Beds.

[Bayshorebuck8]

Wondering how one goes about solidly nailing down what time of year a bed gets used,besides actually busting them out. i find alot of beds doe and buck but am newer into hunting beds and am finding myself losing confidence on my setups on beds i found in late winter spring especially around home in the marsh.

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[oldrank]

Ive noticed alot of my late winter or summer beds dont carry over. Mostly because of human intrusion. Goose hunters wipe alot of ground off my map before I ever get a chance to hunt it.

One little tid bit i noticed this yr however is dont give up on some off these beds. I found a great bed right off the human trail last December. If I stand in the right spot I can see the bed as I walk down the trail. Well all of bow season when I hunted this area I looked n nothing. I started writing it off. I figured it was a random rut bed maybe a cruiser used. Deep in my mind I knew all the sign i found was still in season last yr so something wasnt adding up. Well i was hunting during my vacation n went in early that day. At about 1:00 I decided to move to a new area for the evening n on my way out bumped a buck out of that bed. He was using it when pressure was low midweek. He had to have came into it late morning n was watching for human entrance. Because I dont fit the avg hunter pattern of hunting just a few hrs in the morning I caught him. He probably beds there frequently watching that trail n slips away before hunters ever know he is there. During weekend pressure he is never secure so only uses it mid week with correct wind.. I didnt hunt it this yr but next yr i have a plan.

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[Bayshorebuck8]

Wow interesting rank thanks for the input , i hope nwxt year you whack one out of ithat bed, ill keep an eye out for the story or follow your journal!

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[oldrank]

It pretty crazy for me to try n think about a buck "thinking" about using a certain bed during mid week. But if u think about it, I see it more as conditioning. On a Saturday guys start coming into the woods early.. The early birds r there at 5 am.. Then the guys that cant get up early show up. The guys that r scared of the dark show up.. Small game hunters show up.. Bikers, hikers..ect ect. That trail has human activity all day. The buck beds else where.

Come monday thats all gone. Pressure comes in as guys get out of work. Or a thirds shifter might hunt a few hours in the morning.

He had them patterned. He gets to that bed about 10-11am n sets up to watch the human trail for the evening hunters. I came in on his back side cause I was leaving instead of coming in n snuck up on him. He wasnt expecting that.

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[Bayshorebuck8]

Pretty awsome though really, the average guy really doesent have a chance.

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[oldrank]

Yeah.. Kinda reminds me of an old dog that knows what time his master gets home n starts looking out the window.

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[dan]

Wondering how one goes about solidly nailing down what time of year a bed gets used,besides actually busting them out. i find alot of beds doe and buck but am newer into hunting beds and am finding myself losing confidence on my setups on beds i found in late winter spring especially around home in the marsh.

[ Post made via Android ]

My most success comes from hunting beds used all year... Primary beds. Generally primary bedding areas have a lot of buck beds in a small area... But, I do still have success on seasonal beds. Some are easy, cause they revolve around a certain food source that is only around temporarily, or because its cover based and the cover is only good at a certain time frame... Others are not as easy. In the case where you don't know, or want to confirm your guess, my advice would be to throw a stand at it early season, once during rut, and once late season and see when it has action...

[Bayshorebuck8]

Good points made thanks dan.

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[fishlips]

I struggle with this one a lot. I have found a fair number of beds over the years but have not found many primary beds and don't think I am great at spotting a primary bed.

Not to hijack the thread but how do you guys know you are looking at a primary bed vs a seasonal bed or secondary bed?

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[whitetailassasin]

Wondering how one goes about solidly nailing down what time of year a bed gets used,besides actually busting them out. i find alot of beds doe and buck but am newer into hunting beds and am finding myself losing confidence on my setups on beds i found in late winter spring especially around home in the marsh.

[ Post made via Android ]

My most success comes from hunting beds used all year... Primary beds. Generally primary bedding areas have a lot of buck beds in a small area... But, I do still have success on seasonal beds. Some are easy, cause they revolve around a certain food source that is only around temporarily, or because its cover based and the cover is only good at a certain time frame... Others are not as easy. In the case where you don't know, or want to confirm your guess, my advice would be to throw a stand at it early season, once during rut, and once late season and see when it has action...

Just to piggy back off what dan said, using trail cameras on the entrance/exit trails of those bedding areas and monitor them from a safe distance. Using rain days and also when you sneak in to hunt that day. If you pull the card and you have photos or you don't you will know. May take a season or two. Also monitor the tracks(fresh) leading into those beds as best you can. I'd also locate the preferred food sources around the areas and pressure. Every little bit helps. Sit some observation stands as well, for go a few hunts until you locate one moving through in daylight hours.

[ Post made via iPhone ]

[fishlips]

Wondering how one goes about solidly nailing down what time of year a bed gets used,besides actually busting them out. i find alot of beds doe and buck but am newer into hunting beds and am finding myself losing confidence on my setups on beds i found in late winter spring especially around home in the marsh.

[ Post made via Android ]

My most success comes from hunting beds used all year... Primary beds. Generally primary bedding areas have a lot of buck beds in a small area... But, I do still have success on seasonal beds. Some are easy, cause they revolve around a certain food source that is only around temporarily, or because its cover based and the cover is only good at a certain time frame... Others are not as easy. In the case where you don't know, or want to confirm your guess, my advice would be to throw a stand at it early season, once during rut, and once late season and see when it has action...

Just to piggy back off what dan said, using trail cameras on the entrance/exit trails of those bedding areas and monitor them from a safe distance. Using rain days and also when you sneak in to hunt that day. If you pull the card and you have photos or you don't you will know. May take a season or two. Also monitor the tracks(fresh) leading into those beds as best you can. I'd also locate the preferred food sources around the areas and pressure. Every little bit helps. Sit some observation stands as well, for go a few hunts until you locate one moving through in daylight hours.

[ Post made via iPhone ]

That makes sense. Do any of you guys intentionally bust deer out of bedding areas just to figure out when they are using it? I am assuming that this can hinder your success in that area for the year, but may help in future seasons.

I like the trail cam idea and observation sits. I just haven't ever committed to those things. After two years of eating tags, I am getting antsy to push the envelope a little more because what I am currently doing is not getting me all the way there. Definitely am learning that this can be a big mental challenge forcing myself to do things differently and do things that might be counterintuitive. Observation sits seem so logical, yet every time I have considered them, I talk myself out of it because I'd rather go into an area to "hunt".

[DaveT1963]

I primarily use black flash cameras placed on entry and exit trails. IMHO nothing gives you more concrete consistent data then pictures of the animal you are pursuing. I have over thirteen WMAs that I hunt, no way I can use observation stands to cover that amount of ground. With cameras left for several months I usually have enough pics to where I can go back and check the wind for each picture.... with a little study patterns can be found.

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[Bayshorebuck8]

Good stuff thanks for the input guys and good question fish lips!

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[whitetailassasin]

Dan speaks of stacking beds, so you can place a buck in the bed you can kill him in. Let's say a bed had a tough or impossible way to hunt, you can push the buck to another bed and so forth till you could kill him in a setup that does work. I'm still learning this technique, but Dan and a couple others have done this to perfection.

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[Bayshorebuck8]

Andrae is known for successfully using that method very well, infact he speaks of it in marsh bucks and refers to it as "stacking", someday i will learn to use this method its a very unique and aggressive approach, but if dan and andrae know it works then it does.

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