Afternoon/evening hunts

I have always preferred hunting during the morning that way should I get a good shot I have time to track without doing so at night.

Does anyone prefer to hunt in the evening? :thumbsup:

There are pros & cons of each IMO.
I prefer mornings for more light longer, usuall pretty fall woods, other wildlife, and yes, usually easier to track if need be.
The down side is getting up so much earlier, usually a lot colder, more heavy clothes involved, more food to carry, etc.

Afternoons are warmer, less clothes & food to deal with, arguably have greater chances at a shooter right at dark...but end of day hunts are shorter, light goes away fast, and possible tracking involved in the dark.

I actually alternate some days like today...coffee by the fire with my wife first thing, then an oil & filter change on a car, then a tech came to replace a keyboard on my laptop...so today it's an afternoon hunt...just sat down at 3:00pm

KHickam said:

Does anyone prefer to hunt in the evening? :thumbsup:

Click to expand...

Not me. I prefer the morning and early afternoon hunting. Although, the best chance at seeing deer coming out into fields are right before dark in my hunting spots.

I hunt when I can and try really hard to hunt when I feel the time is right...

It all depends upon work load and personal obligations...

That being said, I believe most of my bucks come in the afternoon...With todays LED headlights and hand held lights tracking is easier for me at night...

Often I decide when I'll hunt based on wind direction and what stand I want to be in...

I'm really leery of afternoon/evening hunts for a couple of reasons.

Number one, blood trails can be tough to follow in low light, even with a headlamp.

But even more so in the land of large brown bears, I really hate stumbling through the brush after dark with lotsa dead meat.

Since I hunt squirrels I don't have an issue with morning or evening. :grin: Its pretty rare (but not unheard of) that I have to track a squirrel, they usually just fall where I shoot them.

There are times in Texas when the evenings are best, I use a 50 or 54 and keep my shots under 75 yards and I seldom need to track them more than 50 yards if at all. However for me the last light is usually is to dark for a good sight picture and I will not shoot if I'm not sure of my shot.

Bad eyes but good judgment! :wink: Geo. T.

I prefer morning, but sometimes the weather becomes a factor. Two of my biggest bucks, were shot just past noon. I think, some hunters are tired by noon and quit or move to a new location. The bucks move too, and on more than one occasion, they came my way. During the rut, they move all day and night. The only reason, I hate to hunt in the late evening, I don't like looking for a deer after dark, and having to take care of it. I've had nights, that I didn't get home till midnight. One night a friend and I had to pull a buck across a river, in the dark. It was a shallow mill race, but temps. were mid 20'S. In those days, we hunted from daylight til dark.

Now, at 63 years old, I prefer morning.

Im a morning person by job and nature. Our season started monday and during the week I hunt after work in the evenings. Weekends I hunt all day :thumbsup:

I prefer mornings because of the light available to drag, gut, and skin a deer, if necessary. However, I hunt when the sol-lunar tables say there is a major feed during daylight hours. Maybe it works and maybe not but I've killed a lot of deer that way ... two so far this year.

I don't pay any attention to the tables when cold fronts move in. Then I hunt just before the rain stops .. if I can figure it right. :wink:

Although I hunt both, mornings are preferred: during the afternoons in the N. Fla. hardwoods where I hunt, the deer seem to show up right at the very last shooting light and it's hard to see with open sights and hard to track. During the mornings, we have seen bucks as late as 9:30 or 10:00 am (especially when the low temp is high 20s to mid 30s). Mornings = more hours of "prime time," better light for shooting and tracking, and more chance I will find my way back to camp :shocked2: :redface: :haha:

I never like morning hunts and much prefer a short hunt of about 3-4 hours before dark. Never had to track one any distance to speak of and usually won't even go if there isn't any snow down.

The deer in my area seem to move best in the evening. Most often I only go into the woods a 1/4 mile or so. I hunt for meat so my prefered target is a nice sized doe; many times I have passed on small to mid-sized bucks. I seldom see any huge antlered bucks and I would take one if I do.

I don't consider myself a hard hunter; it's more like grocery shopping to me. :haha:

I have avoided hunting late in early season since I don't have a good place to hang a deer overnight and don't want to stay up all night skinning and butchering. Too, trying to track in the dark would be difficult to say the least.

Later season, when temps are cold overnight, I could leave a deer hung and skin/butcher the next day.

+1 on the mid day hunting. I've often had success around lunch time when other hunters were moving out or back into the woods....and I have always been a buck only hunter, and have gotten more particular as I've gotten older.

For the last number of years my hunting time has been very very limited, so when I do head into the woods it's always a sunrise to sunset affair for me, no morning/afternoon hunt.

Given a choice I guess I'd prefer to hunt the mornings. I don't like getting up early, but in the areas I frequent, I've seen more deer early than late.

I go when I can, morning, evening it doesn't matter because the deer and elk are out there all day long.

When I have a full day to hunt, then it is from dawn to dusk.

I don't have a preference but a quick mental run through the last few years tells me I kill more in the morning than evening, of course if I kill something in the morning then there is no evening hunt.

Well early season I perfer early morning for bowhunting. In Late season I perfer night hunts better. During the rut I hunt mostly during the day but out there in the AM just so I dont spook the bucks, and once in a while you can catch one cruising first light but all this year I have not seen a buck during the pre-rut now rut until 0730..

Daylight till dark until deer on the ground. 3 of the last 4 years had deer harvested between 11am and 2pm and the other was kilt at dark... Mornings are nice but deer down are most important. :wink:

If I look back at when I've killed whitetails, the majority of my bow kills have been evening and the majority of my gun kills in the morning.

My preference is to hunt anytime! :grin: I don't worry about tracking, butchering, etc to set my hunting time. My first goal is to kill one. Then I do whatever it takes to track and ensure no meat spoilage, regardless of time of day.

However, if I were Brownbear, I'd stay out of the woods at night too considering what lurks around there!!! :shocked2: :wink:

"Prefer"? No. But it sure seems I see more bucks at dusk that at first light.

I hunt both, and in between, and take the shots as offered. Sometimes a buck comes along near noon . . . but more often they appear at sunset.

Heh, that skinning and butchering got old, when I got old, and I found a guy who skins, grinds, adds beef fat, packages, for $50-$60 depending on size. He has a refrigerated area, where I tag the deer, leave my phone number(if he's not there). I have to drive 15 miles, but it's worth it. The meat is so much better, because he only does wild game, and knows how to prepare it. Makes warm day, and evening hunting better, when you know, you're going to have a place to take it to.