How long till success at being a BEAST!

[dan]

I have noticed a few people struggle a year or two when they switch gears and try hunting BEAST style then all of the sudden there knocking down some serious bucks like the light just turned on. I am sure the amount someone puts into learning and hunting this way varies. I remember Singing Bridge telling me that the 1st hunt he ever did beast style resulted in a kill, but I bet thats not the norm... There is a learning curve. I think its a progressive challenge where you take a step back into unknown territory, but then start to move forward and learn more at a faster pace...

So lets hear your beast story... What terrain you doing it in? How have you done? Do you see better results? Did you kill your biggest buck since switching gears? Are you still struggling?

Tell us from the start of switching over, to now, how the journey has been... I know some of you were hunting similar before coming here, for you it may be smaller forward moves, and maybe there are some that are failing.. Still, would like to hear your stories and struggles.

[dagger]

Well here goes, I live in southern NH and had hunted for 14 years. My success rate was a deer every other year. I had alot of big bucks on camera but counter seem to shoot any. Last year a friend of mine showed me a trail cam pic of a corker and within a few weeks he shot it, then he shot two more that season, all mature bucks. I said to Him that's totally unheard of in NH and after much prodding he lent me your hill country and marsh bucks videos.

I watched them and the light came on. This year I shot a mediocre buck but it was my first beast style buck in hill country and I was so sure I would at least see a buck that night I would've been shocked if I didn't. I've never been able to expect to see something when I go out. I've gotten to the point now where every hunt I go on now has a purpose and if it doesn't I do in season scouting.

I can hardly wait till next season to delve into some big swamps that I've known for years hold good bucks but had no idea how to hunt them. NH is tough because deer sightings are few and it's hard to make any solid deductions but after starting beast hunting I've been able to see that the deer here are no different than anywhere else.

I'm fully confident that if I play my cards right the big boys are going to start laying down. Just this year only one season into beast hunting I've been able to cyber scout areas and put myself and other people into buck bedding areas consistently. Im still in awe at this hunting style.

This year I hunted way less than I ever have and the fourth time I went out I shot a buck. I wish I would have found the beast many years ago because I'm positive I would have a wall full of corkers by now. Im only 30 yrs old now so hopefully many more years to hone the skills. I have two boys and three girls and I can't wait to be able to pass this beast style to them first hand. It's exciting for me to think my boys will be able to start their hunting this way instead of having 15 yrs of randomness first.

My wife is from MN and grew up on a big dairy farm and she has a pile of brothers that I hunt with out there. I went there for the first time to hunt this season and was able to break down the property we have to hunt out there and was able to get us seeing bucks the first season I've ever hunted there. So anyhow, I hunted very little this year and shot one, saw several shooters but couldn't close the deal but it was my most productive season ever and I can't wait to continue hunting like this. Some day I would like to visit in person with Dan. Thank you Dan and all the beasts out there, the best hunters in the world are on this site!

[Lockdown]

I just finished my 3rd season using Beast tactics. The first season was rough as I joined during the summer and didn't get to spring scout before green up (crucial element).

At that time I was on a steady streak of solid kills, and it ended up being the first year of my life that I didn't tag a deer in 20 years of hunting.

Tag soup tasted terrible so I hit the woods hard spring of '15. That year I did a LOT of learning. I made mistakes reading sign and ended up hunting doe bedding with rut sign in it. I picked the wrong time of the season to hunt a few bedding areas. I also learned the key to a successful bed hunt is clean access. Not only the route you take but ensuring you aren't stepping on sticks or snagging branches. Learning the hard way isn't fun, but it's the best way to learn.

I had the best season of my life and passed more does and bucks than any other season. I ended up tagging a decent ground pound 10 point (archery) using some tricks I learned from the success from the ground thread. I also had a close encounter with a mature public land 10 pointer during "The Lull" which never would have happened without Beast tactics.

Luckily for my hunting, work was slow spring of this year. I put on over 70 miles while scouting and prepped 20 some brand new sets. I believe there is a definite "snowball effect" when it comes to the learning curve with these tactics. I was putting forth the effort hunting, shining, in the field and cyber scouting, and keeping journals of each.

Come opener, confidence was high and I'd located more shooters and bedding areas than ever. Opening night I had a target buck (3.5 yr old 7 point) at 50 yards. Yet another huge confidence boost! I saw deer 14 or 15 consecutive sits which is 3x higher than my previous high.

I also came as close as you can get to wrapping a tag around a big velvet mulie in SD. Unfortunately my shot wasn't true.

Through the MN season I passed quite a few yearling bucks and some does. I hit a bit of a rough patch during rut, but ended up doing a complete 180 and tagging my #1 buck. A 162 5/8" MN giant. (Shotgun kill). I also put my Dad and a friend on their bow bucks, which was very rewarding.

