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I'll tell you this buddy and you can take it to the bank... Come season, but pre January, 99% of the time a mature buck will visit a feeder between the hours of 11pm- 4am. The same with piled corn. Now IF you can stay away from that feeder, never hunt close to it, never disturb a buck that visits it even when not at the feeder, he might visit that feeder during shooting hours in January..
I watched a property in Vinton county for 2 years that had a bunch of Buckeye Cams on it that were over feeders. Maybe 400 acres and 3-4 feeders.... Ever morning i would come in and go through 500-600 pictures from all of these cameras. I noticed a pattern with many of these deer. They always visited at night, and they never stayed long. They never keyed in on the corn as a major food source.. A midnight snack or a place to kill a couple minutes was all it ever was to them. During the rut however you would see one blow past the feeder not stopping while looking for does. Even then though it was rarely during daylight..
Last year the landowners son killed a buck that had been visiting a feeder for years. They had tons of pictures of him at a feeder but most always at night.. He was killed not far from a different feeder on the property.. But he had never had his picture taken at that feeder, opting instead to visit a feeder further away, almost on the other side of the property... He could have gone to two other feeders before getting to the one he frequented. Why? Who knows. I think it's because he knows feeders are danger and didn't want to shit where he sleeps... The same reason cheating husbands only visit whore houses when out of town.
If you want to use corn to kill deer you have to use it to your advantage... Use it to draw the deer over to it, then hunt between it and where they are coming from or going to.... The below illustration might help with that...... Basically you want to get in that stand in the morning and hope buckey is heading back your way from the corn pile or feeder.... Or hop in that stand in the evening and hope buckey is slowly making his way to that corn with the intent of getting there well after dark.. Or staging around where you have a stand. This is the only way i can see hunting bait would be productive for mature bucks.
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