DEER ON OPEN GROUND. 173 



is bare tracking generally easier on open ground, but 

 much more use can be made of tracks. You can see 

 at a much greater distance the particular kinds of 

 ground which deer are apt to frequent at different 

 times of day. You can see far away the "divides" 

 over or along which trails will be apt to pass, and can 

 take short-cuts to them. When you reach that part 

 of the trail that shows the deer are near at hand, you 

 can sit down and wait for them to show themselves. 

 When you find tracks leading to a certain basin of 

 any size, and see no other ground near it better 

 adapted for lying-down ground, you may feel a cer- 

 tainty that they are there. Not only are the tracks 

 themselves apt to be much more plainly visible than 

 they are in the woods, but you have an immense in- 

 crease in the ease of following tracks by direction. 

 When deer start on a general course, as from a 

 spring, you can tell very nearly where they will pass 

 half a mile away although the trail itself may mean- 

 der considerably. And where trails are hard to fol- 

 low, or it becomes necessary to leave the trail often to 

 avoid noise or being seen, or because the deer watch 

 back, or because the trail has reached a place where 

 they may have stopped and you want to get on the 

 highest ground to look, such advantages are immense. 

 A person of quick comprehensive mind for topog- 

 raphy will soon use most of these advantages in 

 timber, and in fact they must be used by the success- 

 ful tracker. But even such a person will find the ad- 

 vantages of the open ground immense. 



In hunting open ground you must, quite as much 

 as in the woods, avoid looking for a deer. But spend 

 all your time in looking at spots, patches, shades in 

 brush, dark shadowy spots by the side of bushes, 



