woody-san wrote:Before I say anything else, this is a gem of a thread! This sent me on a topo/aerial photo bender, all week!
Question:
Do you guys think that bucks will do, for lack of a better term, "hub hopping"? What I mean is, say you have a series of these high crow's feet between where a buck beds and a bean field 1 mile away. Looking at some topos showing this sort of set up, I'm thinking a buck could hang out in a thermal hub then take the shortest/easiest route up and out of that hub and into the next one. From a buck's perspective, it seems like they could hop, hub to hub, until they reach food, using the falling evening thermals in each hub to get scent info. Seems it could work for the buck, regardless of prevailing wind direction.
Yes! I've personally documented it with trail cameras! Prevailing wind direction is still important, but this definitely happens in the whitetail woods.
You typically won't observe the behavior in the evening. Legal shooting light will come to an end before the buck enters the next hub. However, cool, wet, calm mornings are a golden opportunity to take advantage of this movement. The more wetness, the more prolonged the movement. Also the cool side of the ridge tends to have longer thermal activity too.
Place your stand high just off one of the points that divides the hub taking advantage of any funnel, bench, etc. (even if subtle).
Keep in mind you will want to move once the sun heats everything up or the wind picks up. Typically, on these types of mornings I'll set up as I've stated above for the first couple of hours. Then (if necessary) move to the leeward size to take advantage of the mid-day cruisers. If you are hunting relatively skinny ridges, the last hour is golden in a falling thermal set on the cool side of the ridge as you will have a rising thermal on the warm side of the ridge and falling thermal on the cool side (i.e. buck can smell entire other side of ridge from the cool side).