2024 Land Management Case Study

As always, I had a lot of plans for 2024. I planned to start making improvements to deer bedding areas. I wanted to locate a new stand on the south edge of the property, close to a bedding area, along with an access trail and a hinge-cut barrier to push deer past the stand. I planned to improve the trails that run in and out of the two stands on the east side of the Homestead field, along with relocating one of those stands. Put a new box blind, maybe on a trailer, in the middle of the very popular Central food plot. And make a bunch of improvements along the east-side property line between Ridge Top and Lightning, including hinge-cut barriers, a new trail, and a new stand.

Of course, with my land management projects, nothing quite goes according to the plan. My right hip decided to wear out in 2023 so I had a hip replacement at the end of April 2024 - that set me behind on some of my plans. I always like to start the season with strenuous and sweaty woods work while the weather is cool, but my new hip kept me out of the woods until mid-June, and I had to push off several labor intensive projects until 2025.

My food plots require significant maintenance work each year during the spring and summer. In 2024 I sprayed my clover plots with grass and broadleaf herbicides just as soon as the ground had firmed-up in May, following up by spot-spraying thistles wherever I found them. In late May I drilled soybeans into the tall rye/wheat cover crops in Central and half of Homestead, and then came back a month later and crimped the rye and wheat to form a thick weed shading thatch.

I did five soil tests and spread fertilizer on most of my plots in June, unfortunately that was before I crimped and I think that the standing rye and wheat must have kept my cone spreader from reaching as far as it should have in those plots. Ken Irving spread 12 tons of lime in July - with last year’s road improvements he could drive into all but West Exit plot with his 4WD truck. As in previous years, I had a lot of clover and weeds coming up with the young soybeans and I was afraid that they would shade them out, so at the beginning of July and again in August I sprayed glyphosate on the Roundup-ready soybean plots. In mid-August I drilled the fall blend of brassicas, wheat, and rye into the soybean plots. At the end of August I again sprayed my clover plots with the grass and broadleaf herbicide mixture. It certainly takes a lot of work to maintain my 10 acres of deer forage, and 2024 wasn’t a great growing season due to moderate rainfall, but in general the food plots looked good - unfortunately my 2024 hunting season was affected by another crop issue outside of my control.

In mid-June my hip felt strong enough to do some work in the woods. The land has plenty of food for the number of deer living there, and water is not a limiting factor, so I have long thought that I need more daytime bedding cover. After 10 years of observing the deer coming and going on my land I have a good idea of where they bed, and my goal is to make those natural bedding areas better. I have spent countless hours researching the subject of what makes good bedding cover and, though there are a few competing concepts out there (some even with advocates that regularly belittle the opinions of their competition), I think I have an idea of how to start.

I figured that I would just jump into it, start trying to put into practice what research has led me to believe are the right things to do, and learn from my mistakes. I have plenty of food on my land from green-up through fall, so it seems like I just need more thick bedding areas with side cover, but that cover would also need new growth for deer to browse on during the day. The northern 60 acres was cut hard about 20 years ago and the hardwood saplings there now are so thick that they shade out any ground level vegetation that could serve as deer browse. The tree stems are thick to walk through, but you can see through them, so deer do not have enough side cover to hide them from predators as they bed on the ground. If I drop some of the mature trees, and hinge-cut the saplings, deer should have cover and browse.

But maybe it’s not that simple. The carrying capacity during the winter could be the limiting factor. But I won’t know unless I try. I have read everything I can find on the subject of improving deer bedding areas, so I hope I won’t be screwing things up. I plan to hinge-cut trees in areas about one-half acre in size to give side cover and more sun for forage to grow. I will make plenty of exit trails so deer can find a protected spot to bed without feeling trapped.

