Now that I've reached 60, I have come to enjoy hunting from a ground blind for the safety and relative comfort they provide. You can easily move them if needed once you uncover that deer are using a particular travel route and there's no worry about falling and injuring yourself.

I'm one of those who always puts my blinds out before the season and removes them later so they will last for several years. This brings up the question as to how early before the season do you put up your blinds so the deer will get used to them. Or, some might take more of an ambush approach and put a blind up the first morning or evening they hunt it. I've seen this approach work very well myself with tree stands.

What approach seems to work best for you?

Earlier the better but I have had success putting them up, brushing them in good and hunting almost immediately too.

I try for a month, but get the same results if just a week before the season starts.

Put mine up two weeks ago.

I had it up over a month before rifle last year and still every buck that walked out looked cautiously straight up at the blind before they went to look for does at the feeder. I am amazed at how aware animals are of something different in their house.

At least 2 months for my area and I might still have to brush it in when I put it out. I watch how they feed around the blinds from the trail cam pics. If they are watching or facing the blind they are not comfortable. If they are feeding with their head pointing away they are fine with the setup. I put a ground blind up 3 yrs ago due to a lot of bad NW and W winds. I set it up then put a cattle panel out about 3' in front and filled the panel with cut blackbrush limbs and then piled a few on top of the blind. I put the panel in a curved shape to allow the brush to hide the blind. I corned it heavy every day for 2 weeks and had bucks in front of it in the daylight within the first week. That is the fastest I have had them get used to a blind. My haybale blinds take about 2-3 weeks to get them in front of it in the daylight so I put them out at least 60 days before the first day of archery and feed them every day. Texas deer really do notice anything new or different around feeder or water trough. Takes them a while to get used to it but feeding there helps a lot.