Hunting style

[blizzardhunter]

I hunt the KY side of Land between the Lakes. On my side is roughly 87,000 acres. It is around 99% mature hardwoods and as the name implies has a lake on each side. There are 3 particular places I like and we have been scouting. My question is what is the best method? Should I look for beds and concentrate my efforts in these areas and treat them like a lease? Learn all the inner workings of the general vicinity. Or should I look for small spots I think should hold a mature buck, go in and scout and either pick a setup for the following season or just roll out if nothing is there. I have mixed feelings on this. Sometimes it pays to know every detail of an area but you spend a lot of time looking at areas that are of no use. I feel like the oldest bucks use the points that run out into the lake and are extremely secluded for bedding. These areas are small and won't have any intrusion but at best will only serve one buck. Thoughts?

[Zap]

The next month doe activity may dictate buck activity. Its really hard to get close to a bed to hunt it without having seen it while scouting.
I would look for primary scrape areas.

[headgear]

I like to focus only on the best spots, a lot of spots can look good when you add a little rutting sign but me sitting them usually turns into a whole lot of nothing. When a spot blows me away I tattoo it to my brain, scout the heck out of it and work to fine tune my setups until I get it right. You kind of need to do this in the offseason but I would do what you can to find bedding and fresh sign and hunt it. Its that magical time of year again so do what has worked for you in the past too.

[wibow]

Good advice so far...that's a huge chunk of land! With rut just about here focusing on fresh sign and bouncing downwind of suspected doe bedding areas working the funnels and bottlenecks should see some activity. Hit the spots you've already scouted and go from there.

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[Stanley]

I personally would not hunt the points that go into the lake. These in my opinion are dead end spots and have less deer traffic than most other areas. I would better recommend bays that protrude into the timber. These would be more of a funnel effect and have way more deer traffic. This time of year bucks are moving and every day tend to more until peak of the rut.

I am using an actual picture of land between the lakes for illustration purposes only. Strictly an arbitrary location to give an example of what I am talking about. The blue line indicate possible deer travel routes. Red circles indicate bays that protrude into the timber. Yellow indicates points that protrude into the lake. See what I mean about how poor travel areas those points are?

[MOBIGBUCKS]

I agree with Stan. I have done some scouting in the past on reservoir created points and they're pretty much barren of sign. I'm sure there are exceptions but my findings show otherwise.

[Southern Man]

I agree with what you guys are saying. I'm talking about in general. Forget the rut. I'm looking at scouting for next year. October and then December. I just thought the points would might be the place to find that old buck just trying to live in piece. I'm sure a lot would be dead areas, but finding the right one would be the perfect place for the over the hill buck. Didn't know if anyone had any experience with this.

[Autumn Ninja]

Yes, I've found many large beds on the points at LBL.

Brake your scouting down into the spots you CAN get by with hunting (wind, entrance, exit)....this will eliminate a lot of ground, look for beds, food and other sign in those areas.

One thing to keep in mind about LBL, deer density is very high around the ag in the summer. When the ag comes out and the acorns start to drop, they start to disperse. So in the fall, the further you get from the ag, the lower the deer density will be.

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[Southern Man]

I agree with what you guys are saying. I'm talking about in general. Forget the rut. I'm looking at scouting for next year. October and then December. I just thought the points would might be the place to find that old buck just trying to live in piece. I'm sure a lot would be dead areas, but finding the right one would be the perfect place for the over the hill buck. Didn't know if anyone had any experience with this.

That was Blizzardhunter. He didn't log me out.

[Southern Man]

One thing to keep in mind about LBL, deer density is very high around the ag in the summer. When the ag comes out and the acorns start to drop, they start to disperse. So in the fall, the further you get from the ag, the lower the deer density will be.

Same with the hunters, what few still bowhunt up there. It seems like most still love the cropfields eeven tho there are no crops left. Those points could be some lonely hunts.

[Autumn Ninja]

One thing to keep in mind about LBL, deer density is very high around the ag in the summer. When the ag comes out and the acorns start to drop, they start to disperse. So in the fall, the further you get from the ag, the lower the deer density will be.

Same with the hunters, what few still bowhunt up there. It seems like most still love the cropfields eeven tho there are no crops left. Those points could be some lonely hunts.

The ridge tops around the ag will hold the highest doe#'s. Thats the best place to be for the next couple weeks. 90% of the hunters out there are hunting the old sign and nocturnal sign that is down low.

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