Over the years, deer have always come out of the thick regenerating hardwood area that is just to the south and west of the barn. They come out at the end of the day, moving into the Garden and Barn food plots, so they are obviously bedding in that area. People often talk about “buck beds” as if you can create an area that attracts only bucks. Other writers say that you don’t want to create a “doe factory” because that will crowd the bucks off of your land. I can’t imagine ever complaining about having a doe factory! If I had too many does I would just shoot more - I usually donate some meat to the Augusta food bank each year, and they love getting it. I like to start the season hunting close to the barn where the deer are accustomed to me coming and going, and a mature doe goes nicely in the freezer. I have shot does there, and had many opportunities on younger bucks. During 2023 I had an old warrior, El Chapo, come into the Barn Plot three times without giving me a shot. I would like to increase the bedding capacity of that area, so I started my bedding enhancement project south of the barn

I picked an area that had dry, level ground, and was 100 yards from either the plots around the barn or the nearby Ledges Plot. I hinge-cut the few mature oaks and maples that were there, getting them down to the ground to make some side cover that would shield bedded deer from any human or animal that happened to be passing by. I then cut some of the saplings to allow for free movement through the area as well as places to bed. Other saplings were hinge-cut to create more side cover, and entrance/exit trails were cut for each direction. I finished by raking and blowing the soil to expose the seed bed. It may take a few years for this bedding area to get thicker with vegetation, but the goal will be to have cover and browse at hand to hold deer throughout the day. In time it should become a secure place for deer to spend their daytime bedding hours, leaving in the evening to feed in the nearby food plots - where I’ll be hunting.

Cutting all the saplings in the middle of the bedding area to allow more sunlight in was incredibly hard work because there were so many of them! The ones in the middle had to be cut down to ground level, and I needed to cut even more saplings to the south as well, just to let in the light. I’m thinking that there must be a better way. Most of the saplings aren’t really giving me side cover - I just need to eliminate their canopy. Leaving a bunch of standing dead saplings shouldn’t be a problem, as long as I can still create side cover and keep the trails from being blocked. Next time I plan to try the “hack and squirt” method of killing trees by hacking into their stem with a hatchet and spraying herbicide in the wound.

On the south side of my land, between the Homestead plot and the road, there is a bedding area that gets a lot of action during the rut. From the box blind over by RN2 I have watched does go in and out of the area, as well as bucks cruise through. There are two old cellar holes from a house and barn in this area and I thought that a stand located in an ash tree on the road side of the house cellar hole would be a good spot to sit all day during the rut. Easy to get in and out of via the sidewalk on the busy road that’s only 75 yard away. So I put up a ladder stand where the cellar hole would keep the deer from getting too close, the road and some hinge-cut barriers would keep them from going behind me, and I cut another barrier running in from the field that would force cruising bucks to walk within range. This should be a rut stand to get into during the dark and hunt all day.

I have two stands back in the timber on the east side of the large Homestead field. My cameras show that deer move around in both of those areas a lot, but the access is not great. I can improve access to the stand that covers the northeast corner of Homestead (called the South Fence stand because it is at the end of an old fence that runs along the property line) by relocating the trail, as well as making the trail easier to walk through where it is in the swamp. It has been a problem because it’s too easy to splash through the water and alert any deer that are bedded nearby. I know I can fix that, but I never got to it in 2024 because I need to first fill in the ATV trail that leads to the trail and I ran out of time.

The problem with the other stand (called Water Tank because it is near a municipal water system reservoir tank), in the far eastern side of Homestead, is that the approach and exit requires a long bike ride and walk that lets my scent drift into several bedding areas along the way. It was also in a large ash tree that didn’t give me any background cover. So I relocated that stand to a large hemlock tree that provides better cover, and I came up with a new strategy for getting in and out. To hunt this stand I park at the South Entrance at midday and walk right up to the field and across it to the stand, exiting after dark via a new trail that runs west and south through the bedding area, out to the road below, and walk back along the road to my truck at the South Entrance. Chances are I won’t be seen or smelled on the way in, and the new exit trail should hide me from the deer that will have moved from bedding to field just before dark.

In 2023 I shot a doe from the treestand on the southwestern side of the Central plot. That plot is secluded with bedding cover in all directions so it gets a lot of deer traffic. It is not unusual to see a dozen or more deer there at the end of the day, and in 2022 I had a shooter buck feeding for an hour but he didn’t come closer than 50 yards. The problem with that stand is that the deer usually congregate in the middle of the plot, away from any trees. My plan for 2024 was to eliminate the treestand and locate a new Redneck Box Blind in a spot that puts me within range of most of the deer travel. The box blind should contain my scent, but it is a spot that you can only hunt a few times during the season because you can’t help but blow all the deer out of the plot when you leave. The best solution would be to have someone in an ATV come and get me at the end on the day, but unfortunately that is usually not an option.

