With months of anticipation and preparation, the early season can’t get here soon enough for most hunters, but, for many that hunt on public land, that anticipation is quickly replaced with disappointment. This time of year, deer are generally still on their summer patterns, and when hunting large tracts of timber, this means keying in on acorns and other tree fruits, if you will (whether that be nuts or apples). This creates a problem in the early season because the timber is, for the most part, still very thick with underbrush vegetation and makes it very hard to see any more than 25 yards in any direction. The deer on public lands are very stealthy and can sneak 30 yards from you and you can have no clue they were there.
I guess this is just a long way of me trying to justify why 2 weeks into deer season, I have yet to see a deer myself. I have only been able to make 2 sits this year on stand, both being on Saturday afternoons. This week, though, the weather was a lot more conducive to deer hunting, with highs only in the low 70s and a low of 59 in the early morning. I had high hopes for a good sit and although I didn’t see any deer, I did hear, what I am 90% sure was a deer come behind my stand in some real thick stuff. This is at least a start. So, next weekend, the wind is supposed to be switching around to a south wind and afternoon rain storms moving in. I am going to move my ground blind about 20 yards north, into an area where a large tree is down. This will set me up with the wind in my face and a view of where I heard that deer and with a front moving in, hopefully I will get a view of something.
Ralph Cody's Public Land Blog 