Kentucky Public land (2024)

Looking to plan a KY hunt for the first week of archery season. Anyone have experience with KY public lands?

Stay on the west side. Glass the uncut hay fields if you want to do spot and stalk.

What PK said, plenty of public land in that area. Also deer densities are higher.

What exactly are you looking for? What type terrain are you interested in? Kentucky has everything from mountains to farm land with tons of public access. I live in southeast Ky and have hunted public land all over the state.

The Ky Dept of Fish and Wildlife page is a great tool. Very easy to look up how many bucks or does were killed on a particular WMA. I have my own formula for how I break down the statistics and narrow down public lands in Ky. With a little research you will likely come to the same conclusion as me. Also dont overlook the central part of the state, it can be as good as anywhere.

Thank you everyone. I'm planning on heading down to scout in July and august for a weekend. I plan on just using a climber to get on trails leading to food sources. I love the opportunity to kill a velvet buck.

I have done two DIY elk hunts in Utah so this will be my first out of state whitetail hunt, so any info is appreciated

Pinpointing it big rivers wma

Where are you heading here from?!?! If you do the work to access Fort Knox I can give you some spots to check out!

Ft Knox would definitely be worth the extra work if you are planning to go back in the future. Kinda hard to figure it all out the first time you go but well worth the effort.

I'm from SW PA, how do you get access to Fort Knox?

Ok thank you for letting me know. I will check it out. I’m assuming there’s less pressure there?

Early season they'll be very little. They have zones that they open and close weekly. What may be open this week may be closed for the rest of the season after that. You have to check in the area you are in with an app on your phone. So when you do this on the app you can see how many people are checked in to the unit. Gets pretty crazy there with pressure during prime time but there are still plenty of zones with very few to zero hunters in them.

Good info