But if you try to set a blind and hunt from it the same day you're often going to see deer "lock in" on it as soon as they get to where they can see it. Add your scent, sound, and motion and you have a spooked deer.
Of course, not all deer react the same.
For hunting a new location the same day I much prefer to just "snuggle in" the existing cover without disturbing too much. Most often a weedy/brushy fence row, and simply clear a space big enough to have some ability to move and change positions to be able to cover the likely shooting lanes. Years ago a thin foam cushion or even the ground was plenty to sit on, but today I like one of the low-profile "turkey chairs" to sit on. (the cushion works fine, but it's not graceful to have to roll around on the ground for 5 minutes in order to get your legs under you to get up!
)I've had deer walk within feet of me while setting in weeds in a fence row and never know I was there. I've also seen a hunting buddy get busted be every deer that entered the field when he tried a chair blind in similar weeds & brush. Deer 100 yards away would step out and stare right at the blind, then avoid it like it held certain death - which, of course, it did.
One other incident I know of was with one of the little "portable ground blinds", the camo fabric with a few fiberglass stakes that you shove in the ground to make a camo fence around you. The same buddy with the chair blind had one set at the base of a tree and was deer hunting in muzzle loader season. A squirrel was on the ground only feet away foraging for nuts. Something spooked the squirrel and he ran straight into the fabric fence as hard as he could run, bounced off, looked around kind of dazed, then ran for another tree and then proceeded to cuss and scold my buddy for what seemed like forever.
