Baiting for Deer Hunting

deercam: Wednesday, Sep 27, 2004 at 7:55 am

Let's face it, most all whitetail deer hunting is over bait. If a deer stand is involved, then a deer food plot, deer corn or deer farmland is probably what's attracting the deer to the deer stand. After all, like my daddy always said, "You've gotta give the deer a reason to come close to your stand." If you don't give the whitetail deer a reason to get close to your position, then they won't ever get close and you will never see any whitetail deer. So let's start call it what it really is. Most of the time when we are deer hunting from a deer stand, we are deer hunting over bait.

Moreover, you've gotta be able to see the deer and get a shot at the deer when they get close in range. That's where good shooting lane placement comes in. I like to set my whitetail deer stands up so the stand is the hub of a wheel and the spokes of the wheel are the shooting lanes. It's a hub and spoke deer stand set-up that I like the best.

For successful whitetail deer hunting:

• give the deer a reason to come in close (with bait)
• then get a good look at the deer and get a good shot off at the deer (with good shooting lane utilization)