Trail intersections or "Hubs"

[Terry]

When scouting a new area one of the things I look for are what I call hubs. An area where several trails intersect like spokes do at the hub of an old bike wheel. As usual, terrain and cover dictate where these spots are. In some of the bigger woods I hunt there are often no clearly marked trails until you get to these hubs, so I usually follow some kind of feature until I find where it intersects another. Thickets to creek bottoms, clear cuts to swamps, where a ridge peters out to a thick patch, etc. These hubs are often the location of scrapes and rubs, and in areas with lower deer densities it might be the only place I find any kind of concentration of sign.

These hubs are great spots to kill doe and younger buck, and the occasional bigger buck when he is on a doe, but I have often been duped by the buck I am after. The mature buck don't use the same trails, so it's often a educated guess as to where he is going to show up. I try to think they like do and and set up according to wind direction and safe entry routes, but he is usually one step ahead of me. Another tactic is to find where he crosses the does entry points much like when you hunt a parallel trail and set up accordingly, again I have had marginal success.

I would like to start some discussion as to how we hunt these spots and the tactics we use.

[MACHINIST]

Good topic!! one of my main ways to kill a decent buck.One thing I used to do is set a cam on the hub to find where the bucks where traveling and backtrack from there.It usually ends up in a parallel trail like in the other thread,still a great rut tactic

[oneflag]

Great topic! I have called these places intersections but I like the term Hub better. These places will be so hot that sometimes you can smell the deer. My personal excuses are that most of the activity is at night or (since I hunt public) these spots are over-hunted. Like you said; marginal success.

[Swampbuck]

I used to key in on these type spots as they often held good rubbing and buck sign and have had success on them, but never anything mature. Interested to see if others have had success on better buck this way

[Redman232]

This is essentially how I grew up hunting and still how I hunt if I'm after meat for the freezer/does. From my personal experience, it's not the place to be to shoot a mature buck. Mature buck sighting at locations like this were predominantly out of range. Good locations for deer observation but poor for consistent big buck encounters outside of the rut. In fact during the rut I would still hunt the most likely travel route just off this type of sign and not hunt right over this sign. Here is an example of travel routes. Yellow circles are "hubs", which when hunted you can see a whole pile of deer (does and little bucks generally). Green trails are doe and small buck routes, pre rut, rut and post rut. Red trails are mature buck routes. These are mapped from scouting and visual sightings. All of the mature bucks I have seen on this property were using the red trails, no exceptions so far. As you can see if you were to hunt at the hub, there is a good chance you would not have a shot opportunity (with a bow) at the bucks. Red circle are known buck bedding.

[Terry]

Great post Redman. Your experiences mirror mine and why I made this thread. I want to find a pattern that leads to more success on mature buck at these hubs. So far I have done best by hunting downwind on faint buck trails. I have killed one this way and had two close calls including one miss.

[ Post made via Android ]

[Stanley]

This is essentially how I grew up hunting and still how I hunt if I'm after meat for the freezer/does. From my personal experience, it's not the place to be to shoot a mature buck. Mature buck sighting at locations like this were predominantly out of range. Good locations for deer observation but poor for consistent big buck encounters outside of the rut. In fact during the rut I would still hunt the most likely travel route just off this type of sign and not hunt right over this sign. Here is an example of travel routes. Yellow circles are "hubs", which when hunted you can see a whole pile of deer (does and little bucks generally). Green trails are doe and small buck routes, pre rut, rut and post rut. Red trails are mature buck routes. These are mapped from scouting and visual sightings. All of the mature bucks I have seen on this property were using the red trails, no exceptions so far. As you can see if you were to hunt at the hub, there is a good chance you would not have a shot opportunity (with a bow) at the bucks. Red circle are known buck bedding.

I agree with this.

[oneflag]

There is buck sign at these intersections. I believe that most of the (mature) buck sign around the hub is done at night. Hunters like me have put themselves right over top the intersection knowing that this increases your odds of seeing deer, it works and we all have done it.
It works for a lot of guys, plus low pressure and rut could produce a mature buck.

You could Beast Hunt the buck beds just as Dan and others do. My issue in Hill country is that deer are most times between me and the mature buck bed and based on the wind and thermals a buck has several beds. I get busted by deer way too often. The faint buck trail like Redma232 pointed out is something I will hunt. But; it’s mentally hard to sit out of range of a hub and see deer movement at that intersection. I have spent a bunch of time over the years on that faint red buck trail.

I have to remind myself what has been said before on this forum; am I hunting deer or mature bucks?

