QDMA Articles :
Scouting After the Harvest
By: Dave Edwards Jr.
How many times have you found a great
place on your property to hunt that had everything – great
food sources, cover, deer trails and maybe a few rubs – set
up a stand, sat there all day with anticipation and never saw
a deer? Or worse yet, have you ever convinced yourself that this
is the place, it’s just a matter of time and then spent a
weekend committed to a single stand and did not see much of anything?
I have, and it isn’t much fun! Don’t get me wrong, I
don’t have to kill a deer every time I go to the woods, but
I at least want to see some action. It was very likely that the
area I was hunting was indeed a “good area,” but the
deer simply weren’t using it at the time. It is also a good
bet that there were either abundant food sources or more preferred
food sources available somewhere else on the property.
What drives deer movement? The answer
is simple – food! Some may argue that breeding season or
the rut affects buck movements, which is correct. They are searching
for does. Where are the does? They will be where the food is.
So food is ultimately influencing when and where deer move. Like
me, deer are slaves to their stomachs (or rumens), they feed many
times each day, and food is what drives their movement. Identifying
deer movement patterns results in successful hunts. The key is
to know where deer are bedding, which food source they are using,
and position yourself in a strategic location near the food source,
bedding area, or between the two. To do this, you need to scout
– this includes scouting food sources on the ground, and
“scouting from the skinning shed.” That’s right
– learn what deer are eating by studying the rumen contents
of harvested deer.
Traditional Scouting Methods
Successful deer hunters are familiar with traditional scouting
methods. This method usually begins with close examination of
an aerial photograph or map of the property to identify logical
places for deer to be then ground-checking key areas for deer
sign and available food sources. During the ground-check, the
hunter is looking for trails, rubs, scrapes, and habitat features
that will influence deer movement such as thickets, travel corridors,
bottlenecks or ecotones (where two or more habitats come together).
From a food standpoint, scouting hunters are searching for preferred
food sources such as agricultural crops or food plots, quality
vegetation (honeysuckle, greenbriar, legumes, etc.), oaks that
are dropping acorns, or soft mast (persimmons, grapes, apples,
plums, etc). To avoid setting up on a great food source that is
not being used, a close inspection of the food source is needed.
That is, just because you found a swamp chestnut oak – one
of the most preferred acorns in many southern regions – that
is “raining” acorns doesn’t mean that deer are
eating them. Is there abundant deer sign in and around the food
source? If you are inspecting an oak, do you see many acorn caps,
a good indication that something has eaten the acorns? In fact,
if deer are heavily using a particular oak tree, you shouldn’t
find many acorns because they are eating them as fast as they
fall. Obviously, signs that deer are eating the food source are
important. However, the one key sign I look for and will instantly
give me confidence that deer are using the area is fresh deer
droppings. If old droppings are present too, I’m hanging
a stand! That means that deer have been using the area consistently
for a while.
Effectively scouting by traditional
techniques is certainly necessary to consistently have successful
hunts. However, traditional methods require a good bit of time
and energy on your part, which for most of us is limited. Besides
the time required, traditional scouting techniques require the
hunter to “ramble around” the woods, disturbing deer
and leaving a lot of scent behind. This activity and disturbance
is sure to put deer on the alert, particularly mature bucks, and
will influence deer movements. This is where scouting from the
skinning shed comes in handy. It helps minimize “scouting
pressure” and can save precious time that can be spent in
a deer stand.
Scouting From the Skinning Shed
Scouting from the skinning shed – a phrase I first saw used
in Quality Whitetails by Dr. Grant Woods in his 1999 article by
the same title – refers to inspecting the stomach contents
of harvested deer to determine available and preferred food sources
that deer are using at that time of the season. “At that
time” is important because food sources change from week
to week.
For example, deer may be feeding heavily
on water oaks, but if a more preferred food source becomes available
such as a clump of white oaks dropping acorns, deer change their
diet and adjust movements and bedding accordingly. To be productive,
you need to do the same. This is particularly true for bowhunters
– placing a bow stand just a few yards in the wrong direction
from a great location can cost you the chance at a nice buck.
Another example I often see is when
deer are using agricultural crops or food plots but change food
sources and movements literally overnight once acorns start falling.
Hunters who continue to hunt food plots during this time often
spend the afternoon watching grass grow. They often claim, “The
deer just weren’t moving.” Scouting from the skinning
shed would have told them that deer are now feeding on acorns
and would have prevented a “wasted” afternoon or weekend.
Sometimes you will even see that deer are feeding in different
areas and on different food sources in the morning versus the
afternoon. Scouting from the skinning shed tells you what the
deer are eating and will reduce the amount of traditional scouting
needed to put you in the hot spot.
Notice that I mentioned it will reduce
the amount of traditional scouting. Once you know what the deer
are feeding on, you still need to do some quick scouting to make
sure you are in the right place and that there is active deer
sign in the area. For example, although deer may be feeding on
cherrybark oak acorns, your property may have several areas with
cherrybark oaks. Traditional scouting will pinpoint where the
deer are and more importantly where they are not. But by scouting
from the skinning shed and knowing deer are eating cherrybark
acorns, you can concentrate your scouting efforts on figuring
out which stand of cherrybark oaks they are using. This prevents
you from having to employ full-scale scouting efforts in the middle
of hunting season.
