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| Hunt Introduction This hunt takes place in northwest Kansas on private land managed by the Mid-America Hunting Association, of which I am a member. The MAHA manages approximately 250,000 acres of private land for hunting in Missouri and Kansas. This is my 3rd year to be a member of the organization, but my first year to hunt this property. I scouted this property in Spring Turkey season of 2002 and found some very impressive Whitetail deer sign. The country is fairly open, with the occasional wooded creekbottom running through the prairie. There are some winter wheat fields in the area, and a few fields of milo that are still standing as well. There is also lots of CRP for the deer to bed in. The only bad thing about this property is the shortage of trees suitable (read, straight) for a tree stand is astounding! Good thing I brought my ground blind....  This is an aerial photo of the property I'm hunting the "x" marks where my ground blind is located I watched a wheat field on the property last evening with my binoculars from a distance, and saw one really good buck make an appearance. I've situated my ground blind in a strip of trees about 50-60 yards wide that create a natural funnel, where several heavy trails converge, about 300 yards from the field. Interestingly, there is a little bit of early season snow on the ground from a snowstorm a few days ago. Makes things real pretty, especially with the leaves changing colors also. Saturday A.M.  My ground blind, situated in a thicket This morning I was hoping to catch some deer coming back to bed from the fields. Shortly after daylight a lone coyote came trotting by, and then a few minutes later about 30 Rio Grande Turkeys came running by me. Nothing else happened until shortly after 8:00 a.m., when all of a sudden there were deer everywhere. Amazing how they do that. One second there are no deer in sight, the next minute there are almost 20 deer in sight. There were about a dozen mule deer, including a pretty good mulie buck, and eight whitetail does and fawns. The mulies and whitetails weren't "together", but they didn't mind mingling as they walked past me. Actually, only the whitetails and about half of the mulies walked past me, the rest walked past on another trail out of range. I didn't see any Whitetail bucks in the group. It was pretty chilly this morning, in the mid 20's. I was glad to be wearing my wool.  The main shooting lane from my blind  Turkeys  A mature Mule Deer doe  Several more Mule Deer does and fawns Saturday P.M. I hunted my ground blind again this evening. About 4:00 p.m. a young 8-point with about a 10-inch spread walked past my blind at 12 yards, headed towards the field. I didn't come to Kansas to take a young 8-point, so I just watched him and tried to take a photo but my camera batteries decided to die at just that moment, and by the time I got new batteries in he was past. I've found a lot of rubs and a good number of fresh scrapes in my scouting, I think the deer are just getting ready to start getting after the rut.  I'm guessing it was a pretty good buck that rubbed this big fence post  A big scrape a short distance from my blind  A trail leading to my blind I love hunting trails like this!
Joshua Flournoy owns and manages the Livehunts.com web site. He also arranges exciting hunts through his business Longleaf Hunting Adventures. Joshua resides in east Texas with his wife and four children. |
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