I remember going to the drugstore downtown in my early bowhunting days, more than a half-century ago now, to buy those pink Dr. Scholl’s foot pads you put in your shoes to cushion the soles.

But my feet weren’t sore. My pride was.

A fat 6-point southwestern Wisconsin buck had been sauntering along the ridgetop trail I was watching that morning, but the whitetail paused midstride before entering my carefully cut shooting lane when my arrow slipped off the rest, making a tiny (to me) tink against the then-newfangled compound bow’s riser.

The sound was barely perceptible to my ears, even though they were, what, only 30 inches away?

My fingers finagled the arrow back onto the rest. But the tink was all that nice little buck needed.

Through colorful oak leaves I could see his ears swiveling to and fro, back and forth, this way and that, before he took a careful step backward, flicked his tail, turned off the trail and ghosted away through the brush.

Green and black permanent markers darkened up the pink material before I cut sections of it to size, peeled off the backing, and placed the pieces on all the business surfaces on the inside of that old bow’s riser.

That buck wasn’t the last whitetail that outsmarted me because he or she heard something amiss. But the lesson he provided was one of the most important I have ever learned in the whitetail woods: Deer hear good. Real good. They trust their ears. Really trust them. Every big precaution you can take and every tiny detail you can master, to silence all aspects of the hunt, will make you a more successful whitetail hunter.

Ears Overlooked

Rightfully so, we deer hunters pay attention first and foremost to trying to beat a whitetail’s nose. Special clothes and scent-reducing sprays are fine, but playing the wind is the only truly reliable way to give yourself a chance in this department.

You can smell like your old high school gym locker and still fool a whitetail’s nose … if you respect the wind.

Secondly, we pay a lot of attention to staying out of sight and unseen. Camouflage garb (including facemasks or face paint, and gloves) is the first line of defense against a whitetail’s eyes. But it is errant movement that must really be avoided and conquered.

You could dress in a clown suit and still fool a whitetail’s eyes … if you stay still and avoid movement at the wrong time.

But there is a third, and most overlooked, capper to the trio of whitetail senses that we have to beat: their hearing.

Easy Science

You can read entire articles, book chapters, research studies and other literature about the whitetail’s sense of hearing. It can all be fascinating indeed. But it all boils down to a few simple facts.

A person can get wonky about the “frequency” of what deer hear, as measured in the scientific measure known as kilohertz (kHz), basically low and high and low range. Humans hear best in the 3 to 5 kHz range. Whitetails hear best in the 4 to 8 kHz range. Those are very comparable numbers.

The difference is, deer can also hear down at the lower end of the spectrum (as low as .25 kHz), as well as the higher end (up to 30 kHz) … places where human ears are useless.

Bottom line? Whitetail ears are more sensitive. Extremely more sensitive. Sensitive enough that if you don’t already respect a whitetail’s sense of hearing — and even if you do — you better think again.

As humans, we like to enumerate such things, asking questions like, “Just how much more sensitive or better are a deer’s ears than mine?”

That is an impossible number to build, with dozens of variables involved in even just defining what “more sensitive” or “better” is, but let’s explore a few more facts to get an idea of what kind of multiple we might be talking about.

The average human ear has about 6 square inches of inside surface area to catch and funnel sounds toward our inner hearing apparatus. The average whitetail ear conservatively has about 30 square inches of such sound-gathering inside surface, calculated as follows:

An average ear size of 6.5 inches long by 3.5 inches wide, and adding a factor of one-third for the concave nature of the ear. 6.5 X 3.5 X 1.3 = 29.575, we’ll call it 30.

Six square inches compared to 30 square inches. That’s five, yes 5, times more surface area, per ear, to gather sounds. There’s a reason we tiny-eared humans cup a hand to our ear when we think we hear something, or want to hear something better. Whitetails have a five-times-better chance of catching that noise on the first try.

Enough numbers. Let’s talk about some physiology.

A whitetail can rotate its ears independently, this way and that, in every different direction imaginable, at the same time. This behavior is extremely effective at pinpointing sounds. This behavior also allows a deer to work on pinpointing those sounds without turning its head, a larger motion and giveaway to predators.

I get a real kick out of watching whitetails do “their ear thing.” It can be almost comical to observe. Except when they are using it in high gear it to booger you because of an errant noise you made.

You want a final number for how much better a deer’s ears are than ours?

Let’s assume at least double (2x) the hearing sensitivity. We figured five times (5x) the sound-catching surface. That’s 10 times (10x) better hearing than humans, just for starters. Add some undefinable factor for the ability to rotate, twist and turn those ears like little radars, and where do we get to?

It really doesn’t matter. Deer hear good. Real good. You better respect those ears and their hearing.

SIGN UP TO GET D+DH IN-DEPTH NEWSLETTERS

Golden Silence

Whitetails trust their noses first, their eyes second and their ears third. As whitetail hunters we do a lot to try and beat a deer’s nose and eyes. We should examine all our approaches and do more to assure it isn’t the ears that “get us.”

Being quiet isn’t rocket science. But it is work. Here are seven things you can do, or take to another level, to make sure deer don’t hear you.

Invest in quiet clothes.

Get rid of any old, loud stuff. Fleece, wool and other “soft shell” clothing makes little to no noise when brushing up against something. Go silent for your hat and gloves, too. Code of Silence is a great option.

Silence your gear.

This includes everything from silencing your bow surfaces to strategically padding a treestand in key places, against clunks and bonks. If you are on a rifle hunt, pad whatever you might be using as a shooting rest. Stealth Strips are another good option.

Create a quiet route.

Cut a lane or path to get to your stand silently. Whether it is the last 30 feet, 30 yards or third of a mile, do what you can to assure a final, silent approach. A hand saw, lopping shears and rake will do wonders for your whitetail-hunting chances.

Take a longer walk.

I have spots where I could park a hundred yards from my stand and maybe get by. But why push luck? I choose to park farther away and do more walking to avoid the pitfalls of getting ready too close to my hunting spot.

Do the Grab-and-Go.

Eliminate noise at your staging spot. Everybody knows not to talk, yak, slam doors and the like at the vehicle. But you should also get your gear 100% lined up, organized and ready beforehand for a fast, smooth and silent process before stepping off. Streamline.

Vary the pace.

We are predators at heart, so it is natural to try and walk quietly. That is a worthy goal. But don’t sweat it. One way to help is to not walk at a steady pace like a human, but make pauses, change paces and mosey along, sort of like a deer or other animal would. It will arouse less suspicion.

Know that talking is taboo.

Walking is fine; we have to do it. But we don’t have to talk. The human voice is the most foreign and alarming sound a whitetail can hear. A whisper is almost too much in the whitetail woods, so keep it down. Way down. Better yet, don’t even whisper. Invent some sign language to communicate with a partner. Enjoy true silence.

Conclusion

Compared to a whitetail’s nose and eyes, we whitetail hunters consider our quarry’s ears as, perhaps, not as much of a worry. That’s just wrong. A whitetail’s sense of hearing is magnificent, indeed. Understanding and respecting that fact, and then working harder to control all of the factors that can put whitetails on audible alert, is the only sensible course of action.

— Tom Carpenter has been writing for the Deer & Deer Hunting Community for almost 30 years now, and trying to beat whitetail’s ears for more than 50.