Whitetail deer are back in the yard!
For anyone who takes their trail cameras down for the summer, now is the time to get them back up. The whitetail deer are coming out of the woods and are looking for fresh grass and any feeders you might be filling. They’re interested in apples too.
This young doe stopped by for a fresh nibble at 3 in the afternoon. As my luck usually runs, I had the trail camera in the house. Yeah, I know you have to take care of them but that was lousy timing on my part. I like to get the ‘first one’!
It took longer than a week, but I finally got a short video of her.
I pretty much leave my trail cams up all year, although I do change my focus. In the summer there is a lot more bird and squirrel activity than anything else. I get the cameras up close to bird feeders for closer shots of those little guys.
If you’re interested in capturing deer, the time is right to start getting out your feeders, or just putting out the cameras. Feeders help to center the activity and you’re pretty much guaranteed to get some great footage, but you don’t have to if you’d rather not. For deer footage, I like to set up two cameras, one close up to the feeders for those personal shots and one farther away to capture all the action.
At this time of year I leave the bottom of the lawn uncut. The grass grows a lot slower so you’re not going to get a real shaggy lawn, and the extra length seems to draw them in. They start showing up at all hours of the day. I’ve seen them in the morning, afternoons, and later in the evening, so time really isn’t that important. The deer are usually wary at first but once they realize they’re safe, they come around more often.
This doe nibbled for a good 20 minutes although she kept popping her head up to check things out. I snapped these photos through the window, I didn’t want to take the chance she’d startle if I went outside.
