The question is frequently asked by hunters and frequently answered throughout this book, “Where do the big bucks go?” It can’t be repeated too often that the mature bucks are solitary creatures that regularly practice evasion techniques, even outside the hunting season. When hunting season rolls around, they simply ratchet up their techniques a notch or two. Visualize the majestic buck as a James Bond figure; but instead of some fancy gadget to use, the mature buck calls upon his own instincts to get himself out of trouble. James Bond is always aware, always planning ahead, and always pulls some trick out of the hat, so to speak; so too can the elusive buck that you are hunting. Plus, the buck has the advantages of a thorough knowledge of his territory coupled with superior physical attributes.

Foods and feeding habits

Deer are so successful in their habitats because they readily adapt to the conditions around them and eat what is available. Deer that inhabit different areas of North America, of course, eat what is locally available and may have preferences for local food sources. In fact, whitetail deer are known to eat some 600 varieties of plants.

The average deer needs approximately 8 to 12 pounds of food per day. Their instincts are sensible and deer eat a variety of foods in order to remain healthy and also not deplete their food sources. The list of foods they eat covers most types of vegetation. The diet changes with the season as well as the section of the country the deer inhabit.

Deer prefer high quality green forage whenever it is available, including ground plants and leaves or needles of certain trees. Deer like clover. They like soft foods like persimmon, apples and dogwood as well as woody browse such as red maple, white cedar, sweet fern, oak, witch-hazel, sumac, hemlock, willow, wintergreen, fir, arborvitae, snowberry, greenbrier, bearberry, Oregon-grape and pine. In some areas of the South, whitetails feed on twig ends of trees during the early spring period. The twig ends are appetizing to the deer as well as nutritionally beneficial at this time.

SECRET: While deer love to eat acorns, they will only eat the acorns from a white oak tree and only those that have recently fallen. Know your oak trees before you set up your tree stand in an area with plentiful acorns.

Deer spend more time at feeding than on any other endeavor. While traveling to and from preferred feeding areas, whitetails usually move in single file at a fairly steady pace using their well-established trails, browsing food along the way. They will not even stop long enough to completely consume a tasty morsel. Deer in my area eat a species of fungi that I call a “puff ball.” These round fungi are about the size of a golf ball and I often find them with only one or two bites taken out, leaving the rest of the puff ball with the characteristic teeth marks of deer.

Once in the feeding area, the herd usually separates and the individual deer move about, munching at will. They rarely stop long enough to consume a food source completely. By preference, deer start to feed about a half hour before dark each afternoon or early in the morning. If food is plentiful, they can fill their paunches in less than an hour. When the deer do not feel pressured like they do during the hunting season, they will feel comfortable and graze in open areas at various times during the day. However, if food is plentiful the deer are fussier and select only the choicest tidbits. They walk along slowly and nibble at this shoot or that herb, pausing here and there to taste a few leaves.

There are events that may disrupt this normal feeding pattern. For example, during hunting season, deer will remain hidden during the day and feed mostly at night. When the moon is full and the sky is clear, the herd may party all night and eat in safety under the cover of darkness. When the moon is bright under clear skies, deer may shift their afternoon feeding time to later in the day, apparently in anticipation of being able to feed later into the night.

It takes about an hour for a deer to eat enough food to fill its paunches and it is ready to bed down in safe location to chew its cud. Since deer feed both morning and evening, they spend much of the daytime and nights as well chewing their cud. It’s not a bad life: sleep, eat, chew and wander.

Hunters ask what type of cultivated crops they can plant to attract deer to their area. In Texas and areas with a similar climate, hunters can establish cool-season (November to April/May) and warm-season food plots.

SECRET: Recommended crops for the cool season are: a mixture of grasses; oats; wheat; legumes; hairy vetch; alfalfa; and clover, while recommended crops for warm weather are: cowpeas, soybeans, and milo. For areas with a single growing season, the following crops are recommended: high quality green forage in a hay field; winter wheat; clover; corn; soybeans; and sorghum.

SECRET: If you are planting a corn field for the deer, leave the corn stalks standing over the winter. Deer prefer to navigate standing corn as a way to get out of the wind.

Whitetail deer love the taste of salt and will frequent natural salt licks, salt blocks set out in a pasture for cattle, or even take in road salt that has been put down to melt ice. They seem to prefer to get salt especially in the summer and some biologists believe that the bucks crave salt during the time that they are developing antlers.

SECRET: Hunters will place a salt block out to attract deer. However, be well aware that this practice can be considered as baiting the animal and may be in violation of your state’s game and hunting laws.

In Deer Hunting Secrets and Whitetail Deer Hunting Tactics - Part 3, we will discuss rutting behavior.

Click to view Deer Hunting Secrets and Whitetail Deer Hunting Tactics - Part 1

 Click to view Deer Hunting Secrets and Whitetail Deer Hunting Tactics - Part 3 - The Rut

We have only touched on a small amount of the information that is available in the book. If you truly want to a master the art of deer hunting, read the book.

Wishing You Your Very Best Season.

Sincerely,
Joe Pineland

Deer Hunting Secrets. Discover The Closely Guarded True Secrets Of Master Hunters.

P.S. Don’t wait. If you want it, order now, either you love it or you keep it for free, check it out for yourself. The testimonials speak for themselves and it proves that this is high quality material. Get it today. I will have to double the price soon, so get it while it is practically free.