Sean (and others), I'd appreciate any input on a non-resident trying to DIY hunt in Kansas.

What do you know about this draw system and the overall hunt experience? I'm in the beginning stages of looking to do this in the next few years with a friend, and I'm just trying to gather the best way to go about it. I understand how the draw works for both whitetail and mule deer and how the units are laid out. We would be looking to hunt the western side of the state in hopes of getting into some muleys coming over from CO.

Once drawn, I would assume people are mostly hunting public land?

Is it out of the realm of possibility to find a private landowner that will let you hunt their place, maybe with a trespass fee?

Do people usually set up tree stands/pop-ups or try to spot and stalk?

Is there anything else I need to consider or might not think to ask?

Thanks!

No one? Bueller?

Sorry, you posted while I was looking for my turkey. Since then it was pictures, packing out, processing, then playing catch up at work. I missed the thread.

You said you understand the draw, so I won't spend much time on that. To get a muley tag as an out of stater you basically have to win a draw, AND a separate lottery. And no rifle hunting of muleys for non-res.

The bad news: Kansas has very little public ground. Where there is public land it is almost exclusively on/around BLM/USACE reservoirs. It can get pounded pretty good depending on the time of year and location. ...but there are some good deer to be found. Mule deer usually get pushed off the wildlife areas pretty fast. Also, permission on private land is reasonably hard to come by unless you know someone. It can be done, but you'd want to have it lined up WELL in advance. And in general people are much more protective of the muleys than they are the whitetail.

The good news: There is a lot of private land in the Walk-In Hunting Area (WIHA) program in Western Kansas. Hundreds of thousands of acres. As you might expect, it's not all created equal when it comes to habitat, but you can find deer. I've chased some pretty good deer on WIHA out there in recent years, both whitetail and mule deer. There are several types of WIHA, some Sept.1-Jan. 31 and the majority, Nov. 1-Jan. 31. That can impact the timing of your hunt.

I use both fixed and climber tree stands when I can find a hedge row or creek drainage but if you're in muley country there is often a limited number of trees, so spot and stalk is the order of the day. There are places where a pop up would probably be handy, but I don't even carry one out there regularly anymore. If you're in the grasslands there's no way to brush it in, and if you're in cover thick enough to brush it in you can usually just tuck back into the thicket and be just fine.

The toughest part can be finding deer obviously. It's not like mountain mule deer hunting where you can gain elevation and then glass a lot of country from one vantage point. So lots of walking. Water hole hunting can be good early in the season. Our rut is usually Nov 6-26, or something like that. Rifle season starts the Wednesday after Thanksgiving and runs about 12 days, so you don't want to be there during rifle season. TONS of road hunting. The deer learn where they can and can't be seen from the road. You'll rarely see one of the big guys from the road during the season. Oh, and pheasant season starts the 2nd Saturday of November so that'll bring out a LOT of traffic. Either avoid it, or be in a deep timber funnel super early in the morning so that the bird hunters will shove deer to you, then hope you can get them to stop in time to shoot them because they'll be hauling ass.

In an ideal world I think you'd dedicate about 2-3 days to scouting and 7-8 days to hunting (longer if possible). Come up in very late October and drive the roads for 2-3 days glassing. If you happen to find a good deer on Sept.1 WIHA give him a run, if it's Nov. 1 WIHA then take good notes and be ready in a few days. Then Nov. 1 get after them. I usually spot and stalk hunt the mornings, then treestand hunt (or hunt funnels between bedding & ag even if I have to lay down in CRP grass) in the evenings, particularly in locations where I can see a long ways hoping to learn where a big deer is bedding or traveling back and forth to food. That'll help me hone in on him for the next morning.

Thanks man. I appreciate you taking the time to write that up.

I wasn't aware of the WIHA angle, so that's good to know.

Do you know what role preference points play in the whitetail draw? I'm aware that they have no bearing on the muley draw. Looking at the 2015 draw stats, it doesn't look like it's really a big deal, as the majority of people getting drawn had little to no points. Is it worth putting in for a one each year ($26.50) up until we actually make the trip?

