Terrain - The important details

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DaHunter
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Terrain - The important details

Unread postby DaHunter » Mon Dec 14, 2020 1:10 am

When it comes to mature buck movement, how do they move different than other deer? Specifically "WHY" do they take the trails they do (which are often different than other deer)?

I know they like to feel secure and typically stay in cover but there's even more to it than that, right? We can walk an edge and find 25 trails coming through/out of a swamp, but what's the best one and why. Thermal pull? Wind effects, Pressure(obviously), something else? For those that have figured out the small details, let's hear what you think.


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<DK>
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby <DK> » Thu Dec 17, 2020 11:54 am

Id hate for this post to die bc youre asking a great question. Unfortunately its been talked about on here tons of times. Theres so much that can be said about it unless youre speaking about a specific scenario.

However, this Don Higgins video speaks about and shows exactly how a mature buck like to act. He shows a few hunts out of the same tree. I was going to share it elsewhere but great video!! Hope this helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcsvET0syYE
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Evanszach7 » Thu Dec 17, 2020 10:52 pm

Was about to recommend Don Higgins' new video about giving bucks the wind, then saw DK's post. Haven't seen this one yet. Looks like he's still teaching the same thing 10+ years later, so he believes in it. 90% of the encounters I have, and the couple guys I hunt with, happen when the bucks feel safe coming into the set.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Rsnyder » Fri Dec 18, 2020 3:08 am

Outstanding thank you
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby d_rek » Fri Dec 18, 2020 3:26 am

<DK> wrote:Id hate for this post to die bc youre asking a great question. Unfortunately its been talked about on here tons of times. Theres so much that can be said about it unless youre speaking about a specific scenario.

However, this Don Higgins video speaks about and shows exactly how a mature buck like to act. He shows a few hunts out of the same tree. I was going to share it elsewhere but great video!! Hope this helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcsvET0syYE


It's when I watch videos like this it makes me think i've been hunting the wind completely wrong all along
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Bowhunting Brian » Fri Dec 18, 2020 4:06 am

DaHunter wrote:When it comes to mature buck movement, how do they move different than other deer? Specifically "WHY" do they take the trails they do (which are often different than other deer)?

I know they like to feel secure and typically stay in cover but there's even more to it than that, right? We can walk an edge and find 25 trails coming through/out of a swamp, but what's the best one and why. Thermal pull? Wind effects, Pressure(obviously), something else? For those that have figured out the small details, let's hear what you think.

The trail with the biggest track in it? :think:
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Bio1 » Fri Dec 18, 2020 4:59 am

Dang good video - I know Don - good idea to listen whenever he is talking deer. Kills giants every year.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Lockdown » Fri Dec 18, 2020 8:11 am

I only got 12 minutes in to that video, but Don obviously knows what he’s talking about. I’ve had my scent blow over deer many times, but never on purpose. This is what happens when all the scent control freaks say a buck was strait down wind and they didn’t get busted. You know for a fact their scent never hit that deer’s nose. I guarantee that’s why Eberhart hunts 30’ up.

This fall I had a doe and fawn come 3-4 yards down wind of my pine tree set (I’m roughly 7’ up) and they never smelled me. Right as I was packing up another doe came in and took a different trail. She was 20-25 yards down wind and she picked me off easily.

I’m going to have to re-think a few of my sets.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby MichiganMike » Fri Dec 18, 2020 9:15 am

Lockdown wrote:I only got 12 minutes in to that video, but Don obviously knows what he’s talking about. I’ve had my scent blow over deer many times, but never on purpose. This is what happens when all the scent control freaks say a buck was strait down wind and they didn’t get busted. You know for a fact their scent never hit that deer’s nose. I guarantee that’s why Eberhart hunts 30’ up.

This fall I had a doe and fawn come 3-4 yards down wind of my pine tree set (I’m roughly 7’ up) and they never smelled me. Right as I was packing up another doe came in and took a different trail. She was 20-25 yards down wind and she picked me off easily.

I’m going to have to re-think a few of my sets.

Looking forward to watching this video! Hearing a lot of good things about it. I like john and have had some good interactions with him online etc. Hes a Michigan guy also and has some great tactics and insight on how to get on bucks. But I agree- Im not completely sold on the scent free regiment and if your over 25 ft in a tree your just blowing over the top of them usually. Problem with it too makes for a steep angle shot.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Lockdown » Fri Dec 18, 2020 9:38 am

d_rek wrote:
<DK> wrote:Id hate for this post to die bc youre asking a great question. Unfortunately its been talked about on here tons of times. Theres so much that can be said about it unless youre speaking about a specific scenario.

