Spooking Deer by shooting quail

B

BILLDAVE

Moderator
My friend and I have about 100 acres to hunt in central Illinois. Being a river bottom it has quail as well as deer. So my question is, when quail season starts Nov. 1st will blasting guns and troping through the area with a hunting dog spoil the Deer shotgun season Nov. 20th? any thoughts?
BILLDAVE
 
Yes it will push the deer off the property they will seek quiet and no dogs no human scent territory.Dogs are predators and the deer know that.Proviso,is if you are shooting up untill the day of the deer season.5-7 days left alone the deer will most likely return.
 
My buddy and I hunt a piece of property that is real close to one of the State Game Lands. Archery season is great. When they stock the pheaseants over there and the youth hunt is going then regualr season kicks in the deer move out. We are close (by close I mean we border it) so the deer sightings increase. Also nice when your in the tree and a pheaseant shows up under your stand when the seasons over lap. The birds tend to scatter also once the guns start going off.
 
Personally, I'd stay off the land. Shooting and leaving your scent all over doesn't seem like a great way to keep deer on your land and in their normal routine.

Will hunting on Nov 1st run off deer on Nov 20th? Maybe, maybe not, but I wouldn't set foot on that land for at least two weeks prior.
 
Yeah, the deer would likely move out, but they won't stay gone from home all that long, once things get quiet. I'd guess, just offhand, that a week's quiet oughta be good enough for Bambi to go back home.

Realizing, of course, that not all deer have read my book, "What Deer Do".
 
deer always amaze me. a couple of season past, i was hunting behind a big running pointer in tall CRP. the dog goes on point about a hundred yards ahead in a strong cross wind. since the CRP was tall i had the point locate collar on the pointer. sounds like a garbage truck backing up. after i got to the dog, i kicked up a rooster. at the shot, a muley doe and yearling jumped up from the grass not more than 20 feet to the dogs right. the falling rooster almost struck the departing doe.
 
Gunshots do'nt scare deer, more than once have had deer come from behind the backstop at the rifle range.
 
As Toney stated, I have deer that live around our shooting range, and will have to be run off to be able to practice. These are what I term as "Domestic Deer"
Deer will get used to almost anything, if subjected to it long enough. We have so much farming and ranching that goes on here in southeastern Oklahoma,that the deer are so used to seeing people, and smelling all the smells associated with man, that they don't pay much attention to us on a day to day basis.
Now that being said, if you go down to Honobia or Three Rivers hunting areas, where they don't see anyone for a year at a time, these deer take on a whole new style. The wild deer in those areas will be gone as soon as anything out of the ordinary takes place. A couple of shots in these areas, and the deer will go to another county.
If I had a prime deer hunting area, I would not hunt anything on it, until after deer season is over.
 
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