Corn impact on deer behavior

Now that we have had almost two full seasons of the corn rule I am wondering if it has had any impact on movement and behavior?

My club president put some out in a couple aces two weeks ago and daytime sightings seem to have gone down (he is getting great nightime pictures though). He said he wants to draw the bucks to our property. I told him to tell everyone to quit shooting does in late mid and late January and the bucks will come for the does and not the corn.

My sightings are WAY down this season and I'm the only one hunting this piece of land this year (160 acres). Food plots are ate up but I rarely see a deer in them compared to having 10-14 does/bucks in them, at any given time, last year. I'm starting to think people around me is putting out corn and it's got them messed up. At least messed up for me.

Our CAB in their infinite wisdom lost their mind making this decision. It doesn't matter what other states allow. It makes no sense legalizing corn unless you want to sell feeders.

Did I sleep through a law change? When did it get legal to hunt over corn?

Just playing devils advocate here...

How is corn on the ground, that deer can eat at anytime, different from a greenfield, that deer can eat anytime.

I understand human scent left in the area from putting the corn out but this argument that "corn makes deer nocturnal because they can just eat it at night" makes no sense to me. They can just eat the food plot at night, also. Maybe I'm just dumb and am missing something.

That's why I asked the question because I am not sure that corn will change a deeds behavior. I just know that we are seeing less deer movement now and we should be seeing more.

Obviously you missed something. Nothing was said about hunting over corn being legal. There is a lot of hunting over corn going on and half the folks think it is legal. Wake up, Todd.

More corn or less outlaws?

Well except this,

And the OP was asking about the new corn rule changing deer behavior. So yeah, I see your point. I was way off.

Based on the newer laws, corn was legalized to be fed to deer as long as you hid behind a tree or planted cedars in front of the feeder, or possibly using the law to go illegal and hunted over it (that wasn't supposed to happen.) Not a whole lot of difference to me. To me deer behavior would be changed by the law. Not that you would disagree with me or anything like that.

I believe it's gun pressure that makes deer go nocturnal. If you owned a 1000 acres and they had no pressure they would be sighted in daylight regularly, you break out the gun and it does not take em long to get the drift of things. Then you need to know how to hunt and get close enough to catch them at last light (not that easy for me) headed to food supply from Bedroom. It don't matter what they eat to me as long as I know where.

I agree with OP about shooting does in the last few weeks before season end, Does are the ultimate bait.

May or may not be popular but we feed on a small tract that a buddy and I hunt. It's only 60 acres and we mainly just bow hunt it and use ladder stands. We slip in and slip out most of the time without disturbing much. We've hunted it for roughly 8 years and tried to plant it for the first 6 years. Landowner doesn't really want us taking down trees and we only had 2 small places to plant. They were very small and did not provide much forage. We could easily shoot across and end to end of both places with a bow. Its surrounded by houses(subdivision on one side) and the property is mostly pines. There are a few acorn trees scattered around and that's what we hunt when they drop. The fields usually didn't do much because of soil and when they did they got mowed down as soon as the acorns; if there were any were gone. Very rarely did we have a field left past mid December. All that to say; last year we started feeding in 2 places with tripod feeders feeding 1x a day early then increase it as it gets later in the season. Our sightings have not been any different than in years past and if we often see deer at the feeders walking in and out during daytime hours. We do not hunt them and hunt the same places we always have. The closest stand to either of them is prob 125-150 yds. We don't think they have helped or hurt us other than the fact that the deer have something to eat later in the season. We also have done other feed as well. On our club we do not feed at least not that I know of and it's been hard to see a deer there for the past month. I think it has way more to do with pressure than anything at least in my experience in the places that I hunt. Example: I saw 2 deer at the feeders today. One at 7:00 am walking in and the other @ 10:00 am when walking out.

My deer sightings have been down this year after mid Dec also. No corn. My issue is dogs running deer (and not hunting dogs). They have become more of a problem and sighted way more than the coyotes

I believe that if deer have an option of wheat (great field)and corn they will choose the corn.

