The Hunt
The prep
Upon arrival, everyone must shoot his or her bow. This is only to ensure your equipment is functioning properly and to give you confidence. You will not be supervised or critiqued; it is only for your benefit. I will also need to take down your license and tag information to make sure everything is in order. Finally, we will have an orientation to discuss all the elements of your hunt.
The hunt
You will arrive by appointment the day before your first hunt. Either myself or a guide will drive you to your different parking areas, and show you the properties and stand locations to begin the hunt. During the course of the week, you may be asked to drive yourself to these areas, and then walk to your pre-hung stand. I will personally hang numerous stands for different stages of the rut, as well as different weather conditions. We will then work together in discussing what strategy to use by what you’re seeing in the field. If we decide a stand needs to be moved, I will move it immediately to increase your chance of success. You will follow a trail marked by bright eyes (reflective thumb tack illuminated by your flash light) and orange tape to and from your stands. These trails will lead you to your stands by taking you in the least intrusive route (to the deer). This may make for some fairly long walks to the stand, so be prepared. If you decide to come out of the woods after a morning hunt, then you will return to your vehicle for a sack lunch and a break. Then return to the stand, or another stand that we will have previously discussed.
After taking a shot at your game, you will wait an hour or until dark, climb down and head back to the meeting point and call myself or your guide. We will discuss how long to wait depending on shot placement and weather conditions. Myself or my guide will help track every deer to ensure we don’t get off our property or interfere with another hunter. We will also field dress and cape the deer for you. I encourage every hunter to shoot a doe, this is essential to my herd management. When you shoot a doe, you can donate it to a feed the hungry program for a small fee. We highly encourage all hunters to take the meat home with them, as it is amazing tablefare.