Can't say that I will completely give up on corn feeders, but I am going to shift my strategy more toward food plots and protein. Spend a less on maintaining feeders during hunting season that don't produce results.

I wouldn't completely write them off. All it takes is that one time a deer decides it has a sweet tooth for some corn.

Those pictures definitely make a strong case for corn feeders, and I agree that just giving up on them is not the way to go. I'm just going to cut back on the number of feeders that I maintain and the amount of corn that they dispense. Put more effort into plot development and feeding bulk protein in the off season.

I always act like I'm buying corn for 2x the amt of feeders I actually fill up. Half goes in the feeders, half goes on the ground around the stands.

Beg to differ

Oh yeah I agree. I have seen the pictures and have watched the videos. I am not saying that corn feeders don't work, I am just saying that in my part of Texas ( Red River Co. ) I haven't noticed shooter bucks going to feeders during daylight. This is after 10 years of feeding. Does will hit them everyday, but never mature bucks. That being said I hold out hope that one is coming after looking at pictures like you guys are posting.

In working on my hog issues to get the bucks back on the feeders...it's slowly turning around. Instead the hogs came out on the foodplot during a rattling session.

Feeder pens have increased my luck big time.... never thought it would be worth it but its amazing what good they do

Yeah I have no idea what hunting Those northern countys would be like... everything up there looks like awesome hunting land...

My area is just the opposite, without feeders I would have a hard time seeing any bucks. From what I can tell most of the bucks I see come from neighboring properties. Bucks disappear from the feeders and trail cams 3rd week in Oct and then come back in the last couple of weeks in Dec other than in that time span the bucks are always there early mornings and late in the evenings. I have hunted on these 600 acres for 4 years now and the timing is always the same. Also due to the rock in the terrain I can't put in food plots at all.

I think that is the key to the whole situation. What works in one place doesn't always work in different places. All I know is that I have never seen a mature buck eating under a feeder in ten years of hunting Red River Co.

Folks around me don't see many mature bucks at all during daylight hours. I set our place up where the feeders and plots are smack in the middle of bedding areas and I can sit back a long ways and keep an eye on them.

I just use it as a part of the whole plan. In reality, all I care about is that the bucks show themselves long enough to make a good shot, whether they do it because they are chasing does that were at the feeder or in the food plot or they were hungry themselves. Two of the bucks I have shot actually got spooked by the feeder going off, made a wrong turn and ended up on the wall.

Big bucks may be more elusive, but they like corn just like any other deer. Chances are if you have never seen a single mature buck at your feeder, there probably aren't a lot of mature bucks in the area. Put cameras on your feeder post rut and after a few hard freezes. If there are mature bucks in the area, they will hit the corn.

boom

Nav....you know it doesn't stay cold long enough for the deer to rely on corn.

Naa it really don't but rut is getting more active every year and those rutted up bucks will take anything they can get in January