Not everyone that is supplementally feeding is doing so with a feeder that has a timer that runs at, say 8am and at 3pm. If they are either pouring the corn out on the ground or using a trough or gravity feeder the deer (who while they are not nocturnal do naturally increase there movement at dusk and dawn) will feed from the feeder at times where they have the least interactions with humans.

Deer are very in tuned to their surroundings. I read the tread the other day about the mock scrape and after the guy left a deer was on camera there in a few minutes. I would bet that there are many deer who watch us walk to our stands and we never see them. We don't know that they are there. Think about that. How long does it take you to walk from your truck or atv to your stand? I bet a deer would take twice as long to go same distance. How many of us have been in a stand and all the sudden there is a deer in front of us. We did not see deer approach, just POOF and there there were.

So I guess my best bet as to why deer move at night more would be when the feed is available and the amount of pressure or interactions the deer have with us.

The only reason I could see how feeding corn would make it seem like the movement is down would be that the deer can fill there bellies on corn at night when they are naturally eating anyways. Maybe a full belly at night means they don't eat as much during the day. I also believe that the pressure is the major factor in movement.

In my opinion corn really is just a faster version of a food plot. Especially if you are supplementing with different minerals during the offseason. A food plot and corn are both an artificial food source placed by hunters to feed and attract deer. I have hunted Texas several times where hunting over a feeder is legal. Not really a big difference in deer sighting and behavior. I think human pressure, dogs, and constantly getting shot at in the daylight hours is what moves deer to go nocturnal. Just my 2 cents. It doesn't bother me a bit to see people put out feeders. I wouldn't even care if they legalized hunting over them. Same as a food plot in my eyes. I do not hunt on corn out of respect for the law but really doesnt seem to matter to me.

Unfortunately, I saw this coming. We have data on radio-collared bucks in South Carolina, where baiting is legal. The very large property where we are doing the research used to spread corn out in 75-yard piles near some of their stands (LOTS of corn). What we saw with deer movement was that a lot of our bucks would begin moving just before dark while staying in thick cover. After sunset they would trek across the property to these areas with huge amounts of corn...feed...and then return before sunrise. Some of these bucks were making nightly movements of up to two miles one way. This year they quit doing that and hunting success went way up.

The fact is that the more food you supply the deer herd, the less hungry they are, and the less need they have to move during risky hours. So it's a difficult balance. You want to supply resources for your deer (whether it be habitat enhancement, food plots, or supplemental feed) to improve condition and gain all the benefits of that. But, the more you do so, the less likely you are to see them during daylight hours...because they aren't that hungry.

I don't think the feeders do anything to "hold deer on your property"...contrary to popular opinion. Rather, they just make them less hungry, and the deer don't move as much before dark, no matter whose property they choose to bed on. If your neighbor is feeding, there's nothing you can do about it. But, if you choose to feed to "level the playing field", you're just exacerbating the situation.

You just crapped all over all bunch of people here's beliefs.

Good to hear it backed up by some real research.

How about studies that use an electronic feeder or feeders set to go off at mid day?

thanks for the reply, Steve. Highly interesting.

We don't have data on that, although there could be studies that have been done elsewhere.

But, I guess I would caution against assuming what they will do to deer movement. I've been wrong in my assumptions of deer movement more often than I care to admit, and know this because I've had the luxury of seeing deer movement data in detail. My guess would be that they do influence movement in some fashion, but I can't say to what extent, or in what manner.

That is interesting. In your professional opinion does a food plot have the same effect as the corn piles that were studied?

I posted a link to another South Carolina study on here a few days ago. Hunter satisfaction and success was much higher on public land without feed than on managed private land with feed. I've been preaching this for years. Glad to see newer research is backing that data.

The costs of feeding and unintended consequences are not worth it.

In my opinion...yes. But, I don't have data to support it.

