5 Big Mature Bucks Taken on Small Hunting Parcels

In this video, Jeff Sturgis talks about 5 big mature bucks that were taken on 2 small deer hunting parcels. One buck was taken on a 25-acre piece of land he owns, while the other 4 were taken on some land with 30 acres of cover, a couple acres of food plots, and 12 acres of open fields.

In other words, small hunks of land which provided him with some really great buck hunting.

This is one of his longer videos; he takes his time to talk about each of the bucks while offering advice on the overall strategy that can lead to harvesting great bucks like these on such small properties.

The first buck was arrowed by Jeff, but recovered from the shot and was taken by his son Dante. This one spent the summer on another property about a mile and a half away, but moved into Jeff’s place and stayed there all fall.

The second buck was taken on their small 25-acre parcel by Jeff’s son Sam.

The common thread in all of these bucks is the low-impact type of hunting they do. They only hunt the stands when conditions are right for those stands, and they plan their stand sites and travel routes in such a way that it allows covert approach to the stands.

While most of us hunters (myself included) are taking the easy way into our stands and hoping to get lucky, hunters like Jeff and his family are slaying the big bucks because they manage the land — and their USE of the land — in ways that encourage mature bucks to use their property. Most of us simply don’t go to the trouble to do that. In my case, I have 9 other owners using my hunting land in whatever way they see fit, and for the most part they do so in ways that discourage mature bucks from frequenting the property.

The video is a bit more than 23 minutes long, but it contains a lot of buck hunting wisdom, and if you are a deer hunter who cares about taking mature bucks, it’s well worth the watch.

Russ Chastain

Editor & Contributing Writer Russ Chastain is a lifelong hunter and shooter who has spent his life learning about hunting, shooting, guns, ammunition, gunsmithing, reloading, and bullet casting. He started toting his own gun in the woods at age nine and he's pursued deer with rifles since 1982, so his hunting knowledge has been growing for more than three and a half decades. His desire and ability to share this knowledge with others has also grown, and Russ has been professionally writing and editing original hunting & shooting content since 1998. Russ Chastain has a passion for sharing accurate, honest, interesting hunting & shooting knowledge and stories with people of all skill levels.