How would you drive?
Whitetail Deer
To hunt deer one morning and then drive home? My buddy thinks Im nuts cause Im leaving at 2:30 in the morning and diving 177 miles to just hopefully kill a doe.
What say you guys, have you driven that far or willing to?
Oops
How far would you drive?
Damn, I'm in the woods in 10 minutes one way, 25 at another. 177 each way?? No more than once a week, if I had no other choice.
I drive about 1 hr each way to get to my properties.......it is what it is
Ive driven 100 miles before daylight to kill an elk and be back home by noon
My buddy has property in a neighboring state that's about a two hour drive. We leave at noon, get lunch, hunt from three til dark. Home again before midnight.
157 miles to my Ohio property. Up at 2:30, coffee for the road and off. Hunt till dark then drive home. I do this for 2 days, then sleep in on the third day, and then leave at 8:30 or so, and hunt till dark. I do this till their gun season starts. I will admit though, it will wear your ass out.
Hour and a half (84 miles) one way to our property. I make one hunt trips a lot. For morning turkey hunts I leave at 2:30 AM. For morning deer hunts I leave at 3-3:30. I am going for an afternoon hunt tomorrow will leave at noon as I like to be early.
Out west I have to drive a lot. So yes I would and have and will again. Can't stop want stop.
This is not what I usually do. I usually go down and stay multiple days. But I have been working overtime for comp so I can have more rut vacation.
It's a new farm I scouted Monday and it still has green soybeans with some standing corn to slip through to do a hang and hunt. Weather is just icing on the cake, raining all day today ending tonight with winds shifting from the north west at 18. Temps mid forties. Gonna be absolutely yummy. Now i got to get to sleep.
yup your nuts. I wouldnt drive more than 1 hour. But then again I hunt 5 minutes from my Bed.
I hunt from out the back door to over two hours away. The place two hours away has lots of mature bucks. Like Cas Hunter said, it is what it is. Matter of fact, I'm going there Monday, but I do spend the night most trips. My usual routine is to go down after lunch, hunt the evening, the next day, and the next morning, then come home. That gives me four sits total.
Sometimes when I hunt my own place, (not where I live), I get up at 4:30, leave by 5:00, so that I can be settled in 20/30 minutes before daylight. I don't always do this for one day, but I have done it just to hunt the morning, then hunt somewhere else in the afternoon. The ONLY perk of being retired !
Yes. I have done it, do it and Lord willing will continue to be able to keep doing it. God Bless
I prefer to keep Day hunts less than 100 miles if I have the option.
I hunted the NW corner of CT for a few years - about 90 each way at $5/gallon got old FAST! Especially when I wasn’t seeing diddly during legal hours.
And I never did figure out how I could stay there overnight - not that it makes any sense to do that when you can’t hunt on Sunday.....
I think that’s about my limit for a day-trip....
If I had no choice I would do it once a week at most. All my spots are within 5 minutes of my house and some I can walk to from my house in less then 5 minutes. Shawn
honestly for a "same day" hunt with no sleepover, I don't drive more than 7 miles, and most of my hunts are a walk out the door, or short quad ride, or a drive on the highway between 2-7 miles... That's about it...
I usually try to at least do an overnighter out of it, but I have same basic drive to my area.
My bowhunting place is about 1 hour and 10 minutes from my house. That's about my limit for a 1/2 day hunt. If I were to hunt an afternoon and then the morning I'd make it an overnight.
Almost all my hunts are up at 2 to 3am for a morning hunt. Right now it's shooting light about 5:45. Normally out at 10 or 11 and back to some form of slave labor by 1pm..... repeat next sunday..... 9 months a year.....
I usually drive at least 1 hr, 63 miles each way every time I go to hunt. I have also got up and drive 3 hours to day hunt a spot then drive home. I don't mind time spent driving, not saying I want to but that's just what it is. I can be in the ms delta in 3 or southern il in 3 hr. Either better than north ma hill co deer
The farm I've hunted for the past 28 years is a little over an hour's drive from my house.
Gotta give you guys credit for being dedicated in driving that far!
My south farm is a 3 mile drive from the house, and at the home place, I have several stands that I can walk out the back door and be setting in them in 5 minutes. I’m truly blessed!
I drove 3 1/2 hours on the last day of one of my Utah LE bull elk hunts to the unit and still had an hour in the dark to hike.
It did play out well though.....
Good luck, Robb
Used to drive 7 to 9 hours one way to hunt white tails on weekends.
Hunt on the ground. You can drive to the blind, get a comfortable chair, tree for a back brace, nap if you need to.