So I bested 2015 and had my best year AGAIN. This spring will be my 3rd season spring scouting and I am excited. Time will be an issue for me this year, but when I do get time to get after them, I will be in the game every hunt.

[Crazinamatese]

Im struggling still. But this last season I kicked it into high gear and seems like Im finally on the right track. Maybe??? I don't want to take anything for granted.

One thing I had going for me this last season was time. I finally had enough vacation time from work to take an entire week off to hunt. And that paid off in alot of ways. I ended up seeing two shooter bucks that week.

Looking at years and season past I figured that two things got in my way. Not being aggressive enough and not having enough time to hunt.

[hunter10]

Here goes, I grew up in a non hunting family besides my papa down the road. He was the first to put me in the hunting life. I used to go over for lunch and then he'd give me the pellet gun to shoot birds in the backyard.. soon enough I was shooting the bunnies in nanas garden and the passion grew until I was invited to hunt with a friends gun week for deer. I was hooked. I hunt all farmland consisting of small blocks surrounded by crop fields connecting fence rows etc. Unfortunately I didn't have much for mentors except one guy who I am very grateful that he allowed me to tag along. First time meeting him he said " if you want to come hunt with me go buy yourself a climber and I'll set you up" he has some racks on the wall and hunts great land. For a few years I tagged along and saw 2 mature bucks. Being new, I didn't understand much as far as the in depth knowledge and methods needed to target big deer although I had more drive than anyone to make it happen. Eventually I shifted to hunting alone and eventually found the beast a couple years ago. Until then I had shot many deer but only 1 mature buck to my name. Long story short, I read a lot and learned that if I wanted to be successful I needed to be more mobile, find beds, understand deer behaviour, hunt the thick, get into better land and stop over hunting stands. This season was the turning point in a big way. I shot 2 mature bucks with the bow. First buck I caught early season sneaking back into bedding. Second was based on knowledge of feed and a bedding area. Looking back over the previous years, the mindset was much different and put me out of the game.. now a days if I get out of the truck at a bush I'm not longer thinking where is the easiest area to get to? Where's the best funnel etc. It's all part of growing as a hunter but the beast has saved me many years of wasting time in the woods and Althouvh I may not shoot a proper deer every year I feel I can get on to them better than any other year previous.

[Aaron1987]

This was our first year as a group hunting with this style. We've had success in the past using similar tactics but this was the first year that we concentrated on buck bedding. The Beast, Dan, JoeRE, and many others turned me on to this style of hunting and boy did it every work.

After doing some podcasts with Greg Litzinger and Dan, we began exploring the buck bedding theories. It's just something you don't hear about around the hunting industry(where most of the info is....well....unrealistic ). We've spoken to several "tv hunters" that kill big bucks consistently about the bedding theories and they looked at us like a bunch of fools. But to each their own. Their methods never worked where we hunted so it was time for a change.

In mid-summer of 2016 we started scouting for buck bedding. We'd pick a spot from map scouting and dive in. After a dozen or so scouting trips we'd found some solid areas that looked promising for the fall. The unique thing with public lands in our part of the state is that there is some diversity. They all hunt differently. We have some big timbered areas with hills, ridges, and ditches. We've got some swamps and creek bottoms, farmland, lakes, rivers, etc. It was interesting to compare and contrast buck bedding tendencies on the different areas.

The season brought us all-time highs in mature buck sightings, encounters, and kills. Luck obviously plays a role but I attribute the main reason to the change in tactics. Once we started seeing mature bucks in these bedding areas during daylight in early October, it all began to make sense.

At the end of the early Iowa archery season we'd filled 4 out of 5 tags on mature bucks (and the 5th guy had numerous close range opportunities). Most importantly we learned more this year than ever before. I don't know how someone could have more fun. It was awesome.

I'm lucky to be able to hunt more than the average person and sometimes kill bucks by hunting hard-not necessarily smart. The long-time beasts on here are much more proficient hunters than we are and I look forward to learning more from them in the future.

[jwilkstn]

I had been applying some beast tactics already before joining here and refining my approach. I was already a very mobile hunter, and focused on getting in tight to bedding areas and quietly setting up. I hunted the wind and thermals. I already scouted more than anyone I knew. I was already big into using maps to identify good hunting spots. I already hunted some public land in addition to private, and was already a somewhat successful hunter with a 3 year old buck pretty much every year and all the does I can eat. I killed my biggest buck at the time last year, a 122" 10 point that I had some intel on. I finally killed him in the rut by hunting the does.

