How Would You Hunt This?

[BA-IV]

How would you hunt this exactly?

It's a long leaf southern pine plantation with thick underbrush everywhere BUT this little spot is a group of oaks and blowdowns that's been damaged by the last hurricane and it's THICK. I remember last year going in and cut an oak for firewood and seeing a lot of rubs nothing huge but it seemed like deer were bedding in there. How would you hunt it and with what wind? I'll go look at it in the next couple of days.

I'm new to the Beast style of bed hunting, it's not hill country or marsh just southern pine plantation so the it's hard to decipher for me just what to do based off what you guys are posting. That L shape is a fence line with another ok e thicket belongin to a neighbor. The spot I'm speaking of is the ultra green spot in the dull green forest.



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[TNstalker]

Got a topo view?

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[Hawthorne]

I would scout the interior transitions on foot to find beds. Then plan out your hunt from there. I see some open areas those I would look at first at the transition line. There might be beds right in the corner of that road also if its thick enough

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[BA-IV]

Where the crosshairs are is where the spot is.



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[TNstalker]

Which way is north an what is ur predominate wind? Also u could use an aerial overlay to see which points have some of the open or thick areas on them. There are several points that look good I'm on my phone so can't mark. But I do like 321 324 left of 319 is a little rise there an one left of that. But not sure what's ur most common wind. An I scout this elevation a lot up to 650 the beds are hard to see so any flat spot or what u think looks like a bed check it it takes a few times just looking at what u think is a bed to figure out what is an isn't a bed.

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[msailor]

Bed Hunting isn't a magic potion. You need a better idea what's going on in the entire area you are hunting. Deer aren't confined to the area you showed us in your post, they are going to travel thru thousands of acres. To answer your question "how would you hunt this?", you need to know where the deer are coming from, going to, and what are they doing in the area you can hunt and why they are doing it. You can't effectively hunt this area until you answer those questions first. After that you will be able to determine a proper ambush point.

[BA-IV]

Very true and with most of the property and public land I hunt doesn't have much terrain and it's a lot of mature southern piney woods. Deer can bed virtually anywhere but the key I guess is finding a reason for them to bed somewhere specific especially big bucks. I'm relating what I'm reading to my country and going to see just how it pans out for me this year. This style really has my brain working cuz it's based off good common sense.

[ Post made via iPhone ]

[msailor]

Very true and with most of the property and public land I hunt doesn't have much terrain and it's a lot of mature southern piney woods. Deer can bed virtually anywhere but the key I guess is finding a reason for them to bed somewhere specific especially big bucks. I'm relating what I'm reading to my country and going to see just how it pans out for me this year. This style really has my brain working cuz it's based off good common sense.

[ Post made via iPhone ]

Brain working = good. Question, hypothesize, plan, execute....over and over again. If you get a chance to scout this spot again let is know what you find.

[cbigbear]

Can you post a more zoomed out view? Also where are the access points?

[Ruger]

I'll be watching this closely Ben.

Bow hunting mature pine forests has got to be one the most frustrating things I have ever tried. It took me exactly two trips to decide to go back to hunting hardwoods.

[BA-IV]

I went and looked this spot over, and really didn't care for what I saw. It's already been green for months here now but you can still see old rubs. These pines have an understory in em that pretty much means they can bed anywhere.

I did kill a mature 10 point two years ago working a scrape at dark, it's a primary scrape that's used year after year and it pretty much seems like he's bedding in a huge short pine thicket that needs a rabbit to show you around the place it's that thick. It's hard to pin point one distinct bedding area.

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[Ruger]

Having said that, I do feel like you need to find an area of short pines/clearcuts that are basically impenetrable without detection. This is where the deer will bed (as a whole) through the day IMO. While I don't see this scenario lending itself to TRUE "beast style bed hunting" as trees are not readily available in these areas, that doesn't mean knowing where the beds are located doesn't help. I see you doing well hunting transition areas where the short pines meet more mature stands of pines where there are trees available for setup at entry and exit points. In the evenings, they will be following the edges of the thick stuff, browsing while going to more substantial feeding areas, coming back from feeding in the morning entering their sanctuary (hopefully in legal shooting times). I think you have to find their travel routes and where they are entering and exiting the bedding areas and setup to ambush them. Remember, food sources may change as the season progresses in your area and you may find the travel patterns in and out of the short stuff changing. Human pressure will change their routes also. So don't be afraid to move and don't get discouraged when two days after the season has started, they are no longer even on camera in the areas that were smoking hot only a week before the season.

In the mornings, I'd set up as early as legally possible in bedding areas as far away from the WMA's entry point(s) and wait on bucks traveling to their sanctuary from human pressure. If you can find a ridge beyond a swamp/boggy area, that might be a key spot to set up, but it will be hard to get there with time to spare.

If your public hunting has anywhere near the pressure ours has, I think getting as tight to the bedding area in the evenings (they will leave their sanctuary late) has the highest chance of success in the evenings.

Good luck