I decided that I would buy a Redneck Buck Palace with their new trailer stand and set it up on a utility trailer. Moving box blinds around is a huge issue because breaking something is always a risk. I think that only one of my box blinds is actually undamaged, the three others having broken or bent stand components, crushed windows from a strapping mistake, and one actually tipped over during setup and has cracks and splits. Even though I really like the location in the Central plot, you never know if the blind might be better in the future elsewhere.

I bought the blind and stand from Redneck, and a utility trailer from Tractor Supply. Redneck has a good video on how to set this up and my blind is much the same as the one they did. I bought four pipe-mounted trailer jacks from Amazon and had a local guy weld the pipe parts onto the trailer - the trailer jacks mounted on the four corners of the trailer enabled me to easily level the blind when in place. The stand bolted easily to the trailer and, with the help of my son and great-nephew, the blind went on top. I used my backhoe to clear a flat spot on the north side of Central, along with ramps on either side. Everything came together nicely.

One problem that every land manager has is to keep trails clear from trees and branches growing in from the side. The edges of food plots also have this issue, and in 2024, with 10 years since many of my plots being cleared, I found myself pushing through branches to mow the edges in many spots. I also had a huge problem with my 722 acre tree farm in another town - that land had miles of logging roads that were getting close to impassable. I don’t know where I first saw it, but when I found the Lane Shark I saw a solution. It is like a light-duty bushhog mounted on the front of a tractor and running off the hydraulic system. It goes in place of the bucket and the loader raises it and lowers it as needed. All I can say is that it is a game changer! When you run it you put the bushhog on the back to balance the load. You can mow and trim at the same time - amazing! It cuts branches up to three inches in diameter, though I found that moving slowly into the bigger stuff worked best. I also put a chainsaw scabbard on the tractor so I would always have a saw with me and could cut blowdowns if needed when moving around the tree farm. In less than a week I had all the trails, roads, and fields on my two properties trimmed in great shape, saving me a month of backbreaking work!

With the farming/project season at an end, I was ready for the archery season to begin on September 7th. To sum the season up, it was the best of times and it was the worst of times. All the work to plant and maintain my 10 acres of cultivated plots had resulted in a bounty of lush groceries for the deer. New stands and blinds were in place, vegetation trimmed, a good crop of bucks were seen on the cameras, and a trophy 10-point in velvet that was at least four years old had been frequenting my land. What could possibly go wrong?

Nuts! What’s that you say, nuts? Well, acorns to be exact. 2024 sported the largest bumper crop of acorns that I have ever seen. They were everywhere, carpeting the ground around oak trees in all corners of my land, and I mean a solid carpet! More importantly, they were thick on all the neighbors’ land in the area. Why was that a factor? Acorns are a deer’s absolute favorite food, and in 2024 the deer didn’t need to move very far from their beds to eat. I always see a change in deer movement just before the season starts as the acorns start falling, but this was different. I have oaks on my land, but more saplings than mature mast producing trees. Deer did come in to feed on my food plots, but not as much, and the does did not have as much drive to bed close to my plots. The does were spending much more of their time bedding on my neighbors land, and during the rut the bucks were hanging out with the does.

I hunted fewer days in 2024 than I had the year before, partially because I had hunted too much in 2023, but also because I just wasn’t seeing a lot of deer on my cameras. I had an awesome year in 2021, hunting 25 days and harvesting 4 deer. In 2022 I hunted 26 days, 39 days in 2023, and just 20 days in 2024. I saw deer 68% of my hunts in 2021, 88% in 2022, 60% in 2023, and just 50% of the time in 2024. Was it a negative trend due to the deer just responding to being hunted, or was 2024 just a bad year due to the acorn crop? 2023 was a tough year partially because of factors like my contractor building roads during the beginning of the hunting season, me over-hunting stands because I kept looking for El Chapo, and me passing on deer because I was looking for something older and more mature. I have more things going for deer on my land, more food and more cover, and the winters have been relatively mild. Plenty of deer were caught on camera prior to the acorns, and I’m taking even more precautions entering and exiting my stands. We will see, but I think the acorns were the key factor of 2024.