[Bigburner]

I hunt a particular spot in big woods where there are monster overstory oaks, yellow poplar, hickory and a super thick holly mid-story, hardley any understory/ ground cover and flat as a board. I often see deer ahead of me when accessing spots in the interior to hunt. When I encounter a deer/ group of deer (when they don't see me first) on the way in I back out a little ways to the nearest small opening. Really the only way to hunt this spot is in the small openings They are randomly scattered throughout the tract. But every small opening has a hub like you described. I'll sit on that downwind side of that hub and often times have does come in and bed right underneath me or on the opposite end of the openings. Really effective for this particular spot during the rut. These openings vary in size from maybe 40x40 round or maybe a little oblong. The farthest I have ranged across one was about 25 yards most are much closer . Last Octber I had two really nice bucks one 130+ 8 pionter and 1 140+ 10 pointer dogging does all through these openings. Both skirted me at 25 yards within 5 minutes of each other on the opposite upwind side of the opening. Everything around them is so thick you can't get an arrow through anything. I had another nice buck skirt one of these spots right after I killed a doe. he walked up her blood trail and then parralleled the edge of the opening. The funny thing is I saw him and a spike right first thing in the morning in the field next to the area (I have to access it in gray light). The spike payed me a visit while gutting the doe a little later on. Anyway, those little hub areas are pretty active especially coupled with my circumstances in my spot. The cool part is is that on this particular piece of public the state has box stands all around the perimeter of the WMA and you can access it with portable gear as long as you are 100 yards away from the permanant stands. The deer go nowhere neer these but run all through the adjacent woods in daylight hours.

[JoeRE]

Great topic. I agree with pretty much everything that has been said by everybody. What I would add is sometimes where trails come together in hubs the trails actually fade out because deer are cutting every which way from one trail to another and not using any one path in the hub. Its a common mistake to walk through these areas and not realize what is going on, if the heavy trails fade out as they come together. You can miss a trail hub this way. As has been said mature bucks don't waltz right through that often (I think because bucks learn tight funnels/trail hubs often attract hunters) but they do use the areas in a different manner, often cutting across trails coming together in a hub scent checking them so hunting just off the hubs (often but not always downwind) can be really successful.

[JakeJD]

Good stuff...

[Redman232]

Great topic. I agree with pretty much everything that has been said by everybody. What I would add is sometimes where trails come together in hubs the trails actually fade out because deer are cutting every which way from one trail to another and not using any one path in the hub. Its a common mistake to walk through these areas and not realize what is going on, if the heavy trails fade out as they come together. You can miss a trail hub this way. As has been said mature bucks don't waltz right through that often (I think because bucks learn tight funnels/trail hubs often attract hunters) but they do use the areas in a different manner, often cutting across trails coming together in a hub scent checking them so hunting just off the hubs (often but not always downwind) can be really successful.

I agree with this, if the trails don't all meet at one spot and appear to fade out, you typically should be able to notice leaves turned to confetti or compacted from the foot traffic. Seems to happen a lot around inside corners on crop fields.

[Terry]

As has been said mature bucks don't waltz right through that often (I think because bucks learn tight funnels/trail hubs often attract hunters) but they do use the areas in a different manner, often cutting across trails coming together in a hub scent checking them so hunting just off the hubs (often but not always downwind) can be really successful.

This has been my experience and how I learned to hunt these hubs, but like I said before the success has been marginal. It might not get any better than marginal and maybe I should just take it for what it is. Either way it is another tool in the bag and gives me an option when I have exhausted all others or when I need to do something different.

Another thing I wanted to add is that in bigger hunks of land where the deer have more space to roam I think these hubs are more important than on small hunks of agriculture type land. Large hunks of space don't lend themselves to concentrated deer movement like smaller ones.

[dan]

Hunting season is short... If you want a big buck, don't waste days hunting where big bucks don't move in day light.
Anybody remember the article I wrote called "are little bucks stringing you along?"

[KLEMZ]

Another thing I wanted to add is that in bigger hunks of land where the deer have more space to roam I think these hubs are more important than on small hunks of agriculture type land. Large hunks of space don't lend themselves to concentrated deer movement like smaller ones

I repectfully disagree with this if we are talking about mature bucks in big chunks of land. It is my experience that there are so many travel options (trail hubs) to choose from, that only sheer luck will put you on the right one. In big woods situations, I think your best odds of a close encounter with a big buck are going to be at the destination points...buck beds (all season). Doe beds (rut). Food source (if you can find it in the big woods...good luck with that!)