Ground Hunting with bow pros and cons

I want to hear what you guys have experienced on the ground. I hugged a tree and grunted and groaned my way up it with a Baker plywood climber back in the 80's. I remember being able to move all around with deer around me, and they NEVER NEVER looked up. I remember being taught that "deer cant look up". LOL Well 25 years later and 98% of hunters sitting in the trees, I see deer walking through the woods looking up. Every deer alive in Indiana today has grown up with people sitting in trees. I dont want to get into number of kills, but I will say I have arrowed my share of deer through the years. I have killed probably about 75% of my deer from the ground with a bow. Here is the way I see it for the pros and cons of ground hunting.

pros: bigger kill zone, quiter, easier, and quicker to get set up. mobility if everything falls into place and time, better calling and rattling realism, and mature bucks not being used to people on the ground.

cons: scent game is much harder, cant see as far, cant hear as good, cant move around as much.


Lets hear your experiences and thoughts on it,,,,, let me have it, I can take it LOL

I like hunting both ways but prefer to be in the stand. Like you said scent control. I love hunting on the ground on there level and have killed alot of deer that way. If you hunt on the ground you need to have some scent blocker on and good cover scent around your area and you have to be very still and slow movements even drawing your bow. I love both ways

We started hunting on the ground last year and we like it, but I to prefer a stand. We built a killer natural ground blind out of discarded christmas trees cedar branches and some fake pine branches and the thing works great. The only way we get busted is by scent. We love hunting this set because you are right there with the animals.

Assassin, I have been thinking about using fake christmas tree branches on my blinds, and stands. It seems like they would be perfect. I truly love the whole hunting experience both on the ground and in the air. But for some reason I feel a little more satisfaction out of being on the ground with them and getting away with the movement. I also have been thinking about trying insulated chest waders and hunting in or on the creeks even during the winter. It is a natural scent channel that is easy to figure out, and the deer have probably never seen anybody in brushpile in the creek in the winter LOL. I just like thinking of ways they are not use to.

I have hunted some on the ground but it cannot replace hunting from a stand. I bought anAmeristep for this season and have it set up to use when the wind is not right for one of my sets. My fav. thing about hunting them from the ground is the most obvious......your eye to eye with them. Plus its a ton easier to sneak in a blind under the cover of the night.