Needing some info

[PRB]

Hey guys. I've been reading your post on the forum for the past few weeks and there seems to be some very helpful people here. I have been invited to travel from Alabama to hunt with friend in Kansas on family land. I have never been to Kansas and Just have a few questions to try and get an understanding of what to expect. We will be hunting the 2nd week of the early muzzleloader season. The land is is Cloud county south of Concordia and our tags are for units 7 & 8. So, my questions are. What will the weather be like at this time? How's deer movement? What type of terrain? What can we expect to see as far as deer numbers and buck sizes? Any info will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[Bowhunters]

Hi PRB, welcome to the DHC forum.

The muzzleloader season - Sept. 21 - Oct. 4, 2009 is a time of change for weather in Kansas with cool fronts starting to come down about one a week or so and so its possible you could see warm sunny weather for days, perhaps a thunderstorm and nasty cool rainy weather all in your 1 week of hunting.

Expect winds out of the North or NE when its cooling down or raining and out of the South when its warming up, very seldom do you see West or East winds in Kansas and I do mean winds, we have lots of windy days and its very infrequent to have a completely calm day in the fall.

So if its clear and warm for most of your week you could see 70's-80's for highs but if you are there in a rainy cool spell with north winds it could be highs in the 50's-60's so my advice is to bring both warm and cool weather gear and maybe even rain gear in case you are forced to hunt in the wet to try to fill your tag but usually the rainy cool spells are short in duration that early in Oct. Expect the worst weather and hope for the best.

Northern Kansas tends to have slightly larger bodied whitetail deer than to the southern Kansas areas (SE Kansas generally has the smallest) and most kansas deer are grain fed as most of Kansas is crop and pasture land so we have big, fat, healthy deer with no winter kills. In Northern Kansas a buck that is only around 3yrs old can weigh around 180-200lbs here and 4-5 year bucks probably hit around 250lbs, so not as big as northern U.S. states but plenty big, our does are probably as big as the bucks down in Alabama.

As far as big racked bucks go you can see P&Y/B&C sized racks just about anywhere in Kansas and i've heard of good bucks in those units in Cloud county that you mentioned, there is no one county here that is a golden area like some states have like the famed 'Pike County Illinois', in Kansas a trophy buck or two can pop up from just about anywhere you deer hunt and they do.

As far as the land type - Mostly flat to gently rolling, lots of crop land and some pasture land (some light woods but don't worry about mountains or deep forests) LOL . You may or may not have strong tall trees for a tree stand depending on your friends land because in some areas only the drainages, creeks will have good trees near them so if you are driving up to Kansas I would bring a tree stand and a ground blind if you can unless they say they have stands or blinds already in place for you to use.

We've had more than average rain this summer so they have plenty to eat, they eat green winter wheat in the late fall-winter and corn, soybeans, grass, etc in the summer and they have places to hide and they know them like you know your living room.

If you are hunting drainages or shelterbelts with trees I would look for and hunt the trails you will find in them unless the friends family tells you where they see them every day.

Good Luck!

New Kansas state record whitetails over the last 10 years by county - http://www.deerhuntingchat.com/viewtopi ... 0197#30197

http://www.kdwp.state.ks.us/news/Other- ... First-Buck

[PRB]

Thanks for the help. I have another question regarding the Walk in Areas. We have a few friends that are thinking of making the trip with us but would be hunting public land. Do these walk in areas recieve a lot of hunting pressure? Where can I get more info on these areas? Thanks

[Bowhunters]

Thanks for the help. I have another question regarding the Walk in Areas. We have a few friends that are thinking of making the trip with us but would be hunting public land. Do these walk in areas recieve a lot of hunting pressure? Where can I get more info on these areas? Thanks

There is no signing in or a list of useage of the individual walk in hunting areas so the amount of use and how much pressure for each one is unknown but I have no doubt that the Fish and Game officers that patrol deer units probably write down vehicles seen to show they are used but nothing is ever put into print on it.

Based on what i've seen and using logic would say that the walk in hunting areas nearest to cities and towns would get more pressure than others in remote locations, because of the cost of gasoline alone some properties close by may get hit daily and there are others out in the country by themselves surrounded by miles of nothing but ranches or farmland that may seldomly see a hunter.

Using a walk in area is pretty much first come first serve, if you pull up to a walk in area and there are no vehicles parked along the road there then go for it but if it looks like a small piece of land on the map and there are already vehicles there and you still go in then I wouldn't be surprised to get a rude reception if you do go in and ruin someones hunt but most Kansans are nice people and they may just point out how small that piece of land is and where they saw another deer trail or Walk in area is that has no hunters.

The walk in areas vary widley in size, one may only be 20-50acres but others may be 500 acres or more in size, the maps don't show exact acreage but they do give you aproximate size as Kansas land is largely broken up into 1mile sections so each little black square on the maps is 1 mile square and when you open up the PDF it will show what game has been seen on that walk in area by the land owner/farmer/rancher.

http://www.kdwp.state.ks.us/news/Huntin ... -in-Kansas

The state atlas will be updated/replaced on aprox Sept 1st - http://kdwp.state.ks.us/news/KDWP-Info/ ... ting-Atlas

Since the land if privately owned some land on the 2008 map may not be on the new 2009 map, its also possible that there may be more land added so you definitely want to get the newer maps after Sept 1st.

Click on a map number like #10 and then open the map by clicking the printable PDF version (PDF player required) - http://kdwp.state.ks.us/KDWP-Info/Locat ... las/Map-10

There is a GPS location available for each WIHA also under each numbered map box.

WIHA info - http://www.kdwp.state.ks.us/news/Other- ... in-Hunting

Deer hunting regs - http://www.kdwp.state.ks.us/news/Huntin ... tions/Deer