As I reflected on that buck this offseason and thought about my others, as well as analyzing my trail camera intel from leaving them up on my best travel corridors, it occurred to me that:
1) I basically only had success killing bucks in the rut
2) My "best" spots on the farm were really only good enough to give me a chance at a shooter buck two days a year outside of the rut
3) I would be better off saving my farm until the rut and focusing on hunting public land leading up to it

I knew I wanted to do some things different, I just didn't know what. I had read articles over the years about your success and had probably adopted many of my hunting tactics from you without remembering it, and I had even stumbled upon this site a time or two in the past. Unfortunately, I had only read the link I had clicked on to land here and went on my way. I think it was from listening to old Wired To Hunt podcasts this summer that led me here for good.

The refinements I've made to my approach so far are the reason I killed my biggest and oldest buck to date this season. He was also only the second nice buck I've ever killed that was not with, or trailing behind, does at the time. The biggest keys I have learned and applied:
1) Bucks often have specific beds and they do not bed in the same beds as the does. I started to seek out buck bedding
2) Afternoons are more predictable for catching a buck leaving his bed than mornings for trying to catch them returning. I started choosing the afternoon on days I could only hunt either/or
3) Do not dismiss hot sign in the vicinity while choosing a specific tree to hunt. I killed this year's buck as a direct result of this change

Also, I discovered I wasn't scouting nearly as much as the average beast member. I scrambled this fall to change that, and still spent much of my time on public land going in blind because I did not find what I wanted while scouting some areas. This post season that will change. I'm gonna log some serious miles in rough terrain to learn it as well as I know my farm and be much better prepared for next season.

That leads me to your specific questions. The terrain I hunt varies from the mountainous Cumberland Plateau, to high hills/steep valleys, to flat/swampy all in my home county within a 30 minute drive. I hunted mostly the flat ground and the mountains. The flat ground I really struggled with finding bedding, despite a supposedly higher deer density. It's extremely thick, and since I was often going in blind I just hunted the edges and looked for signs of feeding and fresh buck sign. I didn't see a shooter doing that in my dozen or so hunts there. The mountainous areas I had no trouble finding buck bedding. However, I have yet to find primary buck bedding. What I have seen is used occasionally, but not with enough consistency to be ideal. These areas see zero human intrusion in the offseason, and it seems they don't feel the need for the best possible bedding until the season. Just a guess on my part. I have to really get with it scouting both of these areas.

I definitely saw less deer total per hunt this season than years past, but because I was in thicker cover and closer to the deer I had a higher percentage of what I did see in bow range.

I'm one deer season in to my journey on becoming a beast. I still have many lessons to learn, and I am hungry to continue the pursuit of becoming better. To sum up, I struggled some this season but ultimately had my best success by taking my biggest buck.

[Hawthorne]

This was my second year using and stand and sticks with beast methods and I've killed a couple does and a 2 year old buck. Nothing mature but that's more reflective of the areas I hunt. My goal for 2017 is to get on better ground and find areas that hold older bucks. I will have to travel further probably to antler point restriction area of the state.

[PK_]

Hunting for mature bucks is a slippery slope that is steepest at the bottom.

Personally I feel like I have digressed in the last couple seasons. I feel like I know more, also know how to learn more while in the field hunting/scouting. I also feel like my cyber scouting is much more efficient. I think my digression is more from other responsibilities/focuses and the fact that I don't care as much about killing a buck as I used to. I used to go full bore every day of every hunt because I needed to kill a buck on a hunt to feel satisfied or successful. I am not that way anymore. I still hunt hard but it is different. Can't really explain it.

But from what I have seen on the forum, if a guy has the time and desire, about 3 seasons after he joins this site, watch out. Some guys have early successes with beast style but it usually doesn't remain consistent until a few years. The. There are some guys who are already stone cold seasoned big buck killers before they ever join this site...

[n.sampey]

I remember it like it was yesterday... I got in my treesaddle for the second time, and took down my largest louisiana buck after only a hand full of sits... I had only been beast hunting for about a month... this was in 2014.... Two years down the road and it improves every year. I have taken my two best bucks to date this year, and my buddy has taken his largest last year and 2nd largest this year. I havent noticed a moment where it was like a ahh haaa moment, more of just little things getting put together as you experience different obstacles.... Also you have to learn how to base the beast tactics to your area.... The bucks down here dont seem to do what alot of the northern deer seem to do as far as bedding.... Most beds I find are within 70 yards of parking area no matter what type of terrain I hunt... In the hills its not many beds where they should be it seems our deer want to bed along where the humans always are at so they can see them at all times..

[tgreeno]

Ok...I'm an old dog trying to learn new tricks. I'm 52 and have been bowhunting since I was 12. I have hunted both private and public land. In the beginning I pretty much shot the first buck that gave me a shot. I had great success filling my tag most every year with 1/2 to 2 1/2 year old bucks. And alot of doe's.

Maybe 12 years ago I started being more selective. Since then, I have had inconsistent luck shooting bigger bucks. I have a few bucks on my wall that are in the 120's. Another handful that are between the 100-120 range. I don't think many of the areas I hunted really held huge bucks.

