To grunt or not to grunt?

[Pine]

For years I have had mixed results with grunting for whitetails.
But for the past 8 years I have been hunting thick cover and every time I use a grunt, I don't see any deer at all the entire sit.
I came across an article on the very situation and it makes sense to me now.
When you grunt in heavy cover, a deer will circle you down wind.
Ah ha; so I haven't grunted for the past couple years and I'm seeing deer.
Now I don know if it's the same with rattling but I have never seen a deer when using a can bleet either.

[Bowguy67]

I’m a dif kind of guy, I can’t even imagine grunting blindly. I use grunts primarily on walking stage deer and it works like a charm no matter the cover type

[Zwickey-Fever]

My experience with grunting or rattling, bucks always circle down wind of me unless they are so rutted up that they don't care. I rarely blindly call. I like seeing a bucks reaction to my calling, tells me whether or not to keep calling or change up my calling methods like getting more aggressive.

[Pat B]

I always carry a grunt call with me when I hunt. I've called deer in with a grunt, had them stop and look and had them ignore it all together. Never had a grunt call spook a deer.
 Deer depend on the wind especially if they hear or see something that they can't identify. The wind very rarely fails them. I've never had luck rattling but I know plenty of folks who have.

[ksbowman]

I've had good luck with rattling and grunting. Had the best luck when I can see them. Yesterday I had a forky about 150 yards out chasing and harassing a couple does that weren't interested yet. I could hear him grunting so I dug out my grunt tube and a half  dozen grunts and he came in on a string to 15 yards. He is not what I'm after but he presented a perfect shot. Two years ago I grunted and rattled in 6-8 bucks a very good year. I have had them come in blind calling but have better luck if I can see them. Once you get them coming it's like turkeys don't over call.

[Captain*Kirk]

Well, my son schooled me on this before my hunt this year.
He said, "Dad, if you don't grunt or use a bleat call (can), you're just sitting behind a tree (ground blind) waiting for a deer to just mosey on by."
I bought a bleat can and used my grunt call.
Didn't help, but what he said made a bit of sense.

[Silent footed]

You are exactly right. They do circle downwind and because it's heavy cover, you never see them.

When I did more calling and less still-hunting, I always rattled or grunted in connection with a funnel and hunted directly 10 yards upwind of the travel corridor in a tree stand and used a scent. I cannot tell you how many bucks I have had underneath my stand. My theory is that the wind carried my scent above them because I was so close, and my scent rag brought them underneath my stand.

Back in Indiana, my favorite setup for calling was this 5 year old abandoned field with a grown up fence row and adjacent to a picked bean field. Rattle when the wind blows into picked field with tree stand in tree line of fence row. The bucks will hug the tree line as they circle downwind and shots will be close, and you will see some big deer.

[Silent footed]

The quick fix though for heavy cover requires team work. You need two guys. One calling upwind of the funnel, and the other guy set up downwind of it. 75% of the shots will be from the downwind side, so y'all take turns. Dynamite setup.

[stillhunter]

Talked with a professional coyote hunter and call maker a couple years ago and he told me he calls with the wind at his back. This amazed me but he said 99% of the time they are going to go downwind so you had better be ready and able to shoot them before they hit your stream. I rattled in a buck and shot him at 5 yards off the ground but I had scent out 5 yards to each side of me and he came in neck stretched out to the scent. Last year I had a awesome buck come in to a grunt but the only shot I had was straight downwind. Color him gone. I am not a big scent user but calling is when it may help. When I watch my birddog spin on a dime for a few ounces of woodcock when the wind is right for her sure gives me an appreciation for these animal's noses.

[Silent footed]

Oh man, I thought about you yesterday evening. I was in the woods in thick hemlock/spruce cover, atop a large flat edged on one side by a loong, steep bluff dropping to a streambed, with the wind blowing my scent off the bluff. Deer sign everywhere. Here's what I came up with for a grunting setup:

The bluff is an impassible barrier, right? (It's almost completely vertical).

Set up tree stand on edge of bluff and hunt it in a prevailing wind blowing your scent off the edge into the stream valley below.

