Iowa Deer Hunting

[Flash]

Finally my son and I, Minnesota residents, got drawn for the Iowa Slug season from Dec. 10-18. Just wondering what type of hunting this will be. Here in Minnesota, we hunt the rut. Is the rut going on in Iowa at this time? Would a person hunt food plots down there at that time? Never hunted there before and any help would be appreciated. I will be hunting about 30 miles south and east of Des Moines.

Thanks,

Flash

"Set the Hook"

[Shad rap]

I grew up in North West Iowa. And if it’s only two of you hunting and you got some land to hunt I would just set up on any good runway or deer path you can find. Most of the people that I have seen hunt down there push all the land and have people posting on the ends. Like I said before if you have some land to hunt I would set up on a major runway and let the other people push the deer to you.

My opinion: the best way to hunt deer in Iowa is with a bow. It’s one of the only state that is setup to bow hunt the rut without any gun hunting going on. You will see some of the best bucks of your life bowing down there. The Bucks chase the does around in open field. You can drive around all day see deer in the field. Spot and stack works well. One day we had an 8 point 140 class buck in one section the section next to it there was a 160 class 10 point that I missed. Then just across the road in the next section we spotted an 11 point that scored148 that I have on my wall. I was 8 yards away for the buck on the ground and he was looking right though me at the doe that was stand 20 yards behind me.

[BLACKJACK]

Sounds like fun hunting Shad Rap! Is it hard getting permission once you spot a nice buck?

[Shad rap]

Most of my hunting was done around the spirit lake area. And some by the Mason City area And the DNR has bought so much land down there that they own 60 or 70 % of the land. So there is a lot of land to hunt. The deer in the rut are out in the cut corn field and running fence lines most of the time. So if you spotted a buck chasing a doe out in the open field most farmers didn’t have a problem letting you go out. It was hard to get permission to hunt the timber because people had ether bought the land to hunt on or had it least out. But there is plenty of opportunity down there and that is the part of bow hunting I miss up here. We never start bow hunting to hard until the first or second weekend in November. But now that I have moved up to MN we have been hunting the Bad Lands in ND for mule deer and that is a lot of fun. See plenty of nice bucks and it is all federal ground and cheaper then hunting Iowa.

[jlm]

Just curious, what does a non-resident bow and rifle license cost in Iowa? Are both drawings or can you purchase anything over the counter?

[Shad rap]

They dont have a rifle season only slugs. I think its a little over 300 dollars for every thing you need to hunt. the any deer license is 220 + 80 for hutning license and around 8 bucks for the habitat stamp.

ND gets 220 for any deer tag good for the whole state and you can shoot a mule or whitetail deer.

[Ben Nicholson]

Deer hunting here in Iowa durring shotgun season is a little different in my book. People group up and run some pretty big drives. Not really my style of hunting so I generally hunt archery and the late muzzy season.

The rut will be long gone by the time you get here to hunt, but there will be plenty of big bucks around.

Yeah out of state tags here in Iowa are outrageous.

Good luck!

[Flash]

Thanks for the replies. It will be interesting. There are only 4 of us and we will have about 1000acres to hunt. Sounds like we'll have to do more moving than sitting. We'll see what happens.

Thanks,

Flash

"Set the Hook"