Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Discuss deer hunting tactics, Deer behavior. Post your Hunting Stories, Pictures, and Questions/Answers.
  • Advertisement

HB Store


mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 9:23 am

How have you guys handled this? I had one deer in 2013...I just could not pin down. I got tons of daylight pics of him...in certain spots. But than I would get him .75 mile away during daylight. Then get him .25 away in another direction during daylight. But a lot of 10-11am in the morning. I chased this buck hard. Another guy came in for an observation hunt and killed him 200 yds from me when I was hunting one night. I just could not pin the buck down. In fact, i was shifting cameras around and got daylight pics of the buck morning he was killed. He was killed that evening.

He was just so random. He would show up at an apple tree, daylight pics like crazy. Then gone. He would not show back up for 10days. Frustrating for sure. But, I really did not have a lot of time to chase him. Found him in August, he was killed month later.

I knew some of the bedding areas he was using.

I think there was just more luck involved with this one than anything else. Too bad, he was a beauty.

I think with a bit more time, I might have been able to pin him down. How do you handle roamers?


JoeRE
500 Club
Posts: 4576
Joined: Thu Oct 18, 2012 5:26 am
Location: IA
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby JoeRE » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:16 am

Good topic. On one end of the spectrum there are definitely bucks that have a huge rotation of bedding locations. On the other end are the ones that come back to the same spot for days on end, and then there's everything else in between.

Roamers are very difficult to intentionally kill on a bed to feed pattern hunt just by definition, you have to devote a huge amount of time to trying a bunch of spots and even then its low odds, sort of sort of winning the lottery I think. Typically I see them get killed sort of by chance by some random person, wrong spot wrong time sort of thing. Like you said, maybe the hunter was in a great sot but definitely luck THAT buck walked by! I will say late season even roamers get more predictable as they are tied to food, that can be an opportunity. Also I have noticed the most common age class for that type of deer is around 4, sometimes 5 years old. If a buck can survive older than that he will likely get less and less nomadic. I don't waste much time on a deer that I can't pinpoint, but I will keep an eye on them if they survive to late season, or year to year. Its certainly frustrating when they are the type of buck you want on your wall.
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:30 am

JoeRE wrote:Good topic. On one end of the spectrum there are definitely bucks that have a huge rotation of bedding locations. On the other end are the ones that come back to the same spot for days on end, and then there's everything else in between.

Roamers are very difficult to intentionally kill on a bed to feed pattern hunt just by definition, you have to devote a huge amount of time to trying a bunch of spots and even then its low odds, sort of sort of winning the lottery I think. Typically I see them get killed sort of by chance by some random person, wrong spot wrong time sort of thing. Like you said, maybe the hunter was in a great sot but definitely luck THAT buck walked by! I will say late season even roamers get more predictable as they are tied to food, that can be an opportunity. Also I have noticed the most common age class for that type of deer is around 4, sometimes 5 years old. If a buck can survive older than that he will likely get less and less nomadic. I don't waste much time on a deer that I can't pinpoint, but I will keep an eye on them if they survive to late season, or year to year. Its certainly frustrating when they are the type of buck you want on your wall.


And that is how he got killed. Guy came in, hung a stand and killed him. That buck happened to bed on the other end of the property that night.
I would have like to have him on my wall thats for sure. He was a real beauty. I was very excited because most of my pics were on an apple, not far from a bedding area that he had been using. I mean, show up all hours of the day. But when velvet came off...he REALLY started roamning.

Image

Image

And this the approach I ended up taking with him...just kept running cameras, moving cameras trying to pin something down.
User avatar
Edcyclopedia
Posts: 12605
Joined: Tue Jul 20, 2010 12:54 pm
Location: S. NH
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby Edcyclopedia » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:39 am

Wonder if the amount of trail cam work scented you out.

Did you park and locate cams the same couple ways?

[ Post made via Android ] Image
Expect the Unexpected when you least Expect it...
User avatar
Arrowbender
500 Club
Posts: 1613
Joined: Sun Feb 21, 2010 4:39 am
Location: Minnie!
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby Arrowbender » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:43 am

WoW!
Very Cool Buck.

I think that sometimes just pressuring one buck can make them more nomadic.

That age class of buck may not want to leave his normal range but when pressured he has no choice but to keep moving.

Might be one of those times that the cameras were more detrimental than helpful.

Thinking out loud here.
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:48 am

Edcyclopedia wrote:Wonder if the amount of trail cam work scented you out.

Did you park and locate cams the same couple ways?

[ Post made via Android ] Image


Could be. But I tend to think he just roamed. He was all over the place. He was not camera shy AT ALL. He came to the cameras multiple times after I had been there. AND during daylight.

