Whitetail Wisdom book by Daniel E. Schmidt

Whitetail Wisdom calls itself "A Proven 12-step Guide to Scouting Less and Hunting More." It's an interesting way to present the info, and there's a lot of good stuff in this book. Will it help you scout less and hunt more? That depends on how much you scout now... but the potential is there.

Pros

Cons

Whitetail Wisdom was an interesting book for me. The first thing I read was the author's Acknowledgements, which began with a contradictory statement:

"Although I had always dreamed about writing a deer-hunting book, the thought never crossed my mind..."

Hmmm.

I believe the author's intentions are clear, i.e. that he had never believed that writing a book on deer hunting was a realistic goal for him, though it had long been a dream of his. Unfortunately, that's not what he said, and as editor of a well-known magazine (Deer & Deer Hunting) I expected better from him. Ah well.

From such questionable beginnings, the book grew on me more and more as I read. I appreciate the author's roots in public-land hunting, and I envy his access to multiple pieces of prime hunting land.

Schmidt has done an admirable job of putting his info into a very readable form, although one quirk bothered me. I'd be happily reading along and reach the end of a page, then turn the page and find a lovely two-page photo with some kind of quick tip/sidebar info... which invariably distracted me from what I had been reading.

At such times, I had to turn back to the last page, pick up the thread again, and turn two pages to complete the paragraph or section... and then back-track to read the tip. Not a huge thing, but an aggravation for which there is no good excuse.

The text is good, and so are the tips, and the photography (mostly black-and-white in this book) is top-notch. But the flow of text should never have been so rudely interrupted by intrusive two-page spreads. It's aggravating, and if I want that kind of aggravation in my reading, I'll pick up a magazine, not a book.

This is still a good book, which I enjoyed quite well, and will likely find myself re-reading as deer season approaches.

- Russ Chastain