Deer numbers?

[one-shot-wonder]

Hey guys so it's been an unproductive year for me atleast so far. I'm using the same tactics as last year. Road hunting, hiking into areas I've seen good numbers of deer. And this year nada. I've been out almost every weekend and have seen maybe 25 deer. So whats the verdict guys and gals are you still seeing good deer numbers in your areas (region 3 and 8 ) ? have you noticed better numbers the farther from the roads you get? Or did the fires cause them to congregate and now when you find them there just in high densities?
Thanks for any input hbc

That's a success in it's self right there.... Keep it up and you will close the deal on a buck. This is the week the mules start searching so cover ground (on foot) and you'll run into deer.

[Rayne]

Fair enough thanks one-shot-wonder. I usually rely on the number game to get my deer put in enough hours and your bound to run into a buck. So I'll just keep doing what I'm doing and hopefully it falls into place.

[mike_69]

0 in the freezer so far. Lots of time spent sitting in blinds but very little moving through what has generally been productive areas for us.. So far I have seen a total of 8 deer in 10 days and none that I was able to take. Time to scope out some new ground.

[HarryToolips]

I usually wait til winter to see what numbers/sign I see on winter range to make an assessment, but I'm hearing from a lot of people that they're not seeing as much..I'm seeing the usual amount I'd say, and have a WT buck in the freezer..on winter range this spring I saw lots of deer, so that's a good sign..one of my main hunting partners and I took our 4 year old boys out yesterday, mostly driving but a bit of hiking, from first light til mid afternoon we saw 25+ mulies, a couple bucks on private land even..

[hoochie]

weve talked about this in other threads, but the thing I have found has had the greatest impact is the amount of trucks, quads etc roaming around. Both our bucks this year were taken in quiet areas. WT buck was last light in a field, the mulie buck was 16:45 on a sunny day. He was all by himself, no more than 50m from the tree line. I didnt see him come out, my wife did. we watched him a little while to see if another would come out, but we decided she should take the shot as he headed back toward the tree line after being exposed for only a few minutes.
We found it very difficult to find WT this year. We only saw less than 10 in reg 3 area.. where there had been plenty in the past. Maybe they moved? I dunno.

[Rayne]

That's a pretty good day. I'd be happy to see 5-8 in a day. I usually find I'll see a bunch of deer over the course of a day. Or I'll see 1 and it'll be a buck. I'm just surprised that my spots have dried up. There not that pressured there quite the hike in so unless the predators are pushing them I don't know why they would move

[butthead]

iam not seeing much of anything this year
no deer
no sign of deer
nothing in the snow maybe just the odd one passing through
worst year ever for myself

[HarryToolips]

weve talked about this in other threads, but the thing I have found has had the greatest impact is the amount of trucks, quads etc roaming around. Both our bucks this year were taken in quiet areas. WT buck was last light in a field, the mulie buck was 16:45 on a sunny day. He was all by himself, no more than 50m from the tree line. I didnt see him come out, my wife did. we watched him a little while to see if another would come out, but we decided she should take the shot as he headed back toward the tree line after being exposed for only a few minutes.
We found it very difficult to find WT this year. We only saw less than 10 in reg 3 area.. where there had been plenty in the past. Maybe they moved? I dunno.

I'd wager those whities went nocturnal..

[Salty]

Take it fwiw as I'm hunting mainly new areas this year having recently moved to the mainland so not a great test to compare to other years obviously. I've only made it out about 10 times .. doing a lot of work on the house this year. Anways.. early season was tough sledding found little sign in September and saw few deer. Its picked up in Oct started seeing some mules in my new areas in region 3 and almost got a poke at a decent buck about 3 weeks ago. Just got back from 3-4 days for white tail near the 8/4 boundary to an area I have been before. First couple days were slow, finding a bit of sign here and there but nothing to write home about. This area has been logged heavily recently and patterns had changed a lot. Finally found a hot little hidden pocket littered with sign and came close to a chance on a decent buck yesterday at last light but couldn't quite get the x hairs on him in time. Hit the area again dark and early this morning for one last chance before I had to come home and shot a nice fat flat top. Mixed bag for me not great but certainly not too bad either.

[ajr5406]

Im seeing way more WT than Mule deer in the areas i have hunted, these areas I have only seen MD in the past few seasons. This is from limited experience though, but a few friends have found the same.