You are doing it wrong

Usually this is the time of year where I get real anxious, have a hard time sleeping and all I can think about are ducks, this drought though just has me in a funk. It seems I have resigned myself to the fact that I just will not see that many birds this year. I have seen a couple of balls of teal, but they seem to be blowing right past us, flying high and heading for wetter pastures.
While I wish I had more to share regarding the duck situation, I have to admit, my attention has been focused on deer. This past weekend a friend and I attended an archery shoot at one of our local archery clubs that was intended to be the last big shoot before archery season starts. We both were shooting stick bows and it did not take long before we had to basically disregard the appointed shooting locations for each target due to the distances involved. Frankly they were unrealistic, not just for the traditional archers, but for the compound shooters as well. Many of the shots for the compound archers were 40 yards or greater, and for the traditional archers in the 25-20 yards range. The problem with both of these distances is basically this - if you are whitetail hunting in Iowa and find yourself routinely having to take shots over 30 yards with a compound, or 15 yards with a stick bow - you are doing it wrong.

I think it is great that there are archers out there that practice 50 and 60 yard shots, but unless you are hunting spot and stalk out west then it is just not necessary. If you need to take these long distance shots because you cannot seem to get close enough to a whitetail then you need to change your strategy.

• Scent Control - I cannot stress enough how important scent control is. You need to be cognizant at all times regarding your "scent cone", the distribution of your scent as you are sitting in your stand. Many things factor in to this, clothing you are wearing, wind, humidity. Even when you take all of these things in to account, deer have a very keen nose and can be hard to trick.
• Movement - Deer also have very keen eyes, and can pick out the slightest of movements, their peripheral vision is excellent and just because you do not think they can see you, doesn't mean they cannot. Deer have a very wide range of vision. Once you are sitting in your stand, limit your movements to only the most necessary
• Up, Up, Up -  I have setup many tree stands and it was not until I started using a climbing tree stand that I realized the higher I got the better, I mean get your self way up there if you can. I like to set my hang-on stands about 18-20 feet, if you have a sturdy tree, go high yet. With my climber I try to find a tree that allows me to get at least 20 feet up, with ladder stands, this usually means you will need to buy extensions, it is worth it, get that sucker 20 feet. up.

If you take these few points in to account (while not the whole story, a good starting point) I guarantee you will see more deer and have them closer. In all reality you should have deer routinely within 20 yards of you, it allows for more accurate shots and it shows that you can actually hunt your prey instead of lobbing 60 yards shots because that is the closest deer will get to you.