Seek the High Ground

I love early spring, particularly because I love to turkey hunt, but it can put me in a foul mood at times. It's been sunny, dry and 60 to 70 degrees for nearly two weeks (or at least it seems that way). Then, yesterday, opening day of Tennessee turkey season, the highs were in the 50s, the wind was gusting to 30 miles per hour, and it was cloudy and rainy. To top that off, the land I'd been scouting for turkeys all week, most of it in a low river bottom, was under a foot of water from the rain. The turkeys reacted accordingly. I jumped some out of trees, leading me to believe that they may not have flown down at all. But there were some strips of high ground that remained dry, even though they were surrounded by flood waters. I didn't kill a bird yesterday, but there was enough scratching on this high ground to give me a little hope. Maybe this afternoon (I'll admit; I slept in this morning).

So, what does all this talk of turkeys and high ground have to do with whitetails? Several things. For one, the critters in the Mississippi River Delta are accustomed to high water and flooding. Turkeys and squirrels can react accordingly by staying in the trees. But deer can't do that. They're forced to stay on what little high ground is available or leave the area entirely. By hunting these little strips of high ground in the flooded woods yesterday, many of which were only 20 yards wide and a few inches above the water, I learned some valuable lessons for this fall (keeping in mind that the woods will almost certainly be dry come October). For one, many more oaks were present on this higher ground, and deer paths were laced across these areas. This high ground was also green; the fact that it stays dry most of the time allows for a lot more decay and stability to the forest floor, leading me to believe there's a lot more browse. Do I have any biological data to back this up? No. But old rubs and beaten-down deer paths proved a lot. Plus, this high ground adjacent to the low stuff creates very definite "edges," which whitetails, turkeys and all sorts of critters naturally follow.

These things aren't as defined as a saddle between two hardwood ridges, but I've got no doubt they'll concentrate deer traffic in a similar manner. Spending time in the woods, regardless of the time of year, will often produce some sort of lesson if you pay attention to detail. Savvy, life long river-bottom hunters might think the lesson I picked up yesterday is an obvious one, but I can say with certainty that if you've grown up in hilly country, figuring out a puzzle piece like that is a big step in such a seemingly featureless area.

Will in Tennessee