5 years ago I started strictly hunting public land. I started scouting much harder and much deeper than I ever had before. I only hunted maybe 6 different spots all year. And definitely over-hunted all of them. I filled my doe tag about half the time. And haven't shot a buck. I shot and lost the biggest buck of my life last year. I'm guessing it was possibly a 140 buck. The hit was too far back and I failed to recover the deer. That one hurt!

Then I found the beast. I probably only had 4 or 5 true beast style bed hunts (out of 50 sits) this year with only seeing one shooter buck. I had some good rut activity but only on smaller bucks. So all in all, it was a struggle this year. My scouting has taken another step up and I had more spots than ever before. I didn't hunt any spot this year more than 3 times. And this was my first year ever doing in-season scouting. I feel like I've learned alot this year, but still have alot to learn.

[JoeRE]

Has a lot to do with hunting "basics" that are often acquired pre-beast mode.

I grew up hunting everything that moved as a kid. Hunted to eat, was out there after something or other 100+ days a year I bet. That is the ultimate incentive. Bow hunted for about 15 years before I found this site. Was putting some pieces of the big-buck-puzzle together before this but have found a lot more in the 4 years since then. Can't believe it is 4 years! The whole time successful hunts have just sort of built on each other. I had a very broad education in hunting and woodsmanship first though, that is a huge factor. I will say it again and again...gotta have that base before you get very far up the ladder.

I don't want to sound big headed though, I want to stay a novice till my last hunt in the woods. This place is awesome because there are always new ideas, new angles. Once you think you know it all you might as well hang it up.

[oldrank]

I became a member on this site a few years ago but I had purchased the old Marsh Bucks dvd back in 2008. I started applying the tactics then and was having better success on public almost instantly. I dont want to go into a long sappy story but shortly there after my younger brother was diagnosed with rapid progressive MS. A few months later my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Needless to say hunting took a back seat to many things In my now changing world. After the passing of my father and brother and a few chaotic moves , life settled enough to where I could spend sometime hunting how I had before again. I lost my Marsh Dvd somewhere and wanted another which lead me back to Dan and eventually here.

My tactics have improved and my quality of the hunt has improved. My overall buck size has improved but I dont feel I have hit the highest level. I am killing the second tear bucks. There are bigger ones that just keep slipping me. I am very close but I honestly dont know if it will ever happen. I hit a wall this year. Im not sure if it was burnout or what but I lost something. Hunting pressured public is not easy. Maybe I dont have what it takes. I know the balance of life and hunting is difficult to maintain and I dont see anything really changing that can tip the scales in my favor. I work. Im married with kids... Ill be the same next yr and the year after. We will see what my Beast future holds.

[mag1]

Oh boy, Ok, I started hunting Central Wisconsin when I was 12 (1981 or 1982). Can't remember which season. Typical gun hunting. Moved out of state for a few years in the late 80's, didn't hunt, then restarted in 92. Gun hunted till 2002. I would get the occasional doe, and only had one small buck at that point. I had seen numerous big bucks, but just couldn't capitalize on them. I started bow in 2003, seen some great deer, but had a hard time in the marsh, swamps we have in ne wi. I also only have limited time. In 2006, I found the "blood brothers" site and the org. Marsh bucks DVD. I started seeing improvements each year, but it took me till 2011 to get my big one, and I have been on a drought ever since. Time is the big factor. I'm in the right spots, just not always the time. This year up I have seen 3 that where outside the ears, and have found some unbelievable beds/rubs. I believe next year will be different. I plan on concentrating on a difficult to access spot, but the sign is awesome. I typically only spend about 40-50 hrs in the woods a year, so it's not a ton, but eventually I'll get there.

[creepingdeth]

All of us being different, we probably measure success differently. I'm the typical buy a tag, put up stand, then hope to get lucky guy. Gun hunted up nort (iron range) about 4 seasons and thought picking up a bow and trying south part of the state. Terrain AND bow , totally foreign to me.Knowing before the season I was not very ready, I gave it a shot.My public land experiences were almost comical....combination of my goofs and other hunter encounters were exasperating. This year my goal was to get in a tree(mobile) and have deer and people not know I'm there.Entry, exit, wind, and thermals. I had the chance of a few walking under my stand and did'nt get busted. Maybe a small victory for others, huge for me. Found the beast right before the opener , learned about how important those 4 things are. Next I'll work on more places other hunters dont go. Lots of public water and landlocked pieces around here. So, I felt a little bummed after this bow season, but after watching hill country bucks (santa visited), I felt better because it all made sense to me. I know w/out the work, poor results.Always something to learn.Looking forward to spending time in some new places prior to the melt and before greenup. Thanks so much to you Beasts for putting up w/me!!I'm smarter than last year so I feel successful. Just need something to show for it and it will happen.