Tree stand hunting while sleepy is very dangerous can get hurt even while using fall protection (you may make a mistake).
A college buddy of mine took his biggest buck after being sleep deprived for about a week due to kids ear infections, colic., etc. Drove out to a small wood lot to rest late at night. Woke up around sunrise to a greet big buck. Was home by noon, took care of the kids so his wife could rest. She didn't want to sleep in the woods though.
I drive about 1.5 hours which is not bad at all. It does amaze me how some guys complain about drive time. Had a guy who complained about not getting any deer so I clued him in to my area and he killed a deer. Complained about the drive Time and hasn't hunted since. When you live in a major metropolitan area you can't just drive down the road to hunt, it does take a little extra effort to find some decent land to hunt and yet guys still would rather hunt non productive land cause it's close.
Many times done a day trip to western Manitoba which is 237 miles from home.
One weekend years back my buddy and I drove 90 miles north to hunt deer blackpowder. After a day we determined the deer hunting wasn't what we wanted and he had another spot where there were more deer so we picked up and drove 140 miles south and East to get to that area. But then it snowed in the western portion of the province and after a half day hunting out East we were really jonesing to hunt the snow so we drove 200 miles to hunt out in the snow! 600 miles on a weekend going to and from areas that doesn't even included your daily hunting driving lol. Young and no responsibilities. Had to love those days!
180 miles for me, but I always hunt multiple days. I have gone up and back the same day before for hunts but it is rare that I do.
The three farms I typically hunt are 2 hours away, but it's rarely just an up-and-back day trip. The properties I have close that I hunt during the week are within a half hour from my office. Maybe I should start hunting the nursery we have behind the office...as I just found a nice rub on a 5" crabapple.
My farm is 195 miles one way and I've had many a rain day at work where I'd drive straight there, hunt the rest of the day and then head home. Most of my buddies think I'm nuts, the wife just thinks I'm dumb:)
Pat ;; That's some funny stuff !! Other side of the state 100 miles away ????..... My buddy just retired to northern Michigan..... about a 9 hour drive from Detroit..... My place up north is only about 5, 1/2 hours..... Pure Michigan...... When I go there it's gotta be at least overnight..... or 2 or 3 nights to make the drive worth it....
I once drove 16.5 hours to hunt elk getting 2 hours sleep after arrived. Shot an elk after 3 hours of hunting. Headed back home 24 hours after shooting the elk and drove 17.5 hours. So, elapsed time was 59 hours and was hunting for 3 hours and driving 33 hours. Thank goodness for mystery books on CDs because not a lot of radio choices between Portland and Jackson.
177 miles for a doe, no way. Your in Iowa, surely a piece of public closer that will produce a doe.
As long as you're not putting anyone in your family out, I see no problem with it. Or... depriving yourself of sleep and making it a dangerous situation as you drive?
My wife and I drive about 1-1/2 hours to our place. We have a camper there which makes it nice. It's home away from home for the next couple of months. Plus we get to go in a small town Walmart occasionally on our trips down and see all of the CRAZY people.
t-Roy... I'm jealous.
My urban honey hole is about an hour's drive and I can see crazy people from my stands. No need for a side trip to Wal-Mart.
5-7 hours to get to the other areas that I hunt whitetail.
I drove 19 hrs (round trip) 6 times in one November.Arrowed him on Nov. 26th,so I could've worked in one more weekend lol.
If you want to hunt bad enough you do what you have to do. That said, I would try really hard to find some places to hunt a lot closer to home.
I remember reading about a guy in Bowhunter magazine who was from MI. He drove out to WY for antelope hunt (like 22 hrs one way). Missed a shot on his week hunt. Drove home. The next weekend convinced his sister to drive out there with him, straight thru, for a ONE day hunt and then turn right around and drive back. Arrived just as the sun was coming up. He missed a buck that morning, too. At least he had a lot to think about, over and over and over, on the long ride back to MI!
done something similar many times for elk, deer and even bird hunts. much easier when I was younger and had more ambition. nothing wrong with it, I say go for it. it will make for good memories no matter what the outcome. at some point in your life, you won't be able to even think about doing it. life's short, hunt hard and enjoy while you can. I wish you the best.
No more than an hour, but if I had to I would, I could drive further to better hunting but I'm not as driven by big antlers as I once was.
Drove an hour and a half one way yesterday just to hang a stand in the rain. I had one spot that was close to bedding that I wanted a stand for my rutcation. I needed rain and high winds to sneak in and do it.
