South Dakota Mule/Whitetail hunt

[ManUpNorth]

Looking at doing a fall 2020 archery deer hunt in SD. Ideally looking at areas of SE/E in SD, but open for other options. Really just looking for locations, information, anything I could find useful. This would be my first trip out to SD.

Thank you!

 

[ZBB]

The hunt atlas on the game and fish website is a pretty good map that shows public land. They have a free app for your phone that is good well. I’ve never hunted east river, but I think the mulies are far and few between. I’d probably drive a couple more hours west. That’s my opinion though, so take it with a grain of salt. There’s some other threads on here that would probably help. Good luck in your search.

 

[Sdhunters]

East river deer will be whitetail hunt only. Two schools of thought on the SD archery deer season. Plan for an early season hunt before oct. 19 due to pheasant opener as most public land will be saturated with pheasant hunters. Or my preference, plan for Nov. 1-20 as rut will kick in and some larger bucks start to show themselves. The rut allows more time in the field for your sits. National refuges offer another opportunity mid October for archers.

 

[Muskeez]

SD changed their season to open Sept. 1 last year. If you have ever wanted to shoot a buck in velvet those first few opening days are your chance to do so. Eastern SD is more ag land and less public land I'm sure. My daughter has bowhunted eastern SD around Brookings and found that even for a girl it's tough to get permission from private landowners to bowhunt deer. My advice would be to get on the SD GFP website and look at the public lands of the state, then take 3 days and go for a drive this spring. It will be well worth your time to know what you are getting into before applying for a tag. Best wishes!

 

[beagle001]

Good luck with finding muleys East River. Only small pockets here and there.
If you meant SW/W, there are plenty of threads here with tons of great info.

 

[SD-Esox]

Looking at doing a fall 2020 archery deer hunt in SD. Ideally looking at areas of SE/E in SD, but open for other options. Really just looking for locations, information, anything I could find useful. This would be my first trip out to SD.

Thank you!

If I were in your shoes coming out of state and wanting to hunt public land I would focus around the Missouri River break areas lots of public land. If you have a boat you can use the river to access some more secluded areas.