Movement along River beds

[NYBackcountry]

I'm scouting a swamp along a river bed and have some questions about movement. I was able to locate some good doe bedding and a few buck beds in the swamp, unfortunately not a lot of big buck sign. My question is, the trails running parallel to the river appear to be heavily used. It looks like it's probably used mostly by does and some young bucks. How do you guys typically see bucks travel these routes? I'm thinking probably off the heavy trail downwind but parallel to that heavy trail and downwind of the bedding if possible.

The cover is typical for this setting, it goes from knee high swamp grass to chest high grass/fern looking things (no catts) to thick growth to the trees along the river.

[Josh_S]

I think reading Stanley's "parallel trail" thread would be very helpful

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=15803&hilit=parallel

[daveynewman]

Yea they will have a faint trail scent checking good find

[jporcello]

check out this youtube video from the hunting public guys. this may be another option for you at crossings.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkdEZ5AyKr4

[NYBackcountry]

Thanks guys, I just bumped a creek/river thread from the all time tactical that really helped.

I was thinking about Stanleys parallel trails post too, that was my first thought. I just dont see how it would apply, the heavy trails seem to run parallel to the river. Because the trails are so heavily used I assume theyre does and young bucks. So in order for the mature bucks to scent check the parallel trail they would have to cross them and then cross the river, just didnt seem to make sense. I'm going to hunt it a couple of times and see what happens but the thread i mentioned above seemed to help quite a bit.

Theres a heavily used crossing, the other side of the creek is some ag. so I think I'm going to put my set close to the crossing but within bow range of the heavy trail as well. Kayak access for the hunt.

Just watched the hunting public scouting video the other night, good stuff. Thanks for the suggestion J

[Evanszach7]

I’ve got a similar setup in Ohio where I back tracked the heavy trail to oxbow bedding (primarily doe). The parellel trail for me doesn’t intersect the doe trail until it’s about 250 yards downstream. At this point the doe trail would go straight into a very open flood plain, but instead it makes more of an S away from the river, along the terrain edge, then forks up to ag or to more bedding in an old crp off the river. Buck trail intersects near the fork. There’s a pre-rut/rut buck bed about 100 yards from oxbow bedding and one of the exit trails parallels with a 50-60 yard gap most of the way. Wouldn’t have found it except for tracking the buck.

Wife found a shed in a similar setup on a different piece. I was following sign, she happened upon it. Once she found it I could just make out bits of the trail. Some of these trails are easily overlooked.

[UofLbowhunter]

1-The mature buck trails will be faint, not worn to dirt and usally 20+ yrds of worn trails on down wind side, in thick cover!
2- big bucks are not afraid to cross water, they will walk or swim in it daily. You would be surprized what i have found out what they cross in a days time. Even when not pressured!
3- be a pretty good guess if the fields are pretty close to the other side of the creek, and its pressured, the bucks are probably not using it till right at dark or first thing in the morning if your lucky!
4- you may be thinking about the wrong wind. If you thinking they have to cross a river and be close to ag in a more open environment, there probably not goin to do that, try think for what ever the oppisite wind would be to puy them in thick and be down wind of the trails....

[NYBackcountry]

I'm going to take some time and put a picture up in a minute for some visuals.


Heres the link to the other thread I was talking about.

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14670&start=45

[NYBackcountry]

[jporcello]

cant see the pic

[NYBackcountry]

cant see the pic

I've got it on the Hunting beast photo album or whatever its called. I cant seem to get the image to appear in the actual post. If you right click it and hit open in a new window it should pop up if you have an account.

[Cuzzinfish]

Don’t know if I It helps, but I had a similar situation on public in Ohio along a creek. The bucks were bedded up against the creek (within 20 yards) in the oxbow itself. They would cross the creek occasionally if the wind switched. The parralel trails were used by both the does and bucks so it made it hard to distinguish rut movement. Then I looked closer and discovered that the doe bedding was actually on the transition (cover and terrain) between the hardwoods and creek bottom. The bucks could scent check one particular doe group in this spot just by shifting their bed within the oxbow and never had to travel. They also would just get up and start moving up or down stream without the need to cross trails because they could scent check other doe bedding with the wind. Mostly the faintest trails had the (very sporadic) buck sign.