Photo by BillKinney.com

The problem with shotgun hunting for deer in Iowa is that everybody's an expert. Some of our hunters have taken deer from the same timbers for more than 40 years and could put on a deer drive with their eyes closed. Those hunters know exactly where to put their blockers, exactly where to start their drives, exactly where the deer will move ahead of the drivers.

And that's exactly why big bucks in those timbers frequently elude them!

"When you put on a deer drive, does and young bucks will go where you want them to go," remarked Rodney Hughes, owner of Midwest USA Outfitters, a full-service hunting guide service based at Cantril, in southeast Iowa. "But a big, experienced buck will only go where he wants to go, even if you're pushing him with a drive. I'd go so far as to say you can't push a 4-year-old buck. He's going to lie down and let you walk past him, or sneak out the side of the line of drivers, or maybe be out of the timber and gone even before you get your line of drivers organized. In order to get the biggest bucks with a shotgun, you've got to do things different than other shotgun hunters."

Christian Karam of Fairfax, in northeast Iowa, is a multiseason deer hunter who uses skills and knowledge honed during the bowhunting season to shake up multiyear traditions when afield with family and friends during shotgun season.

"A lot of guys think they're doing a good job on their drives when they see a lot of does and young bucks coming out ahead of their drivers," he said. "They set their blockers to cover the routes where they know deer usually leave the timbers they hunt. The thing is, older bucks don't follow the same escape routes as the does and young bucks. The big bucks may start off moving with the other deer, but as soon as they feel significant pressure they start to do the things that have allowed them to survive more than one or two hunting seasons."

Both Hughes and Karam have spent a lot of time observing and developing an understanding of the movements of mature Iowa bucks during shotgun hunting seasons. Their thoughts on where and how to tag Iowa's biggest bucks with a shotgun aren't revolutionary; they're simply evolutionary adaptations of traditional shotgun tactics.

HERE TO SHOTGUN
Both Hughes and Karam avoid public hunting areas during Iowa's early and late shotgun hunting seasons. Intense hunting pressure and the safety risks that arise when multiple groups of hunters occupy a public area at the same time keep both hunters on private property during those seasons.

Officials with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources acknowledge that drive hunts in public areas have risks. But they note that small public areas -- often county-managed areas of less than 80 acres -- can often be safely hunted simply because a group of hunters can literally surround and check the area before the hunt to ensure that no other hunters are present.

IDNR officials also encourage hunting public areas during midweek, or after the rush of opening day, noting that many public areas get "driven" first thing in the morning on opening day, causing others to avoid the area thereafter (because, they'll say, "It's already been hunted"). Arrange a drive in those areas late on opening day, however, and you may well be rewarded with deer that have moved back into the often-superior habitat provided by state- or county-managed wildlife areas.

That superior public-land habitat, along with intense hunting pressure on surrounding private property, often pushes deer back into the public sector. Several IDNR wildlife biologists report having seen impressive bucks slink back into public hunting areas late in the afternoon on opening day, their entry unnoticed by hunters who assumed that those public areas had been overhunted.

Hunting guide Hughes noted that he can use the activities of other hunting parties in his area to his clients' advantage. "All my clients hunt from stands, either tree stands or ground blinds," he said. "We used to do drive hunts, but it just works better for guided hunts, and gives my clients better-quality hunts, to set them up in stands or blinds.