However, this Don Higgins video speaks about and shows exactly how a mature buck like to act. He shows a few hunts out of the same tree. I was going to share it elsewhere but great video!! Hope this helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcsvET0syYE


It's when I watch videos like this it makes me think i've been hunting the wind completely wrong all along


Right but it’s never as easy as a guy thinks either. What happens when your 15 mph wind falls to 6-8 mph right at prime time. :think: A guy would really have to be paying attention to the forecasted wind. And I’m sure there would be times when the wind dies down sooner than it’s suppose to which could easily spell disaster.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby sdonx » Fri Dec 18, 2020 9:56 am

Can't wait to watch the video. I heard a podcast this year, I forget the guy who said it, I really like it.
He compared buck and doe traveling to him and his wife shopping.
Wife walks all over the store looking at everything, He walks right to what he needs.... something like that.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Boogieman1 » Fri Dec 18, 2020 10:26 am

I watched it and I always enjoy Dons stuff. But what he didn’t mention or maybe I failed to hear is what time of season we are talking about. I admit early season a mature buck is gonna have the ball in his court to move in daylight. I don’t have a cold food based late season so I don’t know.

However, I have spent a great deal of my life hunting the rut and I don’t think wind direction really is a player except for getting in/out. You give me a drizzly day and a cruising buck I would put my money on quartering downwind to start. I also believe they make circles so what they just scent checked quartering downwind will be a quartering nose wind the other half of circle.

Some conditions cause air to rise and some conditions cause air to sink. A buck is lead by his nose and doesn’t think about it just follows the air. There are also places a buck can stand and smell the entire area. These places are learned by older bucks Imo.

All I’m saying is during the rut u just don’t know based off wind direction. If he cuts a hot track he is coming, if he’s trailing behind a doe he is coming, if a more dominant buck just tossed him from a thicket he is moving in a direction away from that buck. I like to personally hunt a wind that makes sense for a buck and also keeps me from blowing at deer. Don’t think there is such thing as a right or wrong answer. If a man always sets up for a nose wind then every deer he sees backs his theories.

At least for me who has some cams out and keeps track of weather/wind I’ve never noticed a correlation.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby oldrank » Fri Dec 18, 2020 11:04 am

I killed my buck this year exactly how he is showing. I put my wind to the bucks advantage. However the area was very tight and really gave him a false sense of security. Our paths crossed as my wind crossed his trail, right in my shooting lane. I do this on a few of my setups. Particularly if there is a defined edge where I can wash scent into a neutral area, just as he shows with the field.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Evanszach7 » Fri Dec 18, 2020 11:21 pm

oldrank wrote:I killed my buck this year exactly how he is showing. I put my wind to the bucks advantage. However the area was very tight and really gave him a false sense of security. Our paths crossed as my wind crossed his trail, right in my shooting lane. I do this on a few of my setups. Particularly if there is a defined edge where I can wash scent into a neutral area, just as he shows with the field.


Same with my buck this year. Came in from my 4 o'clock, my wind was blowing to 5 with thermals pulling it to 6 down a ditch. Just off wind.

It's taken me awhile to figure out the "neutral area" or picking a spot where I want the wind to go... open hardwoods, towards a pressured area, a lake, somebody's yard, over the buck, etc. Pair that with giving them the wind... gets pretty dynamic.
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Re: Terrain - The important details

Unread postby Grasshopper » Sat Dec 19, 2020 2:32 am

Lockdown wrote:
d_rek wrote:
<DK> wrote:Id hate for this post to die bc youre asking a great question. Unfortunately its been talked about on here tons of times. Theres so much that can be said about it unless youre speaking about a specific scenario.

However, this Don Higgins video speaks about and shows exactly how a mature buck like to act. He shows a few hunts out of the same tree. I was going to share it elsewhere but great video!! Hope this helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcsvET0syYE


It's when I watch videos like this it makes me think i've been hunting the wind completely wrong all along


Right but it’s never as easy as a guy thinks either. What happens when your 15 mph wind falls to 6-8 mph right at prime time. :think: A guy would really have to be paying attention to the forecasted wind. And I’m sure there would be times when the wind dies down sooner than it’s suppose to which could easily spell disaster.

In the type of terrain we have here in Pa there aren't too many places where you can get a consistent wind direction. I like trying to find locations where I can make my wind work out over the deer and they do exist, but they are few and far between and only work with certain weather. It seems like the "good deer movement weather" days are the toughest days to get good wind.


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