I believe that food plots can be great tools for hunting...in addition to providing supplemental nutrition. But, I believe that most hunters don't use the tool very wisely (at least many that i am familiar with). We tend to hunt them frequently (walking to and from and always leaving as trail of scent) and deer quickly realize that this general area is bad news. So...they become more nocturnal. My philosophy is to hunt food plots very infrequently (2-5 times a year) so that the deer don't look at these areas as having high human activity. Then, when I do hunt them, there will be lots of deer on them. Of course, I believe this is true for any hunting location. The difference with food plots is that we commonly have a big fancy hunting blind that we have put a lot of time and energy into...so we tend to hunt it more because of convenience and comfort.

Take a look at the QDMA article by Clint McCoy (this article ewas voted the number one article of 2014 by QDMA readers I believe), my graduate student that did the South Carolina research. He found that stands that were hunted had a significant decrease in deer usage of these areas during daylight hours for at least a few days.

My opinion is no. Corn provides needed carbs and energy during peak stress periods making it highly desired and able to pack on weight and provide temporary energy. Food plots don't provide the same thing.

would be nice to know what effect of pile verses timed feeders . you hear these stories about , the spreader goes off and the bucks come running . i always figured the deer didn't care they knew it would be there that night .

Thanks Steve. This is exactly what I was looking for and why I love coming to this site.

Corn has been legal here in Florida forever. You're not gonna draw in bucks with corn, not in the daylight anyway. You'll draw does, yearlings and you might get a buck over it at first light or right at dark during the rut but that's about it. I don't use it at my lease, but I do in my backyard cuz I like seeing deer. However I'm in my house looking out. If I had to walk in to a stand b4 daylight I'm gonna run the deer off it b4 I can get in my stand. Also if you're putting corn in the woods you're stinking up the place extra on top of what you're already doing when you hunt. Corn is vastly overrated.
Out of all the deer sightings I've had at my house, and it's A LOT, maybe 10% of those included bucks.

Maybe on a very controlled access property with very little pressure would you see 'bucks running to a feeder', lol. That ain't happening on the vast majority of properties in the southeast.
I think some people watch too many of those fairy tale hunting shows and think that's how it works.

I can get pictures of bucks on camera at a feed site during daylight hours like clockwork, but as soon the season opens, or as soon as someone starts hunting within 500 yds of the site, the daytime pictures stop. I'd like to see a study done on feed versus day/night movement on 2 separate pieces of property, one with hunting, one without. I agree with Matt on the food during stress. On leased timber land, even with foodplots, there isn't an abundance of food for an Alabama deer to thrive on.

Animals eat to satisfy their energy requirement. When their energy requirement is met, they stop eating.

Corn is a high energy feed. A deer eating corn quickly meets it's energy requirement without having to move much looking for feed.

We are seeing a different result than the South Carolina study, Dr D. The timber/habitat type or pressure may be different? Can you pm me a link to that study? I'd like to read up on it? Thanks in advance.

I'm sorry, but I don't have a link for it. I never read it when it was online because I read it before it was published. Sorry.

I'm sure the habitat and pressure are different between your property and the property where the study was done.

Thanks for the reply. I understand.

We see both bucks an does on our feeders in daylight. The property we are doing this on though is different. They are going to bed where they bed just about no matter what we do and they aren't going too far without running through town. Dr D and Matt knkw more than I ever will about deer but I do know in 2 years it hasn't really hurt or for that matter helped us. The deer are starting to be a little fatter though. A full grown doe on this property is about 75lbs. I agree the feeders aren't holding them and neither is the oaks, the food plots or anything else we have. It is all working together to provide them enough food not too leave the area completely. It's where they were born and raised and I believe will stay unless they run out of resources. The less they know we are there the better; which is one of the reasons we do feeders with timers instead of piles. We only have to fill about 1x every 3 weeks or so.

On another point: I know someone unfortunately that hunts over corn ALL the time and has for years. He kills several deer every year and often kills some good deer. It's most often on the same food plot(it's a big plot he plants and then keeps corn broadcast in it). It's almost like he can shoot one every week and they just keep coming back the next. It's crazy and they usually come out well before dark. I don't get it at all; it seems they aren't phased. The one thing he doesn't do though is ever pressure them anywhere in their habitat other than shooting on that one field. He slips in and slips out; never hunts anywhere else and could kill all he wanted year in and year out. Deer are peculiar creatures!

