Stay Out All Day

• Many hunters try to maximize their exposure to the times that whitetail deer are known to move in which it is legal to hunt--the two hours after sunrise and the two hours prior to sunset. According to Dr. James Kroll from Stephen F. Austin University, who is known as Dr. Deer in the hunting community, the smart hunter is the one who stays out all day.
  
  "I'm amazed at how anxiously hunters await the deer season, then they only hunt four hours a day," Kroll said in an article for Prairie State Outdoors. "Hunt all day and you'll be surprised how many more deer you will see."
  
  

Bring the Antlers Early

• Many hunters who take to the woods for early seasons such as bow hunting in October in Michigan tend to think that the technique of rattling antlers before the rut isn't a good one. Chuck Tiranno, an Ultimate Hunting Team member of the Knight & Hale Game Calls pro staff, disagrees.
  
  Tiranno indicates that using antlers early in the season will entice bucks into the area, looking to watch as other bucks test one another. He said whitetail deer will begin to spar in the pre-rut before breaking up into bachelor groups. The light rattling of antlers is a good way to bring in a curious buck before the rut begins.
  
  

Some Products Work, Some Don't

• As if anyone needed reminding, the commercials and advertisements for miracle hunting potions and scents are designed to sell products. Few, if any, of them come with a guarantee that they will work. According to Kroll, scents and scent blockers fall into these categories. Kroll said that whitetail deer do have a tendency to be curious about new scents in their area, but are just as likely to be attracted to the smell of human urine as they are to the bottled doe estrus and urine that are commercially available.
  
  Scent blockers, Kroll said, sometimes do work however. He indicated that the best way to use scent blockers is to stay downwind of the deer at all times, but that such products do sometimes help mask the scent of a hunter's presence. He added that the best scent blocker he has ever known is that of skunk smell, which totally overpowers any other scent it comes in contact with.
  
  

Keep an Eye on the Weather

• Hunters may not like to hear it, but both Kroll and professional hunter Chris Parrish said that bad weather may be a great time to go hunt. Bitter cold, said Kroll, is when many whitetail deer tend to kick up their movement. Parish indicated that whitetail deer are known to feed every four hours during frigid weather, making it so a hunter doesn't necessarily even need to be out in the pre-dawn hours when the temperature is its coldest. Parrish suggested hunting a secluded food source around 11 a.m. until the afternoon hours for the best chance at seeing deer during the single-digit and lower temperatures.