General rut hunt question- trying to put it together this yr

[dbltmn]

Hey guys.

Thanks for all of the great posts. In the last week I have gone back through every one of the 211 pages of topics and read anything of relevance to getting on some deer. As I have mentioned before I am hunting Nicolet forest, no ag, not a large population of deer and tons of land for them to be. Sept was ok I had some sightings but with the rut coming I need a game plan. I have read about saddles and pinches, cruising bucks ect. I have studied topos of my area and though I would not say I hunt in extreme hill country, there are land features that I can see relate to hill country. I have a mix of a few cedar swamps, large thick pine plantations, oak ridges, and a massive thicket where a tornado went through 7 years ago and is now just a tangled web of brush and new growth spanning a half mile wide and miles long.

I have found deer sign in and around the lower levels of topography but am I understanding that this sign is more from night activity? I have read here that the day activity will be up high. Is that more of a rut scenario? And if so should I be picking my spots for my vacation time during the rut mostly based off of topography and not fresh sign? I guess I am saying should I find the tightest saddle or skinniest ridge connecting other land and set up on it even though there is no abundance of deer sign looking for bucks that are in search of does?

I hate to ask questions that have been covered, but there are new members, more experience, and always stuff left out when reading about strategies and I hope to get some more info to help pick some decent spots with confidence this year.

Last year the gun season hit when bucks were still wandering. My neighbors shot 6 bucks in 5 days all in high ridges. My son and I saw 0 deer and we were hunting thicker pine and popple woods. Not the real high sharp oak ridges.

Thanks for any offerings of tactics. I will follow up. First two fresh scrapes yesterday. Whoot Whoot

[Bucky]

Do you know of any "for sure" doe bedding areas?

The scenario you describe is some of the hardest to hunt unless you are very familiar with the area = scout a bunch

[dkoy85]

First, are you able to use trail cams on the property you hunt or not for fear of them being stolen? I am a huge believer in trail cameras during the rut- especially in doe-ie areas. Granted the land I hunted was 400 acres of private ground, I still believe this is the best way to locate a hot doe and find out when the bucks are really on the move.

The last 3 years on this particular ground the four of us hunting it had cams out and pulled the cards every hunt we were near the camera- we put them in areas just outside of doe thicket beds but where we had very easy and quiet access to pop in and grab one or two cards a hunt. We set them up on trails coming out of the thicket at the intersection where these transition trails crossed the trails that ran parallel with the thicket(the trails bucks like to cruise down wind of the bedding).

As soon as we saw a dandy or a parade of bucks using these trails we knew it was on and hunted the downwind side of these parallel trails and caught the bucks popping in and out of the cover or running parallel trying to get a wind full of- you know what.

Over these three years we managed to shoot or get a shot at the biggest and oldest bucks we knew in the area, and without exaggerating we shot them the day or two after we got first pictures of any of these bucks. In fact, last year my buddy and I hunted different areas of one particular thicket (roughly 150 yards by 150 yards) where we knew a doe was coming into estrous from the number of bucks hitting this thicket the night before and shot our mature bucks within 1 minute of each other- His buck must have pushed my buck out the opposite side- at 1 pm. One of my more memorable hunts to date.

When this happens hunt these downwind parallel trails and hunt them HARD and all day sits- the last 3 years on these setups I had opportunities at least once each year and they came between 11 and 1. Hunt that very thicket day in and day out adjusting sides of the thicket with the wind until you know the doe has either moved on or has been bred.

I hope this helps and if you decide to try it good luck- it's a lot of fun!! And I can only imagine it working even better and the doe thicket being even more of a draw with lower deer densities.