Grunt as much as you want. Any buck checking out the bedding area upwind of you cannot circle downwind of you unless they grow wings and fly! 

They'll likely try, and just end up walking the contour of the bluff straight in to your stand from either the left or right. 

[Friend]

Grunting and bleating are a significant part of my hunting strategy.

Hunting exclusively from the ground, my field of view of view is most often quite restricted and limited.
Therefore, blind calling is typically the norm. My deer encounters would be greatly reduced without blind calling.


This season, thus far

Have called in 22 bucks within my effective traditional bow range -16 from blind calling

Note: Stump73 was in a blind with me one hunt last weekend as I blind called-in 4 different bucks

Have called in a higher unaccounted number of does.

[BAK]

In over 50 years of hunting deer I've had zero luck using calls of any kind.  I have watched bucks turn tail and leave the area though.  I rely solely on knowing the movement patterns.

[GCook]

Grunting, rattling and bleating can all be very effective in the right situations. 
Pressured deer do respond or react differently during hunting season. 
I have used calls to see how they respond outside of season as well. A good time to learn what does and doesn't work for deer where you hunt.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk

[UrsusNil]

I've rarely had success with calls, and it may very well be the fault of the caller. But I did have one come in this year.

Was hunting on the ground on the edge of some heavy cover. I used the grunt call but also kicked up some leaves and made some noise, and I think that was a key thing. A couple seconds later I heard him trotting through the thicket and in he came, ready for a fight. He was a nice sized buck, thrashing the weeds as he made his way in. He came in to about six yards but the weed cover did not allow a shot.

As he walked into an opening I did an "erp" call to get him to stop, but I guess I did it too loud and instead of stopping he took a jump. There was a trio of does a ways behind me and when he saw them he walked their way and no amount of calling was going to distract him from the ladies.

But he walked through my scent stream and just didn't seem to care. I've noticed that with suburban bucks, they are much more tolerant of human scent when they are in full-blown rut.

[LC]

Years ago I regularly called in bucks with rattling. Now days almost never. Let me rephrase that NEVER now days. But it stands to reason if I'm hunting close to anyone in the last few years I get to hear the most incredible buck fights I've only heard on TV! lol

  But I've had a lot of luck grunting and doe bleating. All with my mouth but hardly ever just blind calling. Would never want to rely of a call I had to use one or two hands with. I can't say how many times I've heard deer chasing off out of sight grunting chasing etc. A few mouth calls and they quite often end up under my stand. I think, JHMO, that a doe being chased and hears a grunt call comes running from instinct to make sure the best buck is involved. I don't know but i will say I've had incredible luck calling the doe by my stand being chased by bucks just using my mouth grunt calling. Your mileage may vary.

Blind calling I hardly ever do anymore unless I'm just bored and not seeing even a squirrel. I never expect a response and am rarely disappointed. But I've never spooked a deer either.   lol

[Wudstix]

Grunting in thick cover is not very productive, I rarely hunt where I can see deer at distance.

[Dave Lay]

I think as already said a lot depends on where your hunting, when I hunted Unpressured  deer I killed a couple mouth grunting them in to bowrange after already seeing them, but I really havent had much luck in areas that are hunted heavily, I have a buddy that swears he soft grunts with does to calm them as a social grunt , I’ve tried that but only had them leave the area.
  I only hunt public land some pretty pressured , and am sure private land with limited pressure would have a different result
   I’ve gotten where I just don’t use a grunt call anymore and rarely mouth grunt unless I think he’s leaving with no shot then I don’t have much to lose,
    The point about thick cover makes perfect sense

[SlowBowKing]

Filmed for my brother-in-law this morning. He had positive response calling from multiple bucks, but not one he was looking for. This was in open hardwoods with the deer already in sight. The larger mature buck we saw did circle downwind, but those younger ones came high stepping in there to see what was up!

[Warden609]

Some things in your area to consider when rattling and grunting.

Buck to doe ratio.
Hunting pressure.
Phase of the rut.
Treestand/ground blind and thermals.

Treestand hunting in the morning is one of my favorite times to call. The rising thermals can give you the advantage on a circling buck.

[Terry Green]

I can't even begin to count the number of bucks I've grunted in blind.