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Crossbow Deer Hunting / The Pre-Rut Stage.
Now as you sit in your tree stand on a early morning deer hunt crossbow in hand, you notice its starting to get pretty chilly and you question your sanity as to why you are sitting in a tree with a crossbow across your lap, when you could be sound asleep in a nice warm bed in the security of your own home.
Suddenly you snap back to reality as you hear a disturbance of sorts and you struggle to see what it is, leaves being russeled and stomped, light clacking noises, grunts of sorts, then you just make out in the early foggy morning light there are two bucks forty yards out, head to head, doing battle, no shot and they wonder off. Its time to change deer hunting tactics as the deer pre-rut begins. Pre-Rut
This is where a lot of deer hunters go wrong in their hunting strategy. As the days get cooler and the nights get longer the bucks have made the transition from velvet to now hardened boney antlers that we all admire and the pre-rut begins.
The bucks become progressively more intolerant of each other and engage in sparing matches. Small rubs start to appear on trees and saplings, some minor scraping activity and these signs are indications of the coming rut.
The big mistake.
This is the big mistake most deer hunters will make at this juncture they will go straight to the use of a doe-in-heat or a buck-in-rut deer lure and stink up the deer woods, the older trophy bucks will for the most part avoid this section of woods because they know the doe's are not in season yet.
Effective curiosity calling.
Now is the time to add some antler rattling, grunting, ground pounding and you have to make it sound realistic. When bucks spar they just do not stand there and bang their antlers together. As bucks spar to get rid of their frustration, they first circle around each other, make grunting sounds, stomp the ground with their front feet and eventually engage their antlers and begin pushing and shoving.
To effectively pull off this type of calling, you have to be on the ground, scent free, and concealed with a 360 degree view, as the bucks can come to your calls from any direction. Calling duration should only last for 5 minutes with a 30 minute pause. Food is still the bucks priority scent at this juncture of the season. |
Copyright 2001 - 2010.
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