The best and worst of times … I have outlined the worst side of it, so let’s look at the best side. Before the season opened I was getting a bunch of bucks on my cameras, and one was an awesome 10 point. The day before opening day I had five bucks, including the 10 point, on the Ledges camera - and the 10 point was still in velvet. So the afternoon of September 7th found me in the Ledges box blind. At the end of the day three bucks came in to the plot. I kept looking for the 10 point but he never showed. Two of the bucks were two-year old eight points still in velvet, and one was a three-year old with a crappy five or six point rack that had just peeled his velvet. They were in the plot for a while, making for a fun sit.

Hunting was poor for the next month as the acorn factor dominated deer movement on my land. I mostly hunted the Barn or Ledges blinds because they were non-invasive hunts that kept the rest of my land quiet, and I was still getting photos of the 10 point. On October 10th I hunted the Ledges box blind again and at the end of the day the 10 point came in with two other bucks. I waited for a while until he presented me with a shot. His body language made me think that, unlike the other two bucks in the plot, he might continue upwind to the clover plots around the barn, so I took a shot as soon as I had it. He was at about 23 yards but just before the shot his front leg moved back and I think that I compensated for that, hitting him a bit farther back than perfect. He ran north, through the thick hardwood saplings, and the other two bucks scattered to the south.

I waited for about 15 minutes and then got down to take a look. The arrow had passed through the buck and was stuck in the ground. I saw where he had run, so I tracked him through the thick stuff and out onto the tractor road. I saw where he had taken a left and ran down the trail toward the Swamp stand. I was shooting a 2” MegaMeat three-blade mechanical broadhead which should have produced a huge blood trail, but what I saw was far less. Given the angle and placement of the shot, and the less than stellar blood trail, I figured that it was a liver hit. A broadhead passing through the liver is fatal, especially with a large diameter broadhead, but it takes time.

I went back to the barn and googled how long to wait after a liver hit. It said between one and four hours, and that I should find him dead in his first bed. I sat down to wait. I waited an hour and then went back to the blood trail. I tracked him about 150 yards to where he had bedded, but he was gone. I decided to wait until morning and call in a tracking dog. The next morning a guy that I had met working on my barn came back with his dog and the dog tracked the trail back to the bed and beyond. The buck had only gone another 100 yards, but unfortunately the back half was mostly eaten by coyotes. I tagged him and, since the front half was relatively untouched, took him to the butcher to be caped for a shoulder mount. The butcher said he would probably have weighed around 180 pounds if whole. I had a nice trophy, but no meat. I learned a lesson - next time I will go home, have dinner, and come back at least four hours later to do the tracking. This is the second time I have had a buck ruined by coyotes when I waited overnight.

Four days later I was hunting from the Barn box blind. Four does came into the plot and I harvested the one that presented me with a shot. She dressed out at 101 pounds and was the second largest in the field. I now had meat in the freezer.

I hunted for the next two months until the season ended and only had one good chance on a doe, which I passed because it was the start of the rut and I was still looking for a decent buck. The does weren’t in the food plots much and therefore the bucks weren’t cruising around the plots during the rut the way they usually do. When the rut was over, I didn’t see bucks in the food plots trying to catch up on the weight they had lost either. The new Cellar Hole stand should have been good for a cruising buck during the rut, but the does and bucks were elsewhere. Even though I hadn’t seen any deer on the camera at the Central food plot, I hunted the new trailer stand in December. This should have been a sure thing - I’d seen deer there the past two years including one trophy buck - but only two does came in to feed, out of range. Most of these hunts were in low-pressure situations where the deer should not have stayed away because they thought they were being hunted. I had to conclude that the acorns made all the difference in 2024. I shot the oldest and biggest racked buck on my property ever, and I had meat in the freezer, but I also spent 10 days hunting when I didn’t see a single deer. Yes, it was the best of times … and the worst of times.

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