Hunting Tips: What Do You See?

How to find what you are hunting for
by Dennis Wintch

As far as being a good hunter, a great hunter, a poor hunter, or a hunter at all…it’s your eyes that do 90% of the hunting. They are the key to all successful hunts. I’ve said it many times before, “You can’t shoot what you can’t see!” It’s always amazed me over the years how our eyes sees mostly what they have been trained to see. It tells our brain what we are looking at.

Case in point…sometimes I travel from state to state and each state does things a little different. The traffic lights in Utah are all overhead so as the years have gone by, my eyes (like a reflex action) look for lights in the middle of each intersection I come to. However, if you put me in a state, or a place where all the traffic lights are on the side of each intersection, I’ve been known to run one or two. I just don’t see them until it’s too late. You can, and must, train your eyes to see all things around you. One of the big advantages I’ve had over most hunters is the ability to scan a side hill, shadow, sagebrush flat, oak brush, dark timber, PJ’s, or a rock basin and in the wink of an eye, I can usually spot whatever I am hunting.

I remember a few years ago, my dad and I were hunting together as we have done so many times over the years. I was driving down a back dirt road quite fast (I always drive faster than most people on a dirt road and most hunters who have ridden with me can tell you that “that’s a big 10-4”). Anyway, I bogged on my brakes, leaving two deep runts in the sandy road and I said to my Dad, “look right up there. Right behind that cedar tree there’s a little buck. Keep your eyes open because there might be a big buck with him.” For two or three minutes I tried to show him the buck’s eye, part of his nose and half of his horn through a hole in the tree, but he couldn’t see the buck. Finally he got out of the truck and walked around to my side to get a different angle. Nope, he still couldn’t see that deer. Finally, he said, “there isn’t a deer behind that tree…no way!” So, I got out of my truck and walked up the hill toward the tree and guess what? A nice 15-inch willer-horn three-point (a Utah trophy) came running out and up and over the hill. I still remember my dad saying, “heck, no wonder you always kill a big buck. You can see them standing behind a tree at 50 miles an hour.”

Many times when I’ve been out in the field with my good friends, I’ve stopped and said, “Wow! Look at that big buck standing right there!” “Where?” They’ll say. “Right there!” “Where? I don’t see a big buck.” Well, I’d really have to be your good friend to just sit there and not shoot him first and wait until you see him, and let you shoot him. Besides, by the time you see him it will be too late. He’ll be gone and all we’ll have to say to each other is, “Wow, did you see how big that buck was (and still is)?”

One time my good friend Mike Liddiard and I were out scouting the day before the hunt started. Mike had not hunted deer for ten years or so. After showing him 20 deer or so (me seeing everyone first), he said, “I’m a little rusty seeing deer in the trees.” But in only a few days, he was a lot better at seeing deer. Just last year I was guiding a good friend of mine when I spotted a huge buck standing straight on in the shadows. He was about 80 yards looking right at us. Boy that was a good buck. After 30 seconds of looking, my friend finally sees him. One shot. The big boy was hit but not down. He ran down the hill and stopped in a grove of trees, standing broadside. I said, “Put another hole in him.” “Where? I can’t see him.” “Right there. Shoot him.” “I can’t make out a deer at all.” Not until he ran again and he shot seven more shots did we finally bag ‘Old Mr. Big’. We were lucky. If only he could have see him standing there. I could have, and would have, taken him on the first go around and in the first second I saw him, all because I could see him.

Most of the time when it comes to trophy-sized game, you don’t get a second chance. They see you first and are gone before you even have time to react. There are so many times that I’ve been hunting and my eyes (my trained eyes), have given me that extra second or two to react to the given situation and come home with another big buck.

There is no way that I can count or even remember all the times that my eyes have given me the great success in hunting that I’ve had over the forty years I’ve been out and about. But I do know if you have good trained eyes, that can pick out parts and pieces and put the puzzle together in a hurry; you my friend, will have an edge in hunting that is unequaled.

Hunting Tips – Some of the things you can do to improve what you see and to see faster are:

1. Spend more time in the field looking at game. Different land layouts and types of cover. Seeing game in all different backdrops.

2. Try to train your eyes to move fast over the layouts that are before you. Try to see parts and pieces of any animal at different angles.

3. Know the limitations that your eyes have. If you need glasses, get them. If you have to go slow and take more time to see or pick something out, go slower.

4. Never compromise money for buying good optics. A good scope on your gun and a good pair of binoculars around your neck in the world of hunting is a big must.

5. If you’re not sure what you’re looking at, don’t shoot first and then go see what it was. When in doubt…Don’t!

6. When you come to a good place where you can see into a big basin, canyon or side hill, take more time to look it over and see if you can see old Mr. Big before he sees you. If you can, you have just upped your odds 50% of putting him in the deep freeze to feed your family.

7. Keep your eyes looking up 80% of the time and down on the ground 20%. Most hunters look where they are walking 80% of the time and only look up 20% of the time. Once again…you can’t shoot what you can’t and don’t see.

8. Don’t drink alcohol or smoke. Red, blurry eyes from drinking and smoking are big minuses for your eyes and what they can see when you need them most.

As a new year of hunting is here, try and up your odds by seeing what’s there to be seen. Our eyes are, in my opinion, the best gift of all. From a man who loves this world and all that Mother Nature has to share with us, as I have said before and I’ll ask you again, ”what do you see?”