If you have been following my blog you know by now that I hunt public land quite often. The following are a few examples the good and bad parts of hunting public land for deer.

1. Make sure you wear more then enough blaze orange. You are hunting with lots of other people. You don’t know how others hunt or how safe they are. Stay safe, wear lots and lots of blaze orange.

2. Make sure you have at the very least two areas scoped out for your stand. On opening morning or any morning for that matter any one can sit any where, so when you get to your spot their may be another hunter sitting there.

3. On opening morning make sure to get out extra early to avoid the down side of tip two. This way if you are the fist one there it is more likely the other hunter will leave.

4. If you can, wait in your Tree Stand until at least 10:30am or so, lots of people get cold or bored and get out of their stands. This means they will be pushing deer all around and increase your chances of getting a shot at one.

5. Human scent is all around, so the deer don’t know where to go. If you are scentless you will have a better chance of seeing deer.

6. There are a lot of people to talk to when hunting on public land. Use this to your advantage ask them where they are seeing or not seeing deer, how they have had luck, and/or where they have their stands (so you can avoid those areas). For instance last season it was really cold, windy, and the deer didn’t want to move. Just by asking we found out that lots of guys were having luck walking around and kicking deer up.

7. If you party hunt make sure to set a time and place to meet. This way some one won’t sneak up on you and you can avoid any chance of a tragedy.

8. Know where every one in your party is hunting, so you don’t disturb their hunt when you get out of your tree early to take a walk.

9. Don’t leave your stand up even if it is chained to the tree. I forgot the key to my tree stand after opening weekend last year, and had to leave my stand out in the tree. My brother went to go get it the next evening or so and someone had stolen it.

10. Just be as careful as you can, and be considerate of other hunters. I also want to stress the blaze orange again you can never be too safe.