Hill Country in the Suburbs...I have questions

[Greg4579]

Fresh off the new awesome hill country DVD I am inspired to figure out hill country near me. What we are looking at here is the area around where I work. I blocked out the road and creek name, but someone local to me still could probably figure this out. This is kind of typical for the area around my house too, where I am seeing more rolling hills without a lot of defined points or military crests. What I am also seeing are: 1.) Lots of homes / posted areas (marked with the Red X's) and 2.) Pressure, but only at "easy" access points and 3.) Questionable access: Depending on how you access maybe you could maybe hunt. This area is attractive to me because it could offer me more opportunities to hunt during the week with my busy work/home life. The issue is I am not seeing the typical terrain I should be seeing when I cyber scout, but I also admit that I am fairly new to this (discovered the beast last winter). I marked the areas with a green checkbox where there is open access to hunt. Finally, the star is where I park for work and I have seen a good number of does feeding in the early morning or at dusk. I have never seen a buck here, but I know there has to be some around. I really get thrown off by the houses on top and the road in the middle. I realize these are just "edges" in a sense, but with questionable access up top I feel like I wouldn't be hunting near bedding.

Any thoughts? I would love to hear anything from folks who do suburb hunting in hill country.

[dan]

Near the 3rd blue question mark from the top there is a spot where draws all meet together forming an "X" intersection. I would expect mature bucks to bed off the elevated points created inbetween the draws. I would expect the best bucks in the area to bed there if pressure and cover work. Not sure if you can hunt right there or not? But if you could at least walk it, and find where bedding exits to where you can hunt it will put you in the game.

[rfickes87]

Looks like a great area, enjoy! you have the advantage here over someone else that you work so close. I like that big ridge with the 5 green check marks. I like how it saddles on top. I would think deer would move thru that area thru that saddle and around the hillside parallel to the highway from the bedding that dan pointed out. I've hunted these suburbs a lot too (to the north of town though) and I know being surrounded by private property on both sides of you is a good thing! Should be easy to scout. I was just looking at it on google terrain and I can see atv trails to the southern private property. It looks thick where Dan pointed out. I guarantee this property has some nice bucks on it.

Probably gets pounded on Saturdays. I love hunting these areas on the first cold day in a while and in the middle of the week when no one is in there. Call in sick on those days!

[Greg4579]

I really appreciate the replies. It is funny how seeing it through someone else's eyes makes something so much clearer. I need to put some boots to the ground...and quickly, so I can add it to to my small list of local properties to hunt.

[jman22]

Dan, what are some of the reasons you chose this general area? When you get a spot where the draws converge like this will you get thermal pooling? I'm guessing these elevated points provide a buck with a good vantage point for danger and to spot or smell does moving through the bottoms?

[Greg4579]

Dan, what are some of the reasons you chose this general area? When you get a spot where the draws converge like this will you get thermal pooling? I'm guessing these elevated points provide a buck with a good vantage point for danger and to spot or smell does moving through the bottoms?

I am not Dan, but let's see how good I paid attention in class (his videos)...

The draws will act as a funnel for the rising thermals, so being where several draws converge allows for a lot greater area of scent checking.

When I first looked I noticed the draws and saddle, but I simply labeled them in my head as funnels. Reading Dan's response tells me to check near that convergence for small points that won't show on a topo.

[Greg4579]

I should've added I was consumed in looking for military crests and struggling to find them. I also had some bias to the hill above my work simply because I have seen deer there often and because of the obvious access point. I knew after looking at the topo that it just wasn't the right area, but I also wasn't sure of the two edges above: housing plan and the road.

[jman22]

Makes sense to me! Thanks for the added detail.

