How do you stay on top from two hours away?

[TravisB]

How do you stay on top from two hours away? All the public land I plan on hunting next year is two hours away average. Let's say I go scouting after our season goes out, and find some beds. Let's say I find 5 buck bedding areas, since this will be my first time looking for them, and I don't really expect to just walk out in the woods and start finding beds everywhere. I can't shine deer, and even if I could, the distance wouldn't make it feasible. I don't really want to leave a trail cam out on public land, and checking it would also be tough because of the distance. There is about an hour between each public area, so I can't go to one, say this doesn't look good, and go to another. How are you able to stay on top of what's a hot area from that far away? The only option I can think of right now is, if I find a bed, try to figure out which wind a buck would use that bed, and just go on that wind, hoping he's not a mile away, but having no clue. It's going to be very hard to hunt a specific buck like this, but I'll take any mature buck. I realize it's called hunting, not killing, and there's always an element of uncertainty involved, but what kind of game plan do you come up with hunting long distance?

[MOBIGBUCKS]

I scout everything in the off season and figure out the when, why, and where I'm going to setup the day I'm scouting. Sometimes it take 4-5 weekends to scout the areas I'm most interested in. With all of that info logged into my GPS and computer, I'm confident I can put myself in the right areas at the right time. I also break down bedding areas by their importance and amount of usage. At the start of the season, I'm hitting the best primary areas I can based on the wind. I can only make so many trips being 2-3 hours away so I do my best and stay confident with what my scouting showed me. It doesn't always work but you gain information from one year to the next; I think sometimes it takes several seasons to figure an area out.

[hunter_mike]

I had a big buck encounter this year on a tiny piece of public 2.5 hours from my house. I scouted the bed in the spring and glassed the property from a distance 1 time in late August. I saw the buck come out with a smaller buck right out of the bedding area. I knew that the bed was basically going to be wrecked as soon as there was any kind of hunting pressure so I hunted it as soon as possible. So basically hunting one of my best spots first before someone else did was important that time.

Mainly though, I wouldn't have took the time to hunt it if I didn't have some kind of clue that it was being used. Without shining or trail cameras, you are left with glassing from observation spots, checking food sources for tracks and even better if you can see a bed from a long ways away, visually checking it. Theres no easy way to find out if a buck is using an area thats for sure. One thing you could do that would give you an edge, and I wish I did it more is getting out to your hunting areas early in the morning and since its public you will do no harm by walking areas where a lot of people already walk. One thing thats been eye opening to me ever since i joined this site is how you can walk piece of public and in some areas there will be literally zero deer sign and all of a sudden you see some tracks and suddenly theres tracks rubs scrapes everywhere. Finding stuff like that is basically what got me my little buck this year, but the trail cam said there were mature bucks around too.

[dan]

Sounds to me like you lack one of the most important ingredients... Confidence.

When you find buck bedding areas there are some important questions you should ask yourself, like "when" does a buck bed here? Why does a buck bed here? What wind direction?

You don't have to shine him... You don't have to glass him... Just hunt the bed when you think the time is right and see what happens.

[hunter_mike]

Sounds to me like you lack one of the most important ingredients... Confidence.

When you find buck bedding areas there are some important questions you should ask yourself, like "when" does a buck bed here? Why does a buck bed here? What wind direction?

You don't have to shine him... You don't have to glass him... Just hunt the bed when you think the time is right and see what happens.

Thats awesome Dan. Makes me think about a couple beds I scouted last year that looked good but I never hunted. You are right, what would I have had to lose by hunting them. Its not like I was having much success anywhere else. Something i need to work on.

[TravisB]

Sounds to me like you lack one of the most important ingredients... Confidence.

When you find buck bedding areas there are some important questions you should ask yourself, like "when" does a buck bed here? Why does a buck bed here? What wind direction?

You don't have to shine him... You don't have to glass him... Just hunt the bed when you think the time is right and see what happens.

No lack of confidence, I just haven't even found a bed yet, and was wondering what kind of approach some people take when they have to hunt a place they can't stay on top of. If anything, my confidence is through the roof for next year after watching the videos and reading here. A lot of stuff I've seen and questioned over the years all makes sense, now.

[keb]

Just scouting is all you can do and hunt smart and hard, my stuff is all 1.5 to 5 hrs away, I am in process of scouting new stuff 1.5 to 2.5 hours away right now. Its a better option than hunting close to my house due to pressure. Most of my hunting has revolved around the rut.

This year I am going to be more felxiable and hunt early, mid season places closer hint the 1.5 to 2.5 range, waiting on the 1st cold fronts of the season and be able to ditch work and go for a 1 to 3 day hunts. Rather then put all my luck in the hands of the rut gods.

