Hi Newbies
I have been hunting for about 20 years. I have some advice for you guys, I hope you don't mind. 20 years certainly doesn't qualify me as an expert. Someone posted about hunting for 30 years and still learning and that is one of the best descriptions I have ever heard. Good on that guy. For what it is worth, here are some of the things I have learned about hunting. I am a born and raised city kid and I have no relatives or buddies, so I feel like you are kind of in the same boat I was in when I started hunting.
1. Take the hunters saftey course. I live in Manitoba, so here it is offered by the Manitoba Wildlife Federation. I am not sure about Ontario, but I'm sure there is a wildlife fderation in Ontario who would set you on the right course.
2. Start off with smaller game. Deer is a very big first step. I started hunting with small game. I shot some rabbits and grouse. This is very fun and rewarding hunting. Just go to crown land (forrest) with plenty of logging type roads and trails that you can walk/drive and see what you can spot. I used a 12 gauge for grouse, .22 rifle for bunnies. 12 gauge works well on bunnies too, just make sure you put the sight bead on the head, otherwise you have lots of pellets in your supper. Hunt ducks and geese. Farmers are getting to the point of thinking geese are a pest, and there are plenty who want rid of them. This is a great opportunity to develop a relationship. Who knows? If he lets you on his land to shoot geese, maybe in a few years, he will invite you out for deer or give you permission for deer. Just don't be a #### and always respect him/her. What they say is the law, don't f#ck it up. Besides, cleaning and gutting small game is good practive for when you shoot something larger. The insides of a rabbit look the same as a deer, just smaller.
3. When you do start big game hunting, the best method I have found is to hunt from a tree stand. You go in the bush and look for sign. Scrapes are large areas on the ground where a doe in heat urinates. Mr. Buck comes along and gets all hot and bothered at the scent and digs at the ground with his hooves and with his antlers. The gound get all scraped up. This is almost exclusively under an overhanging branch of a tree. The other important sign to look for is called a rub. This is where a buck rubs his antlers on a small diameter tree and rubs off all of the bark (because a doe left some scent on the tree), right down to the bare wood. This is usually on tress and saplings of less than 2 inches in diameter and not much more than two feet from the ground. When you see these signs, and after a while, you get to be pretty good at spotting them, you will know that there are does in the area, and some bucks as well. Bucks will return to scrapes and rubs, often they are in some kind of line.
4. Once you find a spot in the bush with lots of sign (scrapes and rubs), you look for a good place to set up a tree stand. Look for good sight lines and enough room to hear and see a deer for a 30-50 yard radius around you. Recent logging cuts are not too bad, if you place your stand near the edge. Deer will often go through the cut areas looking for fresh feed and sometimes will bed in these cut areas. Stand should be about 15 feet up in the tree and be comfortable enough to allow you to sit for at least a few hours.
5. Once up in the tree, you may want to use a pair of rattling antlers and/or a grunt call. This may attract some of the local bucks. Good books and videos available for this.
6. When you decide you want to walk and stalk instead of sit and wait, the most important thing to remember is not to cover too much ground. You are not in a race. You don't have to cover miles on trails searching for a deer. Your best bet is to walk very slowly and as quietly as possible. Stop for at least a minute every 10-20 steps and just listen. You will be surprised at how much you can hear. Besides, if you shoot a deer two miles from your vehicle on some trail that you can't drive on, then you have a 2 mile drag back to your vehicle. NEVER CARRY A DEAD ANIMAL. You always drag, although last year I did use a wheelbarrow and it worked awesome. Foot steps should be quite slow and deliberate with your feet gently landing on the ground, not stomping along. A deer can hear you coming and bugger off long before you will see it, if you are making lots of noise. Stepping softly makes very little noise and what noise does come from you sounds very natural, like an animal, not a human.
7. Join a local fish and game association and network. You will find that if you can get access to private land in farm country, the hunting is usually, but not always, better and the deer taste better because they are eating grains and hay, not tree leaves and bark. When you meet other hunters, ask them about hunting and their experiences. If there is one thing older hunters love, it's telling hunting stories. Ask lots of questions, especially how and why questions. Bring hunting up in conversations you have with people you meet. For example, you go the the wife/girlfriend's company Xmas party and you're sitting at the table with a bunch of people that you don't know, talk to the guys about hunting. Sometimes, you find out that the guy sitting next to your wife is a big time hunter. PAYDIRT!!
Now instead of getting drunk with all of the other bored husbands and boyfriends, you get to get drunk and swap hunting stories.
8. Don't get dicouraged. I didn't get a deer my first (or second year). Mistakes are learning opportunities.
9. BE SAFE. Don't learn the hard way from a mistake.
10. There are some good books and videos (see point number 5). Rent them, borrow them or buy them, whatever. There is some really good advice in them. There are also some real stinkers, but after you watch/read a few, you will develop a knack for seperating the fact from the BS.
11. HAVE FUN and keep posting on gunnutz. The folks on this site are absolute gold, most of the time. My advice is to never start a thread about bear defense or which calibre is better 30-06 or .270. Good luck and let us know how you make out.
