Zack from IL asks,
Hey Bill, Hope your season is going well! Really enjoying all the content. I listened to HUNTR podcast you where on. It was really enjoyable and interesting listen. My question is about once a mature whitetail winds you what is there behavior? How long until they are comfortable in the general area, if ever?
Bill responds,
Topic: When Deer Smell You:
The way a buck reacts to being spooked is directly related to how spooked they are. If they actually see you in the stand and recognize you as a threat (not just a big lump) they will likely not come close to that tree in daylight without really checking it out in the future.
Zack,
Like so many other things related to whitetails, it depends on the details as every situation is a bit different. But, I think I can generalize this enough to be useful. First, some bucks are just flat out more spooky than others. The buck I killed this year (more about him in a future blog) actually smelled me in the same stand two weeks earlier. But, he didn’t see me and really didn’t get spooked too badly. After he snuck in and smelled me (wet leaves) he ran about 40 yards and then stopped and started walking back as if to try to figure out exactly what happened. I wasn’t real worried that he would leave the area because of the way he reacted. He wasn’t super spooked, just didn’t like it.
However, I am sure that if he had seen me in the tree instead of just smelling me, he would have stopped using that part of the property or been much more cautious around that tree in the future. So you have to consider the nature of the scare.
Put in human terms; if you hear something in the shadows as you walk down the sidewalk at night, you will probably stop and maybe even cross the road and use the other sidewalk. Next time past you likely will try to figure out it was, but eventually you won’t be worried about that spot any more. This is especially true is sounds are common in that area, stray dogs, possums, etc.
Now compare that to how you would react if instead of hearing a suspicious sound, a guy in a hockey mask jumped out with a machete in his hand. You would likely run for your life and never go down that sidewalk again in the dark for a long, long time.
That is similar to how deer react to human intrusion. If it is fairly common (like you might have in areas with a suburban population of people) the deer will not react with any long term changes. If the scare you give them is mild (like in my case), they won’t abandon that area. They will start to use it like they have in the past very soon.
But, if they see you on stand, they will be very leery of that spot and if they see you actually shoot at them (the analogy of the hockey mask machete killer) they may stop using that area for the rest of the season. Casual scare that is typical of non-threatening human/deer interaction won’t have a long term effect, but unique and really scary interaction will cause them to change behavior for weeks and maybe even the remainder of the season. Like I said, this is a complex subject that is not easy to define, but I hope this helps. Good luck. (11/26/21)