[Bigb]

I hunt 3 hours from where I live and hate that aI can't scout as much as I like. For me, I try and make sure I have a great mental picture of the area (which I've learned over the past three years). I take a digital camera with me when scouting and take pictures of everything,trails, trees, views from ridges, view from potential beds, everything. With digital cameras you can erase pictures without a care but a good picture is worth its weight in gold later on. Then, when I find good spots, I cyber scout. Google earth with the topo overlay is the best thing I have discovered (Thanks to this sight). Then I try and cyber scout when and where I think deer will be bedding, traveling and feeding then using that to my advantage. I'll print out a map, make notations then next trip check out those spots and spots I have found before. Using that and the things I learn from this site I usually can figure out some great spots for stands. A permanent stand I put up last year from info I learned here and cyber scouting has gotten myself and my buddy two great bucks in the past two years. I'm no expert that's for sure, but I've picked out new spots to check out and when I get there and they are better than I expect, it really helps build self confidence in ability.

[Mario]

I think if you can scout the are once or twice with GPS then do some scouting with topos and Google maps you can be fairly confident in your stand placement. Plus anytime out in the field successful or not is fun and a Learning experience. If you check out the hill Country bucks specifically the hunt that Dan does it was all done with cyber scouting based on elevation points.

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[Czabs]

Not only is finding the beds important but knowing what food source he is most likely hitting at that time you hunt is a huge factor on telling you what bed to hunt. Lets say you find 2 really good looking buck beds/bedding areas. Both are located near reasonable trekking distance to a couple fields and a patch of oaks. I would leave extra early to hunt to find out what is planted in the fields and spot check the oaks and make a gut instinct call on what food source you think a big buck will be hitting, then setup accordingly.

[PK_]

I am in same situation. I Get dirty during season, scouting for the following year. I basically burn a lot of bridges by diving in and scouting when I am there hunting. I have to know where the bucks are and are not during hunting season, the only way to do that is to go find them during season or just after. But because of the distance I cannot make as many scouting trips as I would like right after taking off a bunch of time to hunt.

I would recommend lining up a lot of areas this spring, scout as much as you can. What you can't scout on foot, hunt blind. Anywhere you hunt whether you kill a buck or not get in there and scout before you leave.

My basic strategy goes:

1. Scout midday for fresh sign near bedding or suspected bedding.
2. Hunt over fresh sign evening and then following morning.
3. Late morning, dive into bedding and see what is what.
4. Repeat.

I have gotten onto a lot of bucks and a lot of prime bedding by doing this in the last couple years.

[keb]

I think if you truly believe the ground house the deer you are after it's worth the compromise, I have spots close to my house I know like the back of my hand, I have places I don't know as great but those places produced bucks in a few days I could never harvest close to home.

I find there other little things you can do to improve your odds in the woods since the back 40 is not put back, get in tip top shape mentally and physically. I don't care what people say about having to be in good shape about deer hunting, you can be a fat slob and kill deer, but when forced with obstacles both mentally and physically and last a season you will be a cut above the rest

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[James]

I focus mostly on public near home and hunt private the further away I get. It's much easier to have consistent success for me on quality private when my scouting time is limited by distance.

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[Buckfever]

Unfortunately the late season beds aren't always the same beds, that said I think you're over thinking it. This is the time to make quick work of a property. You can find the rubs especially the staging areas, the doe bedding areas, you can find the main rubs and get a general feel for how they're running. From that you can certainly figure out your rut funnels between bedding and considering the topography, the high probability sets for how they run.

Once you have that you can then really start keying in on where the buck bedding is for your non rut hunts. That's why for me I like finding the concentrated tall rubs. Once I have the staging I think about the big picture for the rut and the big picture on the food sources, then I think about the buck bedding and I'm not saying it's easy but at that point there aren't a whole lot of pieces left. From there I just backtrack till I find the bedding, usually an isolated bed or beds in a real tight spot, with just one or a handful of rubs tight to it. It's like a signature, you'll know it.

One of my favorite public pieces is an 1:45 away and it's taken me several seasons to really figure it out. Actually right now I'm running 2 cameras set up high facing down on the 2 main buck runs to take inventory.

I'd rather do 13 quality sits in a season on the right property with the right genetics and moderate pressure, that I've done my homework on, than unlimited hunts on highly and unpredictably pressured public with diminishing quality nearby.

2 hours isn't bad make it a day drip get out there early pick a section that is interesting to you that maybe won't get pressured for some reason and figure it out. Plus it's good exercise.

[E72]

The public land I'm hunting now is an hour and 45 minute drive. Ive hunted two spring turkey seasons in there and first time this fall for deer. I totally avoided easy access trails, parking lots and it paid off with deer activity right away. Just starting to figure out a small area but will be making some late winter scouting trips this year since I caught the big woods public hunt bug. Also will be in there for spring turkey , its loaded with birds.