When would you hunt this property, (north is up) morning or evening, wind direction?
I have permission on these two parcels. The first time I hunted the property was Oct. 29 last year, with a light consistent wind out of the NNW and the temperature dropped from the low 50's to the upper 30's while I was on stand. The ridge line is predominantly covered in shag bark hickory and white oak. The nearest crop field are to the south. A Nature preserve is to the north consisting of a few hard wood ridges and a swampy river bottom. The land owner indicated that he typically saw deer movement to the south in the evening and the north in the morning. I got in my stand(blue arrow) around 4:30 in the afternoon at 6:00 p.m. a 140-150 8 pointer was casually trailing a doe and two fawns that came thru roughly 2 minutes before, from the north, crossed the river and gave me a 28 yd broadside shot, at the red arrow, traveling to the south. I had my recurve and the shot was perfect right and left but dropped just under the deer(About 3 or 4 yards outside of my effective range, my nerves got the best of me). He had stopped on his own and was completely unalerted, if I had stopped him, he may have reacted when I shot and dropped, and I may have actually killed him, but that's a mook point now. As you can see, my stand was at the 1/3 of the way up the ridge line. My thinking was maybe I can catch a buck cruising the bottom part of the ridge after the thermal shift. Any ways, what I witnessed was mild rut activity and I would like to hunt this property earlier in the season because I know there are good deer in the near area. I have since learned there is phenomenal doe bedding on the south 1/3 of the property in an Autumn olive thicket, but was very little buck sign out side of large tracks crossing the top of the point on the north end and along the 2/3 elevation and at the bottom of the ridge. The direction of travel of the tracks was as the land owner described. North and south tracks on top but only south tracks towards the bottom. How would you go about setting up and what would you do differently from what I did? Please be as critical as you feel necessary. Oh yeah and I had not set foot on the property before my first hunt, I had just reviewed aerials and topos.
When would you hunt this property?
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Re: When would you hunt this property?
I say your local is spot on where I would sit pre rut/rut.... I would pound that spots with access from the top and correct winds. It will produce.... not a one done stand local if you ask me. Spend some time in it and you will kill a good buck
"When a hunter is in a tree stand with high moral values, with the proper hunting ethics and richer for the experience, that hunter is 20 feet closer to God." Fred Bear
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Re: When would you hunt this property?
Anymore input?
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Re: When would you hunt this property?
Where approximately on the map is the doe bedding area?
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Re: When would you hunt this property?
On the southern 1/3 of the property, from the valley running NW/SE to the west edge of the woodlot, especially the north south running mini ridge on the west edge of the woodlot.
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