When going for hunting not only looks for the deer but you can also have good time walking quietly. And you could be easily confused when you have many deer tracks. Knowledge of deer habit could be of great use in this case. The deer can hide themselves even while running from you in front of you in the fields or places with dead dry bushes. Many sharp eyes hunters are also sometimes puzzled by the way the deer could hide themselves.
I have seen many standing deer in the woods. Some of them before they saw me, but probably five times as many have seen me first and all that I saw of them were a flag, bounding off through the woods. Some of these deer were practically invisible; while others were so obvious that it didn't seem possible that they were wild animals. I have seen a few deer that neither ran at my approach nor stood to be identified, but that tried to sneak off before I could see them.
These deer are the most difficult to identify and shoot. They move silently, without raising their flag, and are usually partly obscured by underbrush. All that the hunter sees is an indistinct shadow which disappears even as he looks; leaving him unsure that he has seen anything until he finds the track where he saw the shadow. I cannot remember shooting any of the deer that have sneaked away from me in this manner.
Anybody who travels the woods quietly in search of deer will have an enjoyable time, and if he is in a section where deer are plentiful, has a good chance of bagging a deer. The actual trailing, overtaking and shooting of a deer is a difficult and often disappointing method. It can be done if there is a good tracking snow and if there are not too many other deer tracks to confuse the hunter. Very few hunters can resist following the trail of a deer that they have jumped yet failed to shoot. Knowledge of deer habits can be of great value in obtaining a shot when trailing these deer.
When first jumped, a deer seldom travels far before stopping to learn if whatever startled it is something, which will follow, or some harmless accidental encounter. It will run for a short distance and then will stop, usually on some elevated spot to watch its back trail without being seen from that trail, waiting until it can determine the hunter's intentions. This is probably the best chance that the hunter will have, for some time, and it will pay him to be doubly cautious in locating and approaching the spot where the animal is waiting. Both deer and man are on the alert and no hunter need be ashamed of a deer that is shot under these circumstances.
Usually when I jump a deer, I do not follow directly on the trail, but note the direction of the deer's flight. Then I move down wind for a short distance, not over a hundred yards, and less when in thick brush, and travel in the same direction. This often brings into view a deer that is hidden from any point on its trail and creates an uncertainty, in the deer's mind, as to my intentions. This will, sometimes, give me the opportunity for a standing shot. As I am down wind from the deer, it lacks my scent and it seldom depends on sight alone to warn it of danger. Since I am not directly on the track, there is the possibility that I am unaware of, or indifferent to, its presence. Its natural curiosity, together with its indecision, often causes it to wait long enough for me to spot it before it can make up its mind to run.
The deer have good ways of confusing us in tracking them. You have to be very cautious about the way you follow them and make a good use of your chance to shoot them. Making yourself comfortable to shoot the deer anytime it appears will help you to hunt the deer better. here are times when I dont recognize the deer and before I am aware of their presence I could only notice their shadows running. They some times look like more of a dry leaves or woods than deer having their foods. |
