What's Your Take on this Season???

[dbHunterNY]

about the same where i hunt.... more younger age class bucks. last year the neighbors shot a lot of little ones though. this year was tough because a lot of bigger bucks happen to be shot by some of them. not over yet but it'll be tough unless you can find a good late season food source that's still standing.

[JimmyDaSavage]

About the same for me as it has been every year. Good amount of deer sightings on the island and a couple of harvests for me.

[G-Man]

Been an odd year in that we have had no apples, no nuts, no mast of anykind! Stomachs are full of greens. Cleaned out 5 acres of corn before the end of october. Lots of bucks around and camp has taken 7 so far (10 guys) with a few misses. Lots were passed up during bow, and guys still passing small one and does( we get most our doe take during muzzleloader) but have 4 in the freezer already. Lots of east wind has things screwed up more than anything i think, our stands are set for west winds(south or north) as that is predominant direction 99% of time except this year...maybe 20%. Nice its been cold the last week but was very warm during bow, and rut peaked opening weekend of gun season.! For me personally one of my best seasons in recent memory.got my buck during bow and gun as well as a big bear.not to mention the deer i passed...

[ATbuckhunter]

I was doing great during bow season but once gun started i only saw 2 deer the day after opening day.

[chiefbkt]

Given mine and my wife's work schedule, I'm only able to hunt weekends. That being said, since bow season started until now I have only missed 3 days of hunting. This past Sunday was the first time I hunted without seeing a deer. So I would say this year has been pretty good. I can say however, that I haven't seen any bucks while hunting since bow season. Which is quite amazing since I have seen so many does, and none with a buck in tow. Maybe this weekend will be the weekend i see one.

[Doc]

I knew when I did my scouting that I was in for a tough year. The wacky weather around the blossoming time in the spring absolutely destroyed ALL of the wild apples. And then the very few acorns that we actually had never filled out and dropped early leaving us with absolutely no acorns. What I learned is that when both of those failures happen, the deer take on a very random feeding pattern, and traditional heavy trails disappear and new very faint ones appear as the deer tend to scatter a bit. I never did get onto any patterns. Oh by the way, we have no agriculture so there was nothing to work with there either.

Gun season was the usual decent start just before legal shooting hours on opening morning and then .... nothing. I think everyone went to sleep under their favorite tree and then left early from boredom. In other words, nobody was pushing the deer. The days after the opener were completely dead. I mean the silence was deafening.

So I am already frustrated beyond belief to the point where I am looking forward to next year in the hopes that things will get back to normal again as far as the deer food situation.

Weather-wise, I have no complaints. In fact the wind that usually tears up most of the bow and gun season was pretty much absent for most of the days. And I guess there were a whole lot more dry days than usual. The only thing I would say is that this time of gun season, it would be nice if we had a little bit of snow to make the bedded deer stand out better. And I do want to emphasize the word "Little" ... lol. I don't need two feet of snow to have to wallow around in.

[Jennifer]

I knew when I did my scouting that I was in for a tough year. The wacky weather around the blossoming time in the spring absolutely destroyed ALL of the wild apples. And then the very few acorns that we actually had never filled out and dropped early leaving us with absolutely no acorns. What I learned is that when both of those failures happen, the deer take on a very random feeding pattern, and traditional heavy trails disappear and new very faint ones appear as the deer tend to scatter a bit. I never did get onto any patterns. Oh by the way, we have no agriculture so there was nothing to work with there either.

Same here Doc, I was unable to pattern anything this year (I normally love to pattern turkeys) and feeding has been sporadic and random for both turkey and deer. No mast on anything, locally.

[JPP]

Lots of deer this year. Very large number of good quality bucks.

Freezer is full, tags are all filled.

I would say this year is one of best ones in a very long time.

I hunt 8N, Ontario County.

[Joe Red]

I have to say we had a great 2 days of hunting. We almost didn't make it due to sandy . We work in the utility field in the city and been on 12 hour days 7 days a week due to sandy. We were lucky enough to plan our vacation time for the first week of deer season last year so we were able to take off. Between 4 people we had 2 doe opening day mine and my buddy's dads and my buddy shot an 8 on Sunday out of the stand I shot the doe from. Then back to work on Monday. Hope to get out one day at least for muzzy.