# Got it done in MO



## tn_transplant (Apr 18, 2018)

Well, since moving from TN last year I knew I would miss hunting whitetails. I gave it a go hunting elk in my new home state of Utah, but I tell ya, that is a whole other beast there!

Ended up leasing a farm in Macon Co, Missouri and invited my dad out from Indiana to hunt it with me. Well long story short there ended up being 100 acres of standing corn on my 110 acre lease, so it was a dismal start of the hunt. We hunted hard, but all I saw the first five days were does and a seven point that didn’t warrant my tag. Dad had yet to see anything, and was getting frustrated to say the least. Knowing this quite possibly would be our last trip together, I decided to look at other options in the area. I found a website that leased out farms on a daily rate, and saw there was a small parcel not far from the current lease, so after hunting yesterday we drove to it to make sure the corn wasn’t still standing on it. Was down so we decided to give it a shot. Paid for a one-day pass on this 40 acre farm because today would be the last day we had before taking dad back to Indiana so he doesn’t miss his opening weekend there. 

Got set up this morning, just going in blind and going off of aerials. Didn’t see anything all morning, so I relocated and started setting up where I decided to hunt this afternoon. Decided to walk the edge of the field and head dad’s way when all of the sudden this guy came busting across the field. Shot him on the fly, and he ran into the woods and crashed into the bottom of a deep creek bed that was frozen over. 

Craziest thing is before he came running my way across the field he had came up behind my dad by about 30 feet - dad had turned around and scared the buck right to me!


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

Nice looking buck. 

I need to get back down there to a friends property on the Lake Of The Ozarks and do some hunting and fishing again.


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## tn_transplant (Apr 18, 2018)

Not sure how to edit the post - this took place last month during the MO rifle season, some of the wording that I copied over from my original post on another forum makes it sound a lot more recent than it was - deer was taken 11/15


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

tn_transplant said:


> Well, since moving from TN last year I knew I would miss hunting whitetails. I gave it a go hunting elk in my new home state of Utah, but I tell ya, that is a whole other beast there!
> 
> Ended up leasing a farm in Macon Co, Missouri and invited my dad out from Indiana to hunt it with me. Well long story short there ended up being 100 acres of standing corn on my 110 acre lease, so it was a dismal start of the hunt. We hunted hard, but all I saw the first five days were does and a seven point that didn't warrant my tag. Dad had yet to see anything, and was getting frustrated to say the least. Knowing this quite possibly would be our last trip together, I decided to look at other options in the area. I found a website that leased out farms on a daily rate, and saw there was a small parcel not far from the current lease, so after hunting yesterday we drove to it to make sure the corn wasn't still standing on it. Was down so we decided to give it a shot. Paid for a one-day pass on this 40 acre farm because today would be the last day we had before taking dad back to Indiana so he doesn't miss his opening weekend there.
> 
> ...


Nice buck, congratulations. I hunted close to you in Putnam and Adair counties from 1971 till 1982.
.


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## kodoz (Nov 4, 2016)

Why's standing corn a bad thing? 

(p.s., WY has whitetails mixed in with the mulies)


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

kodoz said:


> Why's standing corn a bad thing?
> 
> (p.s., WY has whitetails mixed in with the mulies)


Good question. Midwestern whitetails will hide in standing cornfields when pressured during hunting season. Often times the deer will bed down in them, especially if the fields have weedy waterways. Cornfields are very thick and noisy. There's just no way to sneak up on a deer in a cornfield. An organized drive in a cornfield rarely, if ever, is successful.

I've gutted, or assisted in gutting, over 75 whitetails in Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Wisconsin. My observation is that they don't eat as much corn as what one would think. They prefer broadleaf plants, grasses and forbs, and especially acorns. If there's a poor acorn crop they will switch to corn.

And yes, there are a lot of whitetail deer in Wyoming and their range is expanding.


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## tn_transplant (Apr 18, 2018)

Very well put wyogoob!
This is exactly what we encountered - deer were receiving pressure and using the corn to basically become invisible by bedding in it and limiting movement to and from to nearly dark and when they did move, they utilized the tall grass and weeds of the drainage that wove through the field. I was able to find a decent area deep in the corn where I had about 75 yards of area that I could cover well and started seeing deer, but with my dad’s limited mobility he was getting frustrated.


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## tn_transplant (Apr 18, 2018)

I have been putting in for deer and antelope in Wyoming the past few years to build points - what areas should I look to for decent whitetail with public land access?


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

tn_transplant said:


> I have been putting in for deer and antelope in Wyoming the past few years to build points - what areas should I look to for decent whitetail with public land access?


I don't know too much about Wyoming whitetail deer hunting other than what I see in my travels and whitetail hunting stories I hear from my friends.

The Black Hills, the Sheridan and Buffalo areas are good. Private is the best though.
.