Do you know if the success rates for the drawn hunts is posted?

Try this link for KS Draw stats. It opens kind of odd for me, but should open as an adobe file with the 2015 draw results. Not sure if there is a more historic draw results page or not.

EDIT: My bad, I misread your post and was thinking draw success, not harvest success. No harvest success data that I am aware of. They do some random e-mail surveys after the season but no systematic collection of data that I am aware of.

Essentially it looks like you are guaranteed to draw in the western units if you have at least 1 preference point. And probably 75%+ chance without it. Unfortunately (ALERT-POLITICS-ALERT!), Kansas deer tag numbers are determined on a biological basis, they are determined on a demand basis. So 2016 permit numbers are based off the demand for permits the last few years, more than any general population trends or herd health numbers... at least for antlered deer. As a result it's pretty easy to draw. That said, if you know that you're coming, and you're going to come with another person/people, it seems like $26.50 for a preference point is pretty cheap insurance to guarantee that you get a tag. That way if you have 4 friends, 1 of you doesn't get left out.

also, for Mule deer I would draw a line from Clark county on the Southern border to Norton County on the northern border (or you could just use Hwy 283, I think that may be how the units are delineated)... Those counties and west have good mule deer numbers. East of that there are a few but you are mostly wasting your time.

Thanks

Good luck on a OOS mule deer tag. My family has owned farms N of Goodland & S of Manhatten for over a 100 years...but since my parents, where title sits, live in Texas (me too) I have to draw for a tag...I didn't get a whitetail tag last year to hunt my own farm. KS is extremely anti out of state hunters.

That being said my cousins have pretty good spot & stalk luck on Mule Deer in Western KS.

Kansas increased the Non-Resident fee $100 last year.

Edit: To add to this, I'll agree that they generally do not like non-residents coming in (from my limited experience). My FIL is a lifelong Kansas resident and has pretty much said this. They lived in a very small town in NE Kansas. I hunted up there 2 years ago, met many of the locals and saw their attitude, but overall I had a very great trip. I killed a doe up there that was 20 pounds heavier than the biggest buck I've ever killed in Central Texas.

My FIL showed me pictures of some monster bucks that were killed in that area over the years. Giant, record book bucks. They would not tell anyone outside of town about these bucks, and also not tell B&C because they did not want outsiders knowing that there were huge bucks in their area.

quote:

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Good luck on a OOS mule deer tag. My family has owned farms N of Goodland & S of Manhatten for over a 100 years...but since my parents, where title sits, live in Texas (me too) I have to draw for a tag...I didn't get a whitetail tag last year to hunt my own farm. KS is extremely anti out of state hunters.

That being said my cousins have pretty good spot & stalk luck on Mule Deer in Western KS.

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Unless your farm is less than 80 acres, then no, you don't have to put in for the draw. You can get a non-resident hunt own land permit for less than $90 and you do not have to go through the draw. From KDWPT:

quote:

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• $87.50 Special Hunt-Own-Land Relative Deer Permit (available over the counter and online)

*Available to individuals who qualify as lineal ascendants or descendants or siblings of resident landowners or all tenants, and spouses of a qualifying landowner. Permit valid for any white-tailed or mule deer only on land owned or operated by landowner or tenant during muzzleloader-only, archery, and firearm seasons using equipment legal for that season. Lineal relatives include direct ascendants or descendants such as a grandfather, mother, son, or granddaughter. Cousins, uncles, or nieces are NOT lineal family members. You would also need to purchase an annual hunting license. Available online and over the counter July 1 - Dec. 31

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Kansas is about as far from anti-non res as you can get. Are there individuals that resent out of staters? Absolutely. Because oftentimes they come in and kill young deer, or push people off of land that they've had permission to hunt for decades. But that's not anti-nonres. That's anti-commercialism of deer hunting. Kansas has been a "you can hunt on my land if you help me fix fences" state for a long time. ...but with Texans (mostly) being priced out of hunting in their own state we've seen an influx of out of state hunters leasing up land in Kansas. It's caused a bit of a philosophical shift and has resulted in a lot of locals losing hunting opportunities. It is what it is... It saddens me, but growing up in Texas it certainly doesn't surprise me. ...and for the public hunters like me it can be very frustrating letting a really nice 2 year old walk 4 or 5 times in a year only to have someone blast it the first weekend of rifle season. Often because a 2 year old deer in NE Kansas will be 2x the size of a mature buck in the Hill Country, so "it's huge!" even though it's just a baby. and we do get a big influx of non-res hunters during rifle season because we're close to KC. But overall Kansas' rules and regulations are about as out of state hunter friendly as you can get.

Kansas increased all of their fees last year because our state is in a severe economic crisis and KDWPT lost ALL of their state funding. So they were forced to become 100% license fee driven. Resident licenses went up as well. It has nothing to do with being anti-non res, and everything to do with a budget crisis that is forcing agencies to look for money anywhere they can.

As for people wanting it to be a "secret" that there are big deer in Kansas I think that ship has sailed. I'm not sure if people have ever watched a hunting show but SPOILER ALERT: there are nice sized deer in Kansas and Iowa.

Are there a lot of deer not registered? Sure. But I personally think that's because the B&C and P&Y books are a joke. It's the "Who's Who of High School students" for deer. I've taken 4 P&Y deer and a B&C net deer since I've lived up here and I've never paid to put my name in a book. But that has nothing to do with hiding the deer from people and everything to do with my belief that the book itself is pretty ridiculous for all but the Top 1% of deer.

Actually since title sits in my parents name and they are "Out of State Landowners" I as a Texas resident can't get a hunt your own land permit. They can. Trust me I have spent a lot of time researching this and on the phone with KWPD. Comes down to if "your name is not on the deed." Stupid part, my son at K-State can get a resident tag. And yes there is way way way over 80 acres.

You are right, I was wrong. The direct lineal descendants only applies to resident landowners. My apologies.

Non-resident landowners can get a resident tag, or non-resident descendants of resident landowners can get a tag.

Any idea how it works if the land were in a family trust? You could put your name on the trust... just a thought?

Didn't know that about the state funding.

On the record book bit, the bucks I mentioned that I saw pics of were killed way back in the day, during the "Good Ol' Days" of hunting (FILs words). He said that as Kansas was getting popular way back when, they didn't want their county name popping up in the book.

But yeah, like you said, its no secret nowadays that Kansas has giant bucks.

And then I see this article this morning. Luckily we're a couple of years out on the draw. Hopefully the cut this year will help the numbers come back up.

Kansas Cuts Mule Deer Permits by 100


Edit: As I read the article more, it looks like they're only cutting permit numbers on the eastern side of the state, but still.

There are no big deer in Kansas ... There are no big deer in Kansas ... There are no big deer in Kansas ...

Nope. None.

quote:

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Good luck on a OOS mule deer tag. My family has owned farms N of Goodland & S of Manhatten for over a 100 years...but since my parents, where title sits, live in Texas (me too) I have to draw for a tag...I didn't get a whitetail tag last year to hunt my own farm. KS is extremely anti out of state hunters.

That being said my cousins have pretty good spot & stalk luck on Mule Deer in Western KS.

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Just curious... what unit were you trying to draw? Looking at last year's data, 95% of permit applicants got their 1st choice unit. 9 of the 18 units had more permits to give out than apps received. The lowest draw % for any unit (unit 4) was 63%. Did you just happen to be one of the severely unlucky ones?

If he tried to draw for the Manhattan farm he would have been just extremely unlucky. Those Units had a successful draw rate of 97% & 95% respectively. So I'm assuming he was talking about the Goodland farm. Unit 1 had about a 72% draw rate.

But specifically I think he was talking about the difficult of getting the mule deer validation. In Unit 1 (far NW) the mule deer validation rate was less than 12%. ...and that would be only of the people that were already successful in the general whitetail draw.

As for your link to the article earlier, it was sort of poorly written, so I'm not sure what to make of it. There are no mule deer in the eastern half of the state, so I'm assuming it was intended to mean the easternmost zones where mule deer tags are authorized. Those areas would all be east of Hwy 283 and frankly aren't worth hunting for mule deer on a normal basis because the population is so low.

In general Kansas isn't the greatest state for mule deer hunting because our habitat is somewhat limited and we have a lot of whitetails migrating west and further impacting the mule deer herd.

Got it.

And yeah, after reading that article I wasn't really sure what issue they were addressing.

Sean. Actually my Mom's country IS in a Trust as a named beneficiary. I can get the coveted "mule deer tag.

Stupid part, for the last 10 yrs on our Eastern KS country, I was paying about $900/ yr for my son & I to hunt a farm owned by my dad.

Sean, you wanna go pheasant hunting opening weekend in Goodland...I would love to visit with u bout deer in E Kas.

Maybe. ...and that's not me trying to look a gift horse in the mouth. But as you know, Nov.12 is peak rut here in NE Kansas so if I don't have a buck on the ground I'll probably be in a tree chasing my double drop tine buck (pleeeease survive until then Deuce!) BoerneGator has been trying to get me to come out to Kanorado for a few years now and is getting grumpy that I haven't made it out.

I hear you!!!

This thread has stirred up some interesting debates over the last week with my family members. We are still trying to decide how to proceed. I am for sure starting to lean toward the Kansas is not friendly towards their non-resident landowners thought. It seems ridiculous to me that my older brother (whose name is on the deed) can't buy his son an OTC tag since my older brother lives in Texas.

And now after starting my own research, my "lineal ascendants" have certainly been confused about "special" or "relative" tags for the past 20 years.

In the past we've actually added some names to the deed for the Hunt-Own-Land tags. But we didn't do that for minors. One suggestion that keeps coming up is buying tenant tags. To me, the tenant tag approach seems like a loophole that would require more work than a deed change to make legit. But some in my family disagree.

Some of the tenant description and "substantial interest" definitions muddy things further to me. WheatFarmer, have you had any discussions with KDWPT regarding tenancy?

AgEng06,

Just ran across this post. So how did your season go in Kansas? I just put in for an archery tag for the first time and was curious.

Don't know how I missed this thread last year, but I went to Kansas bow hunting as well. I have to say, the area we hunted in the people we ran into were very friendly. I did manage to kill a nine point that should of been a 10 but his right side main beam was broke off. I will agree with Sean, that if you are used to looking at deer in Texas, it will take a couple of days of looking at deer in Kansas to get your sizes adjusted. We did get permission from a couple of local landowners to hunt on their property, and everything else was WIHA land.

I killed my deer on opening morning of pheasant season and it was a good thing he came out when he did, because if he would have been 20 minutes later the bright orange picket line that was marching my way would have scared him off. In the end I was glad the pheasant Hunters were there, because after pulling the deer out they helped us get him loaded in the back of the truck.

I have put in for a tag this year so we will see. One trick to scouting a big deer in the area we were in, was while driving around look at the telephone poles and the smaller pipeline, cable markers. Big deer will rub on these. We saw one cable marker that was about 4 inches in size that a deer had almost rubbed in too.

How would this one make you feel Penn?

We haven't made the trip yet. We're trying to get schedules to work out.

My buddy also has a few connections up there so we're working on landowner permission as well.

Awesome work.

And rule #1!

Let's see if this works, got it figured out now.

Looks like you tried to link the album instead of each of the individual pictures.

Hey Sean,

Is it common to come across stands and cameras on a lot on the WIHA land around where you live. When scouting several of the places in the unit we were in, we came across several set ups that were out. If we noticed the cameras we just waved at the camera and moved on.

I guess the attitude in Kansas is not like public land here in Texas where if you leave it out people feel it's feee game for them to take. This was just an interesting observation we made while there.

Stands yes, cameras occasionally. You certainly run the risk of theft, but the further west you are the lower the chances. 90% of the people that will come across them are bird hunters out west on WIHA. If you're on a wildlife area I'd say the odds of theft are higher.

Probably Sean's cameras anyway.