So how do you scout from the skinning
shed? Obviously, the first thing you need is a deer at the skinning
shed. If you are familiar with your property or hunting lease
and are practicing QDM, you probably know a few places you can
harvest a deer without any scouting – places that are always
productive. If you hunt with friends or a club, chances are that
somebody in the camp will harvest a deer.
Once you have a deer, inspect the
contents of the stomach. To do this, field dress the deer and
find the rumen. Deer have four stomach chambers that are essentially
“linked” together. As food makes its journey through
these chambers, it is increasingly digested. That is, roughage
and pieces of raw food materials will be in the first stomach
– which is the rumen – and the last stomach will contain
extremely fine food particles in a mostly liquid state. The rumen
is the largest stomach and the one we are interested in. The rumen
is also what most people will identify as “the deer’s
stomach” when field dressing, and even novice hunters can
find it easily.
Simply cut the rumen open (which I
seem to do by accident every time I dress a deer anyway!) and
see what’s inside. A word of caution: if the rumen is bloated
or tight, release pressure slowly with the point of your knife
before slicing… and turn your head or you may be inspecting
your own stomach contents! Better yet, if the rumen is bloated,
ask a naive hunting partner to open it for you. Although the contents
often look like a green gooey mess, with some inspection, the
primary food sources the deer has been eating should be obvious.
It helps to dump the contents on the ground or concrete pad and
run some water over it. Be sure to use disposable rubber gloves
to handle the rumen contents, as it is very difficult to wash
off the odor, and also poison ivy and oak are commonly browsed
by deer.
However, there is a better method.
I keep a “scouting box” at the skinning shed that makes
the job easier. The scouting box is nothing more than a wooden
box with a bottom made of ¼-inch hardware cloth that acts
as a screen or sieve. This box allows you to dump the stomach
contents onto the screen and wash away the more digested particles,
leaving only the larger pieces behind. If you are interested in
seeing the semi-small items, you can use a second box below the
first with a finer screen. However, I only use the larger screen
now because the small items were hard to identify and the larger
items told me what I needed to know.
Identifying Food Items
Once you have washed the stomach contents down and have parts
and pieces of food items left, you face the task of identifying
what they are. If the deer has been eating plants, you will see
bits and pieces of leaves. It’s relatively easy to identify
plants using the larger pieces of leaves, but in some cases you
will have to rely on subtle hints from fragments like leaf edges
and veins. If you are not familiar with common deer browse plants
in your area, I recommend asking your biologist to give you a
crash course on plant identification or study a plant identification
guide. Although I can identify most southern plants, I keep a
field guide on hand for those I struggle with. In the Southeast,
one of the best field guides is Forest Plants of the Southeast
and Their Wildlife Uses, by Dr. Karl V. Miller and James H. Miller,
available from QDMA.
You will seldom be able to identify
highly digestible plants, especially most food plot crops like
clovers, unless the deer consumed them very recently. These simply
digest too fast and are quickly rendered into a green liquid.
Obviously, if the deer has been eating
acorns, you will see acorns. There will be whole acorns, pieces
of acorn meat (usually tan or yellow) and hull. Again, a good
field guide is very helpful to identify which oak species the
acorns came from. Acorns are mostly identified by their size,
shape, characteristics, and markings. Soft mast like crabapples,
persimmons and various berries can sometimes be tricky because
the “meat” is soft and digests easily, and the skin
has been chewed. I often have to rely on the seeds of soft mast
for identification. Once you do it a few times, you will become
more confident and proficient at identifying the deer foods.
You will also be amazed at some of
the weird things deer will eat. I have found rocks, cigarette
butts, rope, candy wrappers and a parachute to name a few! That’s
right, I said a parachute. I once managed the hunting on a National
Guard post in Florida where we checked stomach contents of harvested
deer. During nighttime military maneuvers, troops often dropped
large flares from aircraft that drifted down on parachutes about
the size of a kitchen table. Somehow, this deer ate the parachute!
The entire parachute including the D-ring and cords were in the
deer’s stomach in a ball. The parachute took up most of the
deer’s stomach. I never figured out how the deer got the
whole thing into its stomach, but I’m sure it would have
been a sight to watch!
Unless you are just interested, I
would not spend too much time trying to identify the small stuff
in the stomach. Your goal is simply to determine the primary food
source that the deer was eating. With a very quick inspection
you can tell whether the deer spent more time eating browse or
eating acorns. Upon further inspection you should try to identify
which specific browse plants (agricultural crop, food plot, native
plants, etc.) or mast crop (acorns, soft mast, etc.) the deer
concentrated on.
It is obviously helpful to check more
than one deer. Deer are like people. Given a choice, most of us
would prefer to hang out around a seafood buffet rather than a
salad bar. But there is always someone who would prefer the salad.
I also recommend checking deer throughout the season since food
sources change.
Keeping Records
We use our scouting box to inspect deer rumen contents throughout
the hunting season at our commercial hunting lodge so that we
can monitor deer feeding habits and adjust hunting locations accordingly.