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## BPturkeys (Sep 13, 2007)

Congrats on a nice buck. 
The whole hunt seems so strange to a guy that has only hunted in the wide open, public lands of the West. Terms like "lease a farm" and being limited to a 40 acre plot are just so different. Out here guys will put up a tree stand and claim a 40 acre plot. Many hunters need 40 acres to just turn their camp trailer/toy hauler around. 
Just curious, but what does one have to pay to lease a 100 acres or so back there? Do you always lease for just a day or week, etc? Tell us more.
I would imagine coming out here and experiencing hunting/outdoor recreation on millions of acres of public property would be a real eye opener.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

BPturkeys said:


> Congrats on a nice buck.
> The whole hunt seems so strange to a guy that has only hunted in the wide open, public lands of the West. Terms like "lease a farm" and being limited to a 40 acre plot are just so different. Out here guys will put up a tree stand and claim a 40 acre plot. Many hunters need 40 acres to just turn their camp trailer/toy hauler around.
> Just curious, but what does one have to pay to lease a 100 acres or so back there? Do you always lease for just a day or week, etc? Tell us more.
> I would imagine coming out here and experiencing hunting/outdoor recreation on millions of acres of public property would be a real eye opener.


Yep, going from hunting 100 acres to hunting 100 square miles is a shock. The hardest part I had adjusting to was not knowing who or how many other hunters were going to be sharing the public ground with me that day and what they were going to do, where they were going to go.

Last time I (we) did a lease they were $100 to $200, but it's been quite awhile ago. It depends; how long of a lease; most are an annual or for the deer hunt. Some are for both hunting and fishing. How good the hunting is, number of different species you want to hunt.

There was a lot of private ground I had permission to hunt around where I grew up in northwestern Illinois and I worked a big cross-country pipeline system so I got to know a lot of farmers up n down our system. I had a lot of relatives that had farms, owned property, in Illinois and Iowa.

Quail, pheasant, rabbit, squirrel, deer, fall turkey, ducks, geese, bass, crappie and bluegill all in one day. After the sun went down you could hunt raccoon if you had any energy left. Those were the days, Huckleberry Finn days.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

wyogoob said:


> .............................................
> 
> Quail, pheasant, rabbit, squirrel, deer, fall turkey, ducks, geese, bass, crappie and bluegill all in one day. After the sun went down you could hunt raccoon if you had any energy left. Those were the days, Huckleberry Finn days.


Well not exactly. You couldn't hunt raccoons at night during the firearm deer season (two 3-day weekends)
.


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## tn_transplant (Apr 18, 2018)

BPturkeys said:


> Congrats on a nice buck.
> The whole hunt seems so strange to a guy that has only hunted in the wide open, public lands of the West. Terms like "lease a farm" and being limited to a 40 acre plot are just so different. Out here guys will put up a tree stand and claim a 40 acre plot. Many hunters need 40 acres to just turn their camp trailer/toy hauler around.
> Just curious, but what does one have to pay to lease a 100 acres or so back there? Do you always lease for just a day or week, etc? Tell us more.
> I would imagine coming out here and experiencing hunting/outdoor recreation on millions of acres of public property would be a real eye opener.


 You can say that again! Hunting out here in the vast open spaces and having to spot/stalk and glassing is all new to me. One of the biggest challenges I've encountered is being comfortable shooting what I consider to be long distances (prior to moving here the longest shot I had taken was 250 yds).
Still, I limit myself to 500 yards for the time being until I have more time long range shooting.

My 110 acre lease ran me $1200 for the year - this gave me exclusive hunting rights for any animal and any season. There was also about a 5 acre lake (pond) that I was given permission for fishing if I chose. 
The property where I shot my buck ran me $124 for the day.


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## 35whelen (Jul 3, 2012)

I miss the Midwest sometimes. I also miss unlimited doe tags in iowa. I used to live on 48 acres in iowa, that was bordered by 600 acres of public woods. it was about 40 acres of hickory and oak, with an 8 acre cornfield field, surrounded on 3 sides by timber. I would stay out of the woods during the archery season and early shotgun and muzzle loader season and hunt the late muzzle loader and antlerless rifle. the shotgun drives on public land would push a lot of deer (and some hunters) onto my property. the corn field was a deer magnet during the winter hunts after it was harvested. when it was -10 to -20 the deer would be feeding constantly. I miss that place. a lot of people think the Midwest is all flat, but that property had roling hills, deep ravines, and some limestone cliffs. Midwest in the fall is amazing. im rambling in my reminiscing. 
congrats on your buck! hope you get your first elk or muley next year.


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## KalebReese (Sep 5, 2016)

Nice buck. I live less than an hour from Macon county in Scotland county! I’ve hunted these Missouri white tails my whole life and they definitely will just hang out in the corn. A good strategy is to leave two strips of corn with about 100 yards between them. The deer will run back and forth all day long!


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