very difficult to get in there without the deer knowing you are there. They are out in the fields, and you must walk through the fields to get there. In this case, I'll often wait until its light enough to see and to make sure there are no deer in the fields. Then I'll go as fast as I can across the open field and quietly slip into position. On another area I hunt the farm is like 650 acres and it's hilly. In this situation, the fields are up top and down in the bottoms, and the woods are on the sides of the hills. This is much easier for me to get into pre-selected stand sights as I simply move through the timber early in the morning when the deer are in the fields. I do the reverse in the afternoon meaning I access through the fields on the way to the stand and will move through the timber on the way out after all of the deer have moved out into the fields. After a few years of hunting that particular property its a pattern that now works for me year after year because I was able to learn where the deer will and wont be during my movements and simply avoid them. The result is deer in bow range nearly every day of November on this property due to fairly high deer numbers. Where I hunt near my home, the habitat is greatly reduced, there are much fewer deer, and it's not uncommon to hunt for 2 or 3 days in November without seeing a deer. Different stand approaches for each area.
I drive my quad back every morning before daylight and throw out a few cans of corn on the way. they get to be just like a herd of cows waiting on their breakfast. On days that I hunt I have the wife drive so I can slip into my blind while they watch the boss go to the house.