[BACKSTRAPALIEN]

I hunt very similar properties close to my home and work.
You can be pretty sure the does you're seeing are heading up the hill and bedding fairly close to the houses. I would go find exactly where. Even if you don't find any buck bedding you will likely find old rut sign relating to the doe bedding. Bucks will come out of the woodwork sniffing those does out come Nov. You will 100% get a shot at a good buck right up behind work during the rut if you don't over hunt it early. I've killed a few on the hill behind my work in this exact way.
If you do bump a nice buck scouting pay close attention to how he escapes. Maybe you can set up on the escape route and have a buddy bump the bed. I killed one of my best bucks this way.
I'd be driving those developments in the morning and late at night. Probably not a good idea to shine in someone's yard, but I've located a couple nice ones with my high beams in the neighborhoods. Also walk behind all the houses, chances are you'll find some stands, adjust accordingly.
Suburban bucks come out nowhere during the rut so even if you dont locate the buck beds, stay confident. You'll get a crack at one. I'm psyched for you! Keep us posted.

[SidewayZ]

I hunt very similar terrain in North Jersey near where I work as well. These area are also surround by private land / residences.

I see does all the time, last season I saw a nice high basket 8pt and a wide 10pt during first week of November. They were just pinning does down at the doe bedding in my area.

I have spent many hours trying to track these deer down, I have an idea of where they may bed, but the land is private and I haven't been able to enter it.

I have found that finding buck beds in these areas / terrain is very difficult. The best beds I have found have been in very thickly vegetated areas (usually small patches in middle of hard woods) and small elevated points in thick cover.

Even harder to try pin down why and when they bed in the few spots I have found, seems random to me at this point.

I have high hopes hunting these areas, but I also decided to find more public land that lays out more traditionally with topics here on the board and the videos.

Even if the terrain doesn't layout exactly like example terrain in the video, I have found the tactics still apply in rolling hills (just more difficult). In this terrain I try to remember what would provide "Security" for a buck and look for that, I heard JoeRE say that once it seemed to help me find beds in rolling hills type terrain.

[BACKSTRAPALIEN]

Fresh off the new awesome hill country DVD I am inspired to figure out hill country near me. What we are looking at here is the area around where I work. I blocked out the road and creek name, but someone local to me still could probably figure this out. This is kind of typical for the area around my house too, where I am seeing more rolling hills without a lot of defined points or military crests. What I am also seeing are: 1.) Lots of homes / posted areas (marked with the Red X's) and 2.) Pressure, but only at "easy" access points and 3.) Questionable access: Depending on how you access maybe you could maybe hunt. This area is attractive to me because it could offer me more opportunities to hunt during the week with my busy work/home life. The issue is I am not seeing the typical terrain I should be seeing when I cyber scout, but I also admit that I am fairly new to this (discovered the beast last winter). I marked the areas with a green checkbox where there is open access to hunt. Finally, the star is where I park for work and I have seen a good number of does feeding in the early morning or at dusk. I have never seen a buck here, but I know there has to be some around. I really get thrown off by the houses on top and the road in the middle. I realize these are just "edges" in a sense, but with questionable access up top I feel like I wouldn't be hunting near bedding.

Any thoughts? I would love to hear anything from folks who do suburb hunting in hill country.

One more thing, switch from satellite to a shaded terrain view on your map. You can sometimes get a much better idea of the subtle land features. Military crests included.

[BACKSTRAPALIEN]

I hunt very similar terrain in North Jersey near where I work as well. These area are also surround by private land / residences.

I see does all the time, last season I saw a nice high basket 8pt and a wide 10pt during first week of November. They were just pinning does down at the doe bedding in my area.

I have spent many hours trying to track these deer down, I have an idea of where they may bed, but the land is private and I haven't been able to enter it.

I have found that finding buck beds in these areas / terrain is very difficult. The best beds I have found have been in very thickly vegetated areas (usually small patches in middle of hard woods) and small elevated points in thick cover.

Even harder to try pin down why and when they bed in the few spots I have found, seems random to me at this point.

I have high hopes hunting these areas, but I also decided to find more public land that lays out more traditionally with topics here on the board and the videos.

Even if the terrain doesn't layout exactly like example terrain in the video, I have found the tactics still apply in rolling hills (just more difficult). In this terrain I try to remember what would provide "Security" for a buck and look for that, