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4K views 19 replies 11 participants last post by  Blueump 
#1 ·
First off, let me say nice forum and website!!!
I'm nearly an empty nesters and looking to hunt away from home (West Michigan). We are going to call Zanesville our basecamp and sprawl from there. We are coming down a week before Muzzleloader season just to scout. We are not looking to shoot a MONSTER like a lot of guys who pursue Ohio, just looking to see some deer and have a good vacation.
I'm looking for opinions on where to start.
I've investigated a lot of public land to hunt but what are some that I should weed out or include? Obviously the deer are not going to be rutting so will need to find natural feed, natural runways and hopefully decent deer population. Dillon looked nice with the crops and water boundaries but I've heard it's hunted very hard as well. I've also considered Blue Rock but I'm unsure of the deer population there.

What do you men/women think? Any help would be most appreciated, and I could also suggest some quality West Michigan areas to hunt.

Thanks,
Doug
 
#2 ·
I believe most on here will tell you to investigate the Wayne National forest as it is huge and campable just about anywhere.
Ive only been to Salt Fork in SE Ohio, I hunt special Archery there and was amazed at how few hunters I saw on the public tracts when I was there during gun season. I saw deer this year at dusk driving in on the public grounds. I love hunting there because its so different from where I hunt in Northeast Oh, its hilly with great terrain that is just cool!! I hope we get some snow when you come down to help you out....
anf by the way, Welcome
 
#3 ·
A little south of Zanesville towards McConnellsville there is a lot of AEP land. You need to obtain a permit, they are free and you can contact their office in McConnellsville and they will mail it to you. There are also free camp areas scattered throughout their property that are free as long as you have the permit. You should be able to get on some deer and I would think pressure would be tolerable during muzzleloader. I recommend looking into AEP Recreation lands.
 
#8 · (Edited)
You might want to contact AEP. They sold 1,966 acres of there property back in October of 2014 at auction. The map on there website of there properties is from 2014 and not up to date I think. They have property just west of Zanesville off of 93 and 22 that still can be hunted. They fenced in a couple hundred acres of it because of sink holes from mining. You can hunt the areas that are not fenced in with cattle fence. I bow hunt a property that butts up to AEP's property and have seen quite a few deer there.
 
#13 ·
I can personally say don't bother with blue rock. Yes, like anywhere in Ohio there are deer there. It's not very big and gets a ton of pressure though. Its big woods style hunting and muskingum county as a whole is hunted hard. The deer there will be spread out and mainly on surrounding ag land. Look north of i70 is my opinion. Find the food sources with public access and likely deer will be using them. It's been wet here so sign should be visible. Much of Wayne is big woods hunting as well which can get very tough this time of year. We had virtually no acorn crop in a lot of Ohio so any deer in big hardwoods areas will be spread out and harder to pattern in my experience. Find some cut corn and you can have some great late season hunting. Finding corn on or next to public isn't the hardest thing but finding an area with a decent herd in the area that's using it will be. It's a different state for deer hunting than 10 years ago. You can have a great time still without a doubt. Please share how you do.
 
#16 ·
Blue rock has great deer habitat but it is heavily hunted and I'm pretty sure a high amount of deer were harvested during gun week this year. They had a pretty big planned burn in the middle of the forest right during the rut. And think it could've pushed deer to the out skirts to private land.
 
#19 ·
There and zaleski are the only forest I see them actually managing. A lot of clear cutting and logging. It creates great habitat. Early 2000s that place was over run with deer, now I see higher numbers in the old zone A deer counties. EHD did damage in musk county several years ago from what I've heard and I guess all the years of insanely high harvest per sq. mile. thinned the heard enough to keep numbers down in the public access areas. How coshocton keeps cranking it out who knows.. We have quite a few members that live in the area so hopefully they can chime in.
 
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