First off, congratulations to all who have had success. However, I do have a question, primarily for those west of route 100. Is this the worst deer season ever or what? From my experiences, and in talking with folks hunting the areas around Tazewell and Bland counties, it's awful. I am a member of what could be considered one of the best leases in Tazewell and the surrounding counties. For years, the trophy area of this club (approx. 4000 acres), would produce 20 to 25 fine bucks. This year, with a few days to go, 7. Cameras and hunting have revealed pretty much no fawns. A good full day of hunting will yield the sighting of a spike and 2 or 3 single does, not the 20 or more deer days this place was known for. Others are lamenting as well. I am genuinely concerned about the future of deer hunting around here. Anybody else have thoughts?

Nothing wrong with a gripe! Definately a tough year in most places hit by the acorn drought. It will be interesting to see the harvest numbers. Last year the deer were pounded all during gun season. All the way up to the end it was constant shooting. Daylight sightings dissappeared. About a month after the season, the trailcam action picked up showing plenty of deer of all ages and sizes made it through.

I am predicting that activity will pick up a lot at the end of late muzzleloader. That will be the next time I hunt anyway. The remnants of harvest crops will be spent and deer will be on the move again looking for food in green fields are browsing whereever.

The tough years make you appreciate the good years all the more.

I hunt north of Baltimore and it has been tough here too. We have had to change tactics a lot. Mostly we are hunting field edges and getting a few deer. One area has a worsening yote problem. We are planning to do some yote whacking if possible. We have had a lot of does that have been dry for some time.

If you are hunting your lease the same way you always have you may want to rethink what the deer are doing. I bet they are still around, just not in the usual places.

Vic

I've only hunted twice in Bland County so far. In the national forest I saw two bucks and several does. Not a lot of movement but better then most people are seeing.

On private property I led a stalk for Dad where he shot his biggest buck.

No mast is hurting a lot, especially in the mountains. I went out today in Bedford County in the mountains and there is no mast what so ever. Consider myself lucky to have seen 6 does.

Congrats on a fine deer, and great hunt. The guys I know hunting the Hunting Camp Creek valley are finding a good many acorns, but few deer.

We are hunting the south end of the valley at 3100 feet. No acorns, hickories or grapes

I had a coversation with a buddy from the tazwell area last week. He was also venting about the season. He said it was terrible hunting without the acorns. This was my response..... I love it. Wish it was like this every year. I love the fact that I dont have to trac deep in the woods this yr. I can just hunt big open hay fields. He was hunting his same locations as last yr. Well I told him to start hunting hay fields and he is dang near close to tagging out. This is a great yr for spot and stalking aswell. Bow season was hard but if you could find staging areas or transition areas it was great. I know alot of tazwell is wooded but find the closes hay fields or farmers crops. Best of luck and shoot straight bud

Armyguy, my experience this year is the same as yours. I hunt mostly on a forested military base with grassy fields interspersed among the woods. Without acorns the deer are forced to spend a lot more time in the open grazing on grass. They have been in the fields in large numbers and at all hours of the day. I have never had a year where it was so easy to find deer.

Green fields are not always a sure thing. I have as much green fields as hardwoods. Sometimes they are swamped with deer. In a good acorn year I am covered with deer as long as the acorns last. In late season, the green fields draw a good number of deer.

The other piece are ag fields. I don't know the extent of ag fields within a few my miles of my place. I know every year there is a good amount in corn, but I don't know what else and I don't know where they are all. IMO, acorns compete favorably with ag, but green fields do not. Deer were virtually non-existant on my place during bow season. I had two sitings with over 40 hours on stand. During 2nd week of muzzleloader, sightings still way down but improving. Sunday night of 10 Nov I drove in over a backroad within a couple miles of my house, where there is a lot of cropland. This was at midnight. I literally could not count the number of deer crossing the road. Had to have been close to 20. That's where the deer were. If you have plenty of green fields but little agriculture to compete, of course you will do well in the green fields when acorns are bad.

But, by the end of late muzzleloader, I fully expect to have a lot of sightings on my place. The deer are there, the pattern is different.

I appreciate all the input, and what you guys are saying is true regarding field hunting. However, something is different this year. I'm no spring chicken, and have seen and successfully hunted many years of limited mast. I have access to, and even own, hay and pasture fields. Within the last 5 years, anytime there was little mast we could hunt 4 different fields around here and see 20 to 30 deer. This year we will see less than half that. The situation at my lease is even more dire. It has abundant pasture and hay fields. The folks that have killed a lot of nice bucks there over the last 20 years say the herd is 1/10 what it used to be. One thing we feel is a problem there is that the deer and bear sightings are running close to dead even. We hate bears.

What i would say is that your área was hit with ehd diesase as well as the área i hunt in, i have notice that the deer have bounced back a little around here in the northern neck. Last year was one my worst seasons ever i did a veteran hunt on state managed land in king George co. an we only harvested 2 deer that day when on a good year they kill anywhere between 20-30 deer. So with all that said Hang in there, i always say theres next season.

EHD has crossed my mind. Nobody has reported problems with it around here in the last few years, but I don't know that most folks know anything about it and what to look for. Last year there were reports of it 2 counties over in WV. I think we'll need to give the feet a look on any we kill the rest of the year.

mudfork, i live in bland and you want to know what the problem is?

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That is a sign of a maturing forest. It is like this all over the GWNF for instance. No timber cutting, no successional habitat(regrowth) no browse and cover. Deer populations are down in the mountains bear however do well, they eat hard mast and then sleep, not feed through the winter. We need to cut timber, let forest managers manage the forests instead of letting the so-called environmentalists bully the USFS. We are loosing (lost) the great diversity of habitat of a managed forest that supports good populations of all species.