If you have not been interrupted abruptly by another hunter in the woods, I’ll clue you in on a situation that happens to many public land hunters.

You’ve setup on a location where all the variables are in your favor. The wind is perfect, the temperatures have dropped off, the rut is kicking in and you are waiting for that big buck to cross your path. But as you sit with anticipation you see a fellow hunter approach your general vicinity from the wrong direction and they walk right through your anticipated deer travel route.

It’s a devastating experience, but one that can be avoided through a couple of ways. One thing that I have started practicing and really diving deep into is patterning other hunters like I would deer. “Hunt the hunter”. Here is why:

When I was younger and just starting out hunting, I did some dumb hunting mistakes. For instance, I would hunt the same stand repeatedly all weekend long. Regardless of wind and entry points I would hunt over the same bait pile and in the same tree. I would often wonder why I would go full weekends without seeing any deer. Why was this happening to me? What was I doing wrong? Well the answer was…. I had become predictable.

Humans are creatures of habit. We like to see ourselves as conscious, self-governing, and set apart from animals with our ability to reason, but have you ever watched people (or yourself) closely? How many of you:

· Checking your phone as soon as you get up in the morning?

· Drive to and from work the same route everyday?

· Dry yourself off the same way after you bath?

I started discovering a lot of these little occurrences myself after I had gone through a few counter terrorism courses back during my Marine Corps days. The courses taught me that without even realizing it, we develop certain behaviors that become comfortable to us as individuals. And because most of us don’t like change, these behaviors (unless identified) are hard to climb out of making us predictable. This of course directly relates to hunters and their hunting behavior. Hunters are people, and people are predictable, that much we know. And if we are able to pattern deer movements based on their behaviors, we should be able to pattern other hunters the same way.

Lets take a look at some basic deer patterning hunting strategies and apply it to other hunters:

Sign

Lets face it, people litter. And I’m guessing that most of you can walk through your favorite public land hunting grounds and find a few beer cans, water bottles, and even a few snack wrappers. Take note of that. Just like deer sign, take note of where you have seen evidence of other hunters and mark it on your map. Same goes for if you find another hunter’s stand location. I’ve marked dozens of other hunters stands in the woods to get a sense of how heavily the area is pressured.

Mark it on your map and write off these areas as pressured areas to avoid.

Travel Routes

Just like deer, most hunters will take the path of least resistance. They’ll use the parking area and or local 2-track and park as close as possible to their hunting area and walk on average less than 500 yds to their actual stand location. Most times you can even find a heavily used walking trail that leads from the parking area right to the tree stand.

This type of behavior pushes deer away and into other areas since they know a predator (other hunters) uses those trails. Mark these travel routes on your map to avoid, and start looking for areas that the other hunters are overlooking. Use entry points that no one is using and focus on those areas. Some hunters walk right past prime hunting locations in route to their stand. You may even find yourself right near the road!

Movement Times

We all know that deer move most at dawn and dusk. Well guess what? Hunters are not much different. They move most from 10:00am – 11:00am and again at 3:00pm-4:00pm when they are getting out and getting back into their stands. This is of course supports the popular belief that mature bucks move at 10:00am to 2:00pm, especially during the rut. A mature buck is a very smart animal. They haven’t survived multiple hunting seasons without knowing a thing or two about hunter behavior.

Practice the art of patience and teach yourself to wait an a hour or so to longer than usual. Or better yet, sit all day if time permits. Other hunters might just bump deer right to you as they are leaving or coming in.

Public land is a blessing that we all have ownership in. We all have equal rights to access it, whenever we want to. Public land gets a bad rap for being over populated and hard to hunt. But there are things you can do to help bond the relations with others while there. Showing restraint and practicing general Public Land Hunting Etiquette is one way to deal with the situations like I explain above. Also knowing how to hunt smarter than everyone else will set you up for success for years to come.

Hunting the Hunter: A Guide to Patterning Hunters