when do you guys start scouting ?
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when do you guys start scouting ?
Any tips for my first year of "Beast style" off season scouting ? I usually don't bow hunt after the regular 9 day gun season, & was thinking that would be a good time to start looking for beds & rubs... the only thing is though, how do you know if that buck is still alive ? He could have got shot the week before by someone & obviously will not be back..
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
Feb-March is probably my favorite time to be out.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
solocam88 wrote:Feb-March is probably my favorite time to be out.
ya, the deer never use to stay on our little 60 acres of woods because it was so wide open and no cover... But we logged last year, quite heavily, so there already is some great cover, so I'm hoping some of those deer will use our land this year and I can get a better grasp on where they are.... As it was, they would all congegrate to the south on most of our neighbors land, and you would see them out in the fields in the winter time all grouped up....
So if that's the case, and they are somewhere else for the winter months all grouped up, when do they start filtering back into their regular summer homes ? Does the woods need to be getting green already , or is like you said solocam, can you start looking in Feb-March already ?
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
When the snow melts you can see sign left from the prior season; beds, trails, rubs. You dont need deer living in there at that very moment to see their patterns. The woods at this time will also closely resemble what it looks like in the fall so you will know what cover is availible, how close you can get to buck beds and how much trimming you need to do for your stands.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
You can pop in and scout now if you want. You might screw it up for this year but your scouting for next year anyways. Or you could find some beds now, and then spot check around them for tracks going in once we get snow. Scouting right now will give you a for sure look at what's going on in the fall. Also if you find good bedding areas after gun season it doesn't make a huge difference if the buck got shot or not because it's likely another buck will take it over before next season if that's the case.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
All the above posts are really good info. I'm tagged out in WI, so my scouting for next season is already underway.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
solocam88 wrote:Feb-March is probably my favorite time to be out.
X'S 2
Plus right when the snow melts because everything looks exactly how it was in late fall just before it snowed.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
Wrinkleneck wrote:All the above posts are really good info. I'm tagged out in WI, so my scouting for next season is already underway.
X2 as soon as your done hunting. Once you don't have to worry about spooking deer for this season have at it. This is probably the absolute best time, as you will see what deer are doing during the season. Finding fresh beds now will pretty much gurantee, they will be used in season next year, unless some there are some major changes to the landscape between now and next season.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
I never stop scouting, but the best time IMO is just after the snow melts off completely.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
I am always scouting/spot checking. Majority of my areas are for in season, not summer patterns. Find the hot sign and hunt. Spring scouting is more for finding the areas that slobs like to bed. Make notes and review just before or during the season, then spot check to see if something of interest is there.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
dirt nap giver wrote:I am always scouting/spot checking. Majority of my areas are for in season, not summer patterns. Find the hot sign and hunt. Spring scouting is more for finding the areas that slobs like to bed. Make notes and review just before or during the season, then spot check to see if something of interest is there.
What do you mean by "spot check just before or during season"? Do you go to those beds and bump whatever is there, to know what exactly is using that bed ?
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
dreaming bucks wrote:dirt nap giver wrote:I am always scouting/spot checking. Majority of my areas are for in season, not summer patterns. Find the hot sign and hunt. Spring scouting is more for finding the areas that slobs like to bed. Make notes and review just before or during the season, then spot check to see if something of interest is there.
What do you mean by "spot check just before or during season"? Do you go to those beds and bump whatever is there, to know what exactly is using that bed ?
I think what he may mean is that he sneeks in by the staging area and checks for sign that shows that there is a buck using that particular bedding area during the hunting season and is ready to hunt it right then. Depending on the freshness/size of the sign(tracks, rubs, ect.) he decides whether to hunt that spot or not. If not that's what I do when I spot check an area during the season.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
No I don't bump them. Typically the deer change their pattern a couple weeks before the season begins. They do this because the extreme pressure they receive from last minute hunters setting stands and scouting. With that said, I have a lot of areas that I have located "generational rubs" and beds. However, majority of these areas are not holding the caliber of buck that I am interested in, because some one or some thing has happened to them. I need to have some sort of evidence that he is the one I want to pursue. Then there is also the fact that just because there was no evidence last week, doesn't mean that a different buck has moved into the area this week. Very seldom does this happen, but occasionally it does, and I want to know about it. As far as the sign I check, it's the entry, not the staging area. Majority of what is written/videoed, doesn't apply to my area.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
Because I am limited in the amount of land I have, I don't do a tremendous amount of in season scouting unless the locations I had set up for in the spring are cold, then you really have no choice but to carefully look for new sign. If I have to scout in season, It is basically a stalking hunt wind in my face and slow as she goes moving through the woods.
However I am back out there shortly after season ends looking at all the seasons rut sign...and winter feeding patterns and bedding, because it seems to me the bedding is significantly different in the hard winter months than it is near green up in the spring. But am hoping learning the late winter bedding areas will help me with the lack of success I have had in the late season in years past. I can't really concentrate greatly on food sources because they are primarily agricultural and rotating. I think over time though I can build a knowledge database of preferred foods when certain fields are in certain crops and will help also.
Since the Beast I scout with a plan, but much different than I used to scout. I used to have these hard fast rules about the locations I would hunt. Used to be that I would hunt food sources until the last weekend of October and then I would switch to funnels and the likes using rut tactics. Now I hunt early season as close to known buck bedding as possible and don't switch to rut areas based on approximate dates but strictly on the sign. It was a slow and late rut around here last year and for myself and everyone else I had talked to weren't seeing hard core chasing last year until abround the 20th of November which is crazy late. This year everything I am reading and hearing is saying they are moving early this year. So you have to plan you hunts according to the sign otherwise you could spend a lot of uneventful time on stand.
However I am back out there shortly after season ends looking at all the seasons rut sign...and winter feeding patterns and bedding, because it seems to me the bedding is significantly different in the hard winter months than it is near green up in the spring. But am hoping learning the late winter bedding areas will help me with the lack of success I have had in the late season in years past. I can't really concentrate greatly on food sources because they are primarily agricultural and rotating. I think over time though I can build a knowledge database of preferred foods when certain fields are in certain crops and will help also.
Since the Beast I scout with a plan, but much different than I used to scout. I used to have these hard fast rules about the locations I would hunt. Used to be that I would hunt food sources until the last weekend of October and then I would switch to funnels and the likes using rut tactics. Now I hunt early season as close to known buck bedding as possible and don't switch to rut areas based on approximate dates but strictly on the sign. It was a slow and late rut around here last year and for myself and everyone else I had talked to weren't seeing hard core chasing last year until abround the 20th of November which is crazy late. This year everything I am reading and hearing is saying they are moving early this year. So you have to plan you hunts according to the sign otherwise you could spend a lot of uneventful time on stand.
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Re: when do you guys start scouting ?
I'm really scouting all year long. Now most of my hard core scouting is done after the MN rifle season to see if anything survived and then again in the spring. But at any time during the year I get some free time I like to check out new areas, scout for mature bucks and talk to people and see if they have seen any nice deer in a given area. Its kind of hard to go anywhere and not wonder where the deer are even if I have zero chance of ever hunting that land. There is just something about sizing up a new area that is fun. I've got about 10-15 new spots on my hit list but I am also learning to need to hit some of my old spots again and learn them even better!!! You just can't have too much intel about a property.
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