 How
to Know When Bucks Move
The Deer That Move the Most in Bad Weather
EDITOR’S NOTE: You have no way of knowing what
day you’ll see a buck of a lifetime during deer
season. But you can pinpoint which days to hunt to increase
your odds of sighting one. By hunting on  the
days when deer tend to move the most actively, you’ll
have more deer sightings and a greater chance of taking
that buck you’ve wanted all season.
“You can take a buck in foggy, windy and rainy
conditions,” Bo Pitman, the lodge Manager at White
Oak Plantation in Tuskegee, Alabama, explained. “But
on those days, you usually will bag the younger, dumber
bucks. Young bucks haven’t learned they risk encountering
a hunter when the weather impairs their senses. But
the trophy bucks understand that they face severe disadvantages
if they move in foul weather. They know they must hold
in thick cover to survive in bad weather.”  Most
of us have to hunt when we can, even under difficult
hunting conditions. If you’ll discover how to
hunt in bad weather when bucks don’t move, you
can drastically increase your odds of bagging a really
big buck. In nice-weather conditions, you may see a
trophy buck almost anywhere. But under bad-weather conditions,
the larger bucks likely will hold in the thickest cover
they can find. To take those deer, stalk into that thick
cover to find a buck in his bed. The deer will have
difficulty seeing, hearing or smelling you. A man-drive
provides another tactic for producing big bucks in foul
weather. In wind or rain, a group of hunters can move
into position to  surround
a thick-cover area without the bucks seeing or hearing
them. If the drivers go into the thick cover on the
downwind side of the thicket, they often can jump a
buck and push him toward the standers. If you have only
bad weather in which to hunt, you’ll find man-drives
the easiest and most effective method of bagging a buck.
Now you know the good news - where the big bucks hold
in bad-weather days and which strategies to use to take
them. Even if you can’t hunt the days bucks should
move, you can force the bucks out of cover by utilizing
these tactics.
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