Tracking And Stalking Deer by TR Michels
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I first picked up the deer tracks on the south side of a 120 acre wood lot. I was fairly sure the tracks were made by a buck because they were on a rub route, not on the more heavily traveled trail the does used. The rub route paralleled the doe trail but wound through heavier cover and kept to lower ground. After it had begun snowing late last night I decided to wait until just after daylight before hunting the next morning. The light covering of fresh snow on the ground was just what I needed. By the crisp outline of the tracks I guessed the tracks were not more than two hours old. I went back to the Suburban, pulled a Scent Lok suit over my polypropylene underwear, took my Total Snow camouflage out of the protective charcoal impregnated bag where I kept all my hunting apparel, slipped it and my LaCrosse pack boots on, grabbed my Mossberg 500 12 gauge and slipped quietly into the woods.

As I followed the tracks they continued down the rub route. About seventy yards into the woods the tracks left the trail. Ten feet off the trail the snow was littered with tracks around a nine inch maple which had just been rubbed. The tracks showed that the buck had wandered through the brush for about twenty yards before going back to the rub route. I continued to follow the tracks down the rub route for another two hundred yards before they left the trail and began to wander through a brushy area, where the buck appeared to have stood. I was sure the buck was looking for a bedding site. I stopped near a tree for cover, then looked ahead.

Knowing the buck might be close I carefully scanned the woods, looking for anything that might be deer. First I checked the area in the direction of the tracks, examining every large gray spot I saw. Then I slowly checked the rest of the area. When I was satisfied that the buck wasn’t near I checked again, looking for an ear, an eye, the twitch of a tail, a horizontal line where everything was vertical. It was fifteen minutes before I quit looking and listening. Slowly, quietly, I began to follow the tracks again. They led out of the thicket, over a small rise and continued through the woods. Seeing the tracks lead into a thicket of plums fifty yards away I stopped near another tree and scanned the thicket for fifteen minutes before following the trail again.

Once into the thicket I found that the tracks began to meander again. And again, I was sure the buck was looking for a place to bed. Following the tracks I could see where the buck had stood for a while before walking and stopping again. Then I saw what I didn’t want to see, the tracks of a bounding deer. It looked like the buck had seen or heard me following it and fled. Not willing to give up I continued to follow, carefully checking the wood for the buck, or any other deer that might be nearby. The bounding tracks continued for fifty yards before the buck began to walk in a fairly straight line. The buck obviously wanted to get out of the area and had someplace in mind.

A nother hundred yards and the tracks began to meander slightly. I stopped near another tree for cover and looked ahead. Fifty yards ahead stood a deer. The buck was standing still and looking straight ahead. I absent mindedly wondered i t had seen another deer. I was just getting ready to shoulder my gun when another gray form trotted into view. I looked to see what it was, and as I did the buck bolted, with another gray form right behind it. As I watched in frustration the two coyotes ran after the buck. Obviously the hunt was over, but there would be another day.

Tracking is a just one more hunting technique for those of us who are addicted to hunting big game. I’m not referring to trailing a wounded animal, but to following fresh tracks that can lead you right to the animal. To track game you either need to be like those legendary trackers that could follow a snake across rock, or have conditions in your favor. Those of us who live where it rains or snows frequently encounter these conditions.

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