DEER IN BANDS. GENERAL HINTS, ETC. 249 



will be connected with the others by trails, upon 

 which the deer will be almost sure to travel in passing 

 from one to another. In any one of these places they 

 may pass several days, and may also pass only one 

 day even when undisturbed. The general center may 

 be some unusually choice feeding-ground, or the only 

 spring for many miles, or may be one of those pecu- 

 liar spots that deer often take a special fancy to with- 

 out any apparent reason. A band of antelope act 

 about the same way, but upon a vastly larger scale. 



To this general center a band of deer may come 

 every night for several nights, or may come for two 

 or three successive nights; and then stay away for 

 several nights, especially if scared away from it. 



Deer acting thus are in many respects harder to 

 hunt than when single or in small companies. The 

 prospects of making a good bag when you do find 

 them are much better than when they are scattered, 

 especially when on ground where you can get above 

 them or ahead of them. But the prospects of any 

 one day being a blank day are also much stronger 

 than when hunting scattered deer. Unless you take 

 a whole day to it and find out just where they are in 

 time to get " the evening hunt" on them, you will 

 often discover only where they are not. And this dis- 

 covery you may make just too late to go where they 

 are. For unless you find fresh tracks at the general 

 center which you can follow back, it will often use up 

 the best hunting-hours of the whole morning to find 

 where they were last night. And this will sometimes 

 be the case when you find the tracks at once in the 

 morning. For you cannot safely follow such tracks 

 back rapidly, but must be keeping a constant watch 

 for the game. And if you once start the band it is 



