Hi All,

Do any of you guys have experience camping and deer hunting in the BWCA? I read an interesting article about camping and hunting up there, and got me interested. For those of you who have, is it mostly spot and stalk by walking upwind? Do you guys bring in stands? Any advice on good areas / methods would be very much appreciated.

Thanks!

Josh

jwolszon@gmail.com

When I deer hunted there we still-hunted (slow, quiet walking). It's big country...

I think that bringing in your own blind to sit in all day may be appropriate. No tree stands, of course (LNT).

I'd guess walk in stalk.

It seems like you can get pretty close to deer from a canoe, not sure if this is a method that is used or not?

The Whitetails need to be thinned out for the Moose to stand a chance, not quite sure why they dropped the intensive harvest thing.

Good luck!

quote BWCAGUY18: "Hi All,

Do any of you guys have experience camping and deer hunting in the BWCA? I read an interesting article about camping and hunting up there, and got me interested. For those of you who have, is it mostly spot and stalk by walking upwind? Do you guys bring in stands? Any advice on good areas / methods would be very much appreciated.

Thanks!

Josh

jwolszon@gmail.com"

The BWCAW is a very hard place to hunt deer, very thick woods, many wolves in certain places, no logging in many years so not much food for what deer are left up there, etc.
The articles are more fun to read than live them!

Deer population may be effecting the moose,but in reality the deer population compared to areas outside of the BWCA it is very low.Quality hunt and chance at a big one, but few deer.

I hunted the BW in 2009 and wished I had gotten back in 2010. Went back and scouted this spring and will be up every Nov from now on. I'm a still-hunter/tracker and have the experience though. I hunted a lot in NW Ontario for many years, but the numbers really collapsed on me. I'm also from Michigan's Upper Peninsula, so the big woods are like home to me.

I will say, don't expect to see a ton of deer. In 2009, I only saw three. We camped about 6 1/2 miles from the closest road, trail or two track too. We only shot one mediocre buck between four of us. We went in on a Fri and came out the following Thurs. I saw more moose than deer. I think that'll change slightly this year though. The winters of 2007/2008 and 2008/2007 were harsh. I'm still not planning on seeing more than 10 deer though...it is the Big Woods. Deer number are less than 10 per square mile in most areas of the BWCAW.

Last year, one of my hunting partners made the trip and saw eight deer from Sat to Sat.

You could sit or use stands, but you may go a few days without any activity at all....that drives me nuts.

Get ahold of me if you want more info.

I will agree with the post made by The Great Outdoors above.

I would not hunt BWCA for deer as I have seen very few over the years and would be a waste of time in my book.Moose on the other hand would be more interesting to me but you have to be prepared for it and in very good shape.

What I noticed in the BWCA their is pockets where deer exist in low to moderate numbers and some big bucks present. That said hunting would be hard and if you see a deer a day that might be good.

What about hunting near the Ham or Cavity lake fire area? It's pretty hard to get around in there but the visibility is great, seems like you could set up on a ridge and do ok.

I might try and do some scouting on my next trip up.

Good thread.