Deer move more at night, than during the day. More food, less movement. Thats why when i see a ton of acorns on the ground, that deer sightings are going to be less. I'm not about to spend the money on corn, when IMO, it doesn't help.

I can get all my deer through the summer and a little during bow season off mineral sites then the cameras come up and back in storage. Corn is to much trouble and everything eats it. Hard to feed crows rabbits all kinds of birds coyotes coons, and #1 hogs. Corn is a huge waste of time and deer have plenty to eat they live in the wild for a reason.

I haven't done a deer study but I can confirm this:

We have 7 electronic feeders stationed in legal areas throughout our property of 1250 acres. We have cameras on every feeder. They were originally set to activate at 7am and 4pm through Dec 31, for 8 seconds intervals. We were getting several pictures of deer, both doe and bucks at the feeder locations the first two weeks, during daylight and dark hours. After a few weeks, the bucks completely stopped visiting the feeders during the daytime hours. In an effort to save oorn, we adjusted the feeders to activate at NOON each day. The bucks continued to visit the feeder locations during dark hours, typically after midnight and continue to do so. Our sightings of bucks on our food plots have dropped considerably since we began using the feeders. In January we have started to see younger bucks in the plots but they are just cruising, looking for doe. The pictures of bucks at the feeders these last two weeks of January have dropped off to almost ZERO, as they are no longer focused on eating but locating doe.

Based on our findings, we will not be setting up any feeders next season and should save our club between $1000 and $1500 a year, which will be used to build new shooting houses.

Lord knows (and everyone else) that I don't know anything about deer except how to hunt and cook them and I'm not too great at that. You cannot convince me that providing a large wild grazing animal that has free range capabilities with a new food source outside of its normal parameters isn't going to drastically affect its behavior. I'm thinking Ethiopians.
They have been living forever on not much of anything and have got pretty good at getting by or they would have died out. So they know where the food is and how to get enough of it to survive and reproduce. Now all of a sudden we go and add a Golden Corral in their village. And its free. You don't think that their behavior will change?

This is interesting stuff. I know I have a neighbor that "feeds" in addition to his food plot.

My sightings always decline near/during/in the rut due to hard dick spikes harassing everything that moves. Food plot movement becomes very erratic. Cameras in the same plot will show 0 deer for two days, 12 on day three. No rhyme or reason to me. Maybe corn has something to do with it.

It's clear something is different this year. We've had a handful of guys on this board saying they've had a standard to great year of deer sightings, seems like the rest of us are seeing less. All over the state.

I LOLz at these corn threads and the myths that it makes the bucks nocturnal etc.

Its no big secret deer love corn and will eat it over most anything else. It may slow down when the acorns fall some but they will be right back on it, especially late season.

I grew up in SC and have hunted there 25 years. Killed many mature bucks over corn.

There is a right way and a wrong way to put out corn. Most people don't do it right or use feeders correctly and wonder why they only get night time pictures or no pictures of big bucks at all

Placement of the corn is important. Put it right on the edge of the thickest cover you can find.

Feeders are the wrong answer most of the time and I'll tell you why. Feeders take a long time for mature bucks to get used to. A long time - like he needs to eat there as a fawn. If you want to use a feeder you are going to be investing years into that spot. Tripod feeders are the worst, my experience is they generally are scared of them. Hanging feeder in the air and using a boat winch is far better. The more the capacity the better and the less you have to go in there to fill it. 55gal drum works great. Just run it a few seconds an hour after sunrise and hour before sunset. Don't ever take that feeder out once you put it in there and always let it run and feeder corn year round. You want it to be part of the landscape and you want that sound to be a dinner bell, not something to be scared of.

Now I'll tell what is even better. A corn pile. They will come to this very quickly and there is nothing to be afraid of.