Basically, I knew about this buck in August. 1.5mos later, he was dead.
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 11:50 am

So was he a roamer BECAUSE of the cameras OR because he was a 4yr old buck who just had that personality? Another buck he was running with, was definitely not nearly as much of a roamer. I just was not close enough where he was bedding. The other buck showed up .5 to 1hr after dark and was there 4-5 nights a week.
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 12:17 pm

And the camera he showed the most on...was 70yds from a main road. So really, was not a whole lot of walking in the woods to check the camera.
User avatar
Stanley
Honorary Moderator
Posts: 18734
Joined: Tue Aug 09, 2011 4:18 am
Facebook: None
Location: Iowa
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby Stanley » Mon Feb 15, 2016 12:26 pm

Arrowbender wrote:WoW!
Very Cool Buck.

I think that sometimes just pressuring one buck can make them more nomadic.

That age class of buck may not want to leave his normal range but when pressured he has no choice but to keep moving.

Might be one of those times that the cameras were more detrimental than helpful.

Thinking out loud here.

I believe this also to be true. In my opinion the best trail camera operators are also good buck hunters.
You can fool some of the bucks, all of the time, and fool all of the bucks, some of the time, however you certainly can't fool all of the bucks, all of the time.
Bucky
Posts: 5586
Joined: Tue Aug 31, 2010 12:35 am
Location: Appleton WI
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby Bucky » Mon Feb 15, 2016 12:39 pm

These guys are IMO the hardest to kill

Hope to find him in a doe pocket during rut... when he shows up on cam with a doe in a doe bedding area pound it for the next 2-3 days. Essentially what u were already doing. If that random guy would have not killed em.... good chance you might have got a shot same day or next. I keep hunting area in this scenario until sightings and cams cool significantly 2-3 days usually

[ Post made via Android ] Image
"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
User avatar
DaveT1963
500 Club
Posts: 5196
Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 1:27 am
Location: South
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby DaveT1963 » Mon Feb 15, 2016 12:52 pm

Habitat has a lot to do with it. When there is a lot of great bedding cover and food is abundant as browse and no real crops, deer bed in random spots. I hunt bedding areas (approach and exit) as the bucks I am after seldom use the same bed. Im lucky if while glassing a buck using the same exit or entry more then two or three days in a row at best. A big buck that uses the same bed day after day should be very killable.

[ Post made via Android ] Image
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 12:57 pm

Bucky wrote:These guys are IMO the hardest to kill

Hope to find him in a doe pocket during rut... when he shows up on cam with a doe in a doe bedding area pound it for the next 2-3 days. Essentially what u were already doing. If that random guy would have not killed em.... good chance you might have got a shot same day or next. I keep hunting area in this scenario until sightings and cams cool significantly 2-3 days usually

[ Post made via Android ] Image


EXACTLY what I was trying to do. If was not showing up in daylight, I would blame pressure...but I was still getting him in daylight at different areas I was hunting. And I was really hoping to catch him in September. I was hoping to observe him do something that I could capitalize on. Just did not happen.

Really would love to take advantage of observation stands...just not really beneficial when most food sources you would see a buck at are apple trees in cover. Many times these bucks really never have to show themselves in the open at all. They move from alder thickets 70yds to a hidden apple tree.

The guy killed him, killed him right where I had placed a trail camera week earlier. It was an area I was moving towards checking out.
mainebowhunter
500 Club
Posts: 3448
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 10:45 am
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby mainebowhunter » Mon Feb 15, 2016 1:00 pm

DaveT1963 wrote:Habitat has a lot to do with it. When there is a lot of great bedding cover and food is abundant as browse and no real crops, deer bed in random spots. I hunt bedding areas (approach and exit) as the bucks I am after seldom use the same bed. Im lucky if while glassing a buck using the same exit or entry more then two or three days in a row at best. A big buck that uses the same bed day after day should be very killable.

[ Post made via Android ] Image


100% agree -- Its pretty much...you zig, they zag. So you zag zag zag and they zig zig zig. The bedding cover and habitat availability is staggering.
IF I had observed him on his first pattern...100% killable.
User avatar
Arrowbender
500 Club
Posts: 1613
Joined: Sun Feb 21, 2010 4:39 am
Location: Minnie!
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby Arrowbender » Mon Feb 15, 2016 2:06 pm

I'm not saying it was the cams. I had two instances of similar activity prior to my using cameras.
Two different bucks; two different seasons.
They kept showing up just outside of where I saw them the last time I was set up for them. I'd move in for the kill only to have him adjust again.
One I ended up killing, One I did not.
But they both definitely knew I was after them.

I have to believe that they were both younger than the one you were after, so not exactly apples to apples.

My point is that even though they don't completely vacate the area does not mean that they are not reacting to pressure.
Whatever that pressure is.

Live and learn eh ??
JoeRE
500 Club
Posts: 4576
Joined: Thu Oct 18, 2012 5:26 am
Location: IA
Status: Offline

Re: Bucks that continually shift bedding areas. Roamers

Unread postby JoeRE » Mon Feb 15, 2016 2:59 pm

Yea if he just showed up occasionally, it wasn't the cameras. That's not typical of a buck avoiding cameras or the disturbance associated with cams. If it had been the cameras you might have gotten one picture of him and then nothing. Some bucks are just roamers. That's an awesome looking deer by the way!


  • Advertisement

Return to “Deer Hunting”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Google [Bot] and 78 guests