Hunter success was location dependent on opening weekend

According to anecdotal evidence, many hunters saw very few deer on opening weekend of the gun deer season. In some places, lucky hunters were seeing more deer, but bucks were hard to come by.

Lisa Hirman saw this doe who had been shot during archery season, but still walking around.
(Contributed image)

John Fetzer sits on the Oneida County Deer Advisory Council (CDAC), and, because he does not gun hunt, preferring archery season instead, this gives him the opportunity to drive around to talk to hunters on opening weekend. He has been doing exactly that for the last four years since he began serving on the CDAC.

This year, Fetzer said he was able to talk with 63 different hunting parties on opening day. That was the highest number of hunters he said he has seen in the county forest in the Town of Woodboro in the last four years. However, of those hunting parties Fetzer spoke with, only one had seen a deer on public land. One party hunting on private land was able to take one buck and one doe. 

“But that was it,” Fetzer said. 

By Sunday of opening weekend, most of the hunting parties in that area had gone back home, he said, but he was able to make contact with 10 more hunting parties that day. Of those, only five saw deer on the second day of the season and one party reported seeing a buck on the way in to his stand in the morning, but nothing after that.

Although some hunters in the town of Stella saw plenty of wolves on their trail cameras leading up to the season, there were still deer moving around. Most, however, reported seeing only fawns and does.
(Contributed image)

Fetzer said he feels the deer spend their days in swampy areas, coming out to graze at night. From his own trail camera experience over archery season, shortly after he walks into the woods in the morning, there will be a buck walking through on his trail camera, but not much activity after that.

“All we have is deer depredation because of wolves,” he said. “I almost don’t even want to deer hunt here anymore. It’s a waste of time.”

Fetzer said he was all for having no antlerless tags available in Oneida County for this year’s deer hunting season. The CDAC is responsible for sending recommendations regarding antlerless tag allotments on to the Natural Resources Board (NRB) and the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) for each season. While the Oneida County CDAC recommended 400 tags on private land and no antlerless tags for public land, the NRB went against that recommendation, offering 400 antlerless tags on private land also. Those tags were gone in the first 20 minutes of license sales opening for the season, Fetzer said. 

Hunters in the St. Germain area reported seeing a good number of deer. One hunter told Fetzer that he had a good number of deer on his trail camera, but then did not see any on opening morning.

Gregg Kizewski of St. Germain hunts public land near his home and said he saw a fair amount of deer as well. He said he heard more shooting in his hunting area in the past eight seasons. However, by the time he was interviewed on Tuesday morning, he said he had not heard a shot since Saturday.

“I am seeing between eight and 12 deer a day,” he said. “Lots of mature does, but all the bucks seem to be one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half years old.” 

Balie Strasburg of Strasburg’s North Country Taxidermy said her hunting party was finding things pretty slow going so far, and customer reports were similar. Most said it was pretty quiet in the woods on opening weekend.

However, she did note a big uptick in public land hunters. She saw this especially during bow season. Hunters are using their apps to find public land and to really do some research. Those that are doing that work can be rewarded, she said. While those who were able to harvest a buck did not see many, there were more mature bucks than in the last few years. The quality of deer was definitely going up, she said. But research seemed to be key.

“The younger hunters tend to be more app savvy,” she said. “But they are really doing their research and putting in the time and work to find good areas to hunt. It’s great to see.”

Beckie Gaskill may be reached via email at [email protected].