I'm going to give you some pro-tips on how we see and kill bucks over corn in SC.

A big corn pile the size of a truck hood at least is what you want, bigger is better. Cob corn is better than shelled. (Let your wallet dictate how much you put out but we buy corn by the gravity wagon load from a local farmer). By creating a large corn pile of cob corn you are silhouetting that deer on the yellow background at last light. And since you are hunting in a thicket it will be dark faster. So you want to invest in a quality low light gathering scope for your rifle too. The cob corn also forces them to work to bite off a bite of corn instead of taking a mouth full of shelled and throwing their head back up fast to look around while they chew. All the sun bleached old cobs around the pile also add to silhouetting them.

Only refresh the piles/feeders every couple of weeks. Drive a 4 wheeler right to the pile/feeder and dump it right off the 4 wheeler and leave. If you have a trail camera, check it then wearing rubber boots and leave.

Make sure your stand is 100 yards away minimum, 150 is better, on the downwind side of course. Not a shooting house either, they stick out too much. Use a tall ladder stand 20' minimum with a shooting rail and makes sure it is brushed in and has good back cover. You want to be high so you can see down on top of your corn and if the wind does swirl hopefully you are above their noses. Hunting mornings is safest, scent rises as the earth warms, and never ever hunt on a bad wind. Cut your shooting lane back to your stand just wide enough to get a 4 wheeler down. You don't want it too wide, you don't want the deer to feel like they are in the open. An old timer once told me you want that big buck to be in a shooting lane that he doesnt realize is a shooting lane. We also sometimes just clear a 10'x10' hole in a thicket that could be seen from the stand only, at ground level you want to feel like you are in the middle of a thicket.

Really try not to hunt there until the rut. You can get lucky and catch him in daylight maybe but a mature buck is nocturnal by nature anyway its not the corn that made him that way. So stay out until the times right and never ever shoot does off of there if you are trying to kill a big buck. The doe family groups are what you want coming there every morning and evening. Many times I have killed a big buck following those does out in the rut. I have also killed them standing on the corn pile waiting for the does to show up. And I've killed them mid-day coming in for quick snack.

Bottom line, corn works and most dif influences movement. And it is expensive. Here in AL I wouldn't put it out because its silly to draw deer to spot I cannot hunt. I'd rather them have to walk out in that foodplot or browse through that cutover that I can legally hunt.

In other words, put a whole bunch of work into scouting out the perfect place that already attracts deer because of cover and proximity to bedding. Then put a bunch more work into picking a stand location that minimizes pressure and is positioned down wind of where you expect the deer to be. Then put a bunch more work into cutting and trimming shooting lanes that will maximize your opportunity for a shot but still give the deer plenty of security cover. Then go spend a bunch of money and time feeding corn. Have I got all that right? That sounds just like what most any good hunter would do but I think I'll skip the corn part since doing all those other things will produce good results if you put your time in. That should leave me plenty of money to buy night vision technology to hunt all the deer turned nocturnal by my corn feeding neighbors.

x2 on all of that.

Not one damn bit of that sounds like "hunting".

walt4dun we are talking about 2 different things. In Alabama it is illegal to hunt over corn. If you put that corn out and hunted in Alabama the legal way you would never see those bucks in the daylight.

What does it sound like to you?

Dang. Truck hood pile of corn.

LOL - You forgot to reply in your holier than thou font.

I know that. Like I said I don't put out corn in AL. Why would I? Makes no sense to throw money away in corn if you can't hunt over it. I have never had any trouble seeing and killing bucks here in AL without corn.

Woodsmanship will always be the #1 tool in a hunter's toolbox and I think most of us get that here.

I was merely illustrating that corn is also a tool in the toolbox and can be effective if used correctly where it is legal.

I think the reason you and others aren't see the bucks in daylight on your "supplement feed sites" (snicker) is because you aren't using corn correctly - either to far from where he beds, are scenting the place up too often, or using new feeders that they are scared of.

Just my 2c.

Corn on the cob vs shelled corn. Only thing I see in that is its just a tad bit mean.