“Big woods” deer are not hunted as often. They don’t eat at farms, cross highways, watch humans or follow predictable corridors. They live in swamps, walk in the thickets and are rarely seen in open areas. They move seasonally to different yards of vast territory. They contend with the big predators: wolves, coyotes, bears and mountain lions. They avoid humans; many have never even seen a human their entire lives. They don’t eat the fattening corn, but eat bark, buds, tuber roots, wild plants and grasses. They travel in small, family groups and when the rut occurs, these groups of does meet up with families of bucks in prescribed yards. The bucks can be enormous and very territorial to their perceived territory.
It is the unusual hunter who stalks the “big woods” deer, since it does not offer the rewards of the fattened buck or doe that lives off the farm corn. Why then, would some people climb through swamps and thick woods to try and out smart the wily, big woods deer?
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| Swamp typical of a “big woods” whitetail habitat. |
There are probably two categories of these hunters: the ones who don’t have access to the other lands or public hunting is too crowded for them; and those who are purists, loving the challenge of getting the mystery animal. The hunter of the “big woods” buck is akin to the muskie fisherman.
A muskie fisherman considers it a successful weekend upon seeing a swirl in the water after 20 hours of fishing. Compare the muskie fisherman to the bluegill enthusiasts who love to catch something every few minutes. This gives you an idea of the type of person that is the hunting the “big woods” deer. Success is not always possible.
An excellent book on this topic is: Hunting Big Woods Bucks (2003) by Hal Blood, Creative Outdoors Publishing.ISBN: 1-58011-219-6. For big woods bucks, Hal Blood suggests one important strategy is “still hunting”: moving slowly and stopping every few steps while stalking the deer. Hunting with a tree stand or blind is very difficult since the deer are in constant motion in an unpredictable path. Remember, for these deer, many have never seen a human. They enjoy lying in the thicket and walking through such difficult thick brush that you need to wear safety glasses if you follow them. To the successful hunter, packing the deer out is a great problem since they are so far in thicket that no ATV can retrieve the downed deer. The thicket is terrible to drag a deer through. You might as well expect a 6-8 hour drag over the exhausting terrain.
However, when they register their deer, it might look the same as the habitated deer that someone sat in a tree stand and drove out by ATV with. So why go through all that work?
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| “Big woods” whitetail area in black spruce. A bucks ear is barely visible at end of shotgun. Shooting here is very thick and close. |
You have to love the wilderness first and foremost to hunt the “big woods” deer. The reward for such an adventure is that you will stumble upon signs and wildlife that are never seen to the average hunter. You have stalked an expert animal using camouflage for evasion, yet you prevail with intuitive hunting. You are not hunting merely for the kill, but for the whole experience. You have tested your orienteering, your endurance, and your fear. For when you have been alone in the deep woods, miles from help or cell phone coverage, you are on your own.
Wayne Hockenmeyer, well known big woods Maine guide says:
“Hard work and suffering! While every word above is true, then so is the admission that hunting "Big Woods" trophy whitetail is not for everyone. It is not easy. I would be lying if I said differently. The odds are against you. The weather can be extreme. The "Big Woods" do not have large numbers of deer, it has enormous deer. I will contradict most of the theories you have read in hunting magazines and show you the proof of what I have come to learn. Hunting the "Big Woods" will challenge your thinking about whitetails forever. Not living in the presence of man, dogs, traffic, smells and noise, the whitetail shows you his true nature and behavior, not the animal that has learned to adapt to civilization and shows a face that leads to false conclusions.”
Hal Blood, author of “Hunting Big Woods Bucks” says:
“Hunting a hub where generations of bucks have rubbed and their territories overlap. This is a signpost of a hub of several deer trails. The trees of a hub grow in wet areas and are rubbed year after year, some for fifty years. This signpost is gold and worth more than a lot of sporadic rubs. Scrapes and pawings are different. Breeding scrapes are places where bucks and does meet to mate. It has the characteristic bare dirt with an overhang limb where a buck breaks off a branch and urinates on it over the scape. Putting doe estrus right into the scrape will draw the buck back to the scrape. Pawings are just made in the snow out of aggression, but sometimes are made in a line of travel. Pawings are not returned to or really mean anything about the buck returning.”
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| Estrous scrape where branches are placed by buck on top of scrape. |
There is an old Ojibwe saying: “the bigger the cedar, the bigger the buck” For the “big woods” bucks, the center of their life is swamps, thickets, and cedar beds.
Those hunters who challenge themselves in pursuit of the “big woods” deer are not always going to see one, but they know they are there, watching you. They may be laying only 20 yards away under some brush looking up at you. If you call them, the buck may snort and stomp his paws, but he won’t come out. You must come up on him by surprise, or be sitting in a pit blind where he won’t expect you. He has seen your ground blind or tree stand, because nothing new in the woods goes unnoticed by the wily “big woods” whitetail.
During whitetail deer season in the northern woodlands we find ourselves hunting in one of two categories; “big woods” or hunting the “habitated” deer found near cornfields, highways and generally close to where humans are living. “Big woods” deer is a term to define an deer who does not eat farmland food or go near human habitats.