We also keep records of our findings. This allows us the ability
to predict which food sources deer will be using next year and
gives us an advantage that allows us to stay ahead of the game
(pun intended). After collecting information over a couple of
hunting seasons, you will begin to see a pattern of feeding habits
for each week of the hunting season. For example, from annually
collected diet information, you will get a good feel for when
deer use agriculture fields, when they prefer natural browse,
and when they shift to acorns or other mast crops. Many food sources
are only available for short periods of time, and you may not
have time to locate the food source or adjust your hunting strategy
the same season you see these foods in rumen contents. By keeping
records of what you found and when, you can make predictions for
next season and plan and scout accordingly (With acorns, however,
remember that acorn crops are inconsistent from year to year,
and your predictions about timing will be dependent on having
a decent or strong acorn crop that year).
Date, location of the harvest, sex
and age of the deer, major food sources present and percentage
of their composition are a few things we record from each deer.
Recording the location is certainly helpful if you are hunting
a relatively large property. Although deer across a property will
usually focus their feeding efforts on similar food sources, I
have seen completely different diets on the same property due
to the availability of food sources in different areas.
For those who enjoy seeing exactly
what the deer are eating, collect as detailed information as you
like. Obviously, more information will result in finer-tuned results.
However, I caution you from trying to identify every single piece
of food you find, as this is virtually impossible. From a hunting
and management standpoint, concentrate your efforts on things
that are common in several deer and are relatively abundant in
the diet.
Analyzing rumen contents is also a
good way to assess your habitat and nutritional management strategies.
For example, if you are constantly seeing poor quality food sources
such as red cedar or oak leaves in stomach contents, this may
be a sign that your deer population has exceeded the property’s
carrying capacity. Improved harvest or habitat management may
be needed. Your property may appear to have plenty of “green
stuff” for deer to eat and may even have a decent food plot
program, but a closer inspection may indicate that few quality
food sources exist. A high deer population results in high competition
for desirable, nutritious food sources.
I commonly visit new properties where
deer populations are high. From a truck window the woods appear
to have food in the understory. But a closer look indicates that
most desirable plant species such as greenbriar, honeysuckle and
ragweed have been heavily browsed or are non-existent. This reminds
me of the old saying, “Good from afar, but far from good.”
Scouting from the skinning shed will help you monitor your management
efforts and make adjustments when needed to ensure deer are getting
a quality diet.
Pay Attention to the Little Things
Although it is more important to note the common food items you
find when scouting at the skinning shed, paying attention to some
of the weird or odd items that show up in the stomachs of deer
can instantly put you in a honey hole. Pokeweed is a common plant
in the South that is often found on recently disturbed ground
such as roadsides, logging decks, firebreaks or clearcuts. Because
pokeweed is a preferred food source for deer, it is common to
see pokeweed that has been heavily browsed. In fact, I would consider
it an “ice cream” plant for deer.
I can remember checking a doe’s
stomach during archery season a couple of years ago – the
rumen was completely filled with pokeweed leaves. I ran out and
checked a couple of logging decks from a recent pine thinning
operation. Sure enough, deer had been hammering the pokeweed,
and there was fresh sign everywhere. A friend and I set up on
two different logging decks the next morning. I had action all
morning and was able to get a doe. I picked my friend up at 10:30
a.m. He had witnessed similar deer activity and had a dandy 9-point
buck! We would never have thought about hunting these locations
without seeing the pokeweed in the stomach of that doe.
Post-Season Scouting
Scouting from the skinning shed does not take the place of traditional
scouting, it simply complements it. You still need to scout and
know the woods. I recommend scouting shortly after the hunting
season is over. During this time of year, deer sign, including
rubs, scrapes and trails, is still relatively fresh and easily
seen, and after being pressured all season, deer will be hanging
out where they feel comfortable and secure. This is also where
you will find deer next hunting season once hunting pressure cranks
up. Post-season scouting goals are to identify travel corridors,
bottlenecks, thickets, bedding areas, and various food sources.
Use this trip to become intimately familiar with your property,
habitat features, food source locations, and key areas deer use
when hunting pressure is applied. With this information you will
know where to look and hunt next season after you identify what
the deer are eating.
Conclusion
Scouting from the skinning shed has many benefits. It’s free
information that will improve your hunting success, and it only
takes a couple minutes to “scout” while you are dressing
or processing a deer. But most importantly, it helps you identify
what deer are eating so you can concentrate your scouting efforts
in specific areas and avoid having to cover the entire property.
This not only saves you time and energy, it reduces disturbance.
Lastly, scouting from the skinning shed allows you to assess and
monitor your habitat management program. Although many factors
influence deer movements, food is certainly high on the list.
Find the food, and you will find the deer!
About the Author: Dave Edwards
Jr. has a bachelor’s degree in Wildlife Ecology from the
University of Florida, and a Master’s in Wildlife Management
from Mississippi State University. He is currently a project manager
for Westervelt Wildlife Services and previously worked for the
Florida Fish & Wildlife Commission. Dave is a Sponsor Member
of QDMA.
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