Ani-Logics Outdoors

I met Luke Onstad at a Deer and Turkey Classic this last spring, and his story is fascinating. He was being recognized at the Big Buck awards ceremony for shooting one of the biggest bucks in the state, and it’s not his first time on the leaderboard. He harvests GIANT bucks nearly every year with 18 bucks on his wall that are over 170” or more than 5.5 years old. I started asking about his hunting style; I was expecting to hear that he hunts a 1,000-acre farm or that he spends $30K on leasing each fall. What he does is much simpler than that, and he only hunts on 40 acres. His hunting success boils down to two keys factors:

1. Not shooting bucks before their prime
2. Selectively hunting premium food plots when conditions are right.

Luke sets up his plots with a green to grain transition so in warmer conditions the greens are popular but when the temps get much colder the grains become the destination food source. He lives on the property so he can monitor the plots without disturbing any of the bedding cover around the exterior of the plots.

He treats the bedding cover like a sanctuary and only ever enters it to retrieve deer. This year he planted the Amazin’ Grains for most of his green plots and planted the Pro Bean Blend for his grain plots. He tried a comparison with normal ag beans, and here are his words, “No kidding I planted regular beans on one field and your beans on another, the amount of deer in your beans is easily 2 to 1 or more!”

Within the last 5 years, Luke has taken a gross Booner every year, and he even took two 200″ bucks in consecutive years in 2022 and 2023.

His 2022 bow buck is actually the #2 net non-typical archery kill in the state at a whopping 232 & 4/8″. 

His 2023 buck was no slouch either. It ended up scoring 204 & 2/8″.

His 2024 bow buck wasn’t far from his previous two years and stretched the tape at 192 & 4/8″ gross.

Luke had 4 years of sheds off this buck, and you can really see how being patient paid off for him. A lot of people would see that buck at 3.5 years old and think he’s never going to be a superstar, but he sure proved them wrong!

His second buck of 2024 was harvested during the muzzleloader season in his field of Pro Bean Blend.

It was a deer he had 6 years of trail cam pics, and he waited until the perfect December cold front to hunt the standing beans.

For the last 20 years, Luke has been focusing on passing bucks under the age of 5.5. In that timeframe, his trophy wall has grown to an impressive size. He sets up his blinds in places that he can get into and out of without being detected and he always hunts with the wind in his favor.

He also uses subtle tactics that keep the deer from knowing they are being hunted. When his hunt is over for the evening and he has a field full of deer to contend with, he blows really loud like a deer a couple of times. The deer don’t always take off running right away but instead work back into the thick cover giving him an opportunity to exit the area.

It’s not uncommon to see over 15 deer on his plots nightly. Having the food next to high quality bedding cover is key to holding deer on a small property.

If you are looking for ways to have better hunting on small property, combining high quality food plots with low-impact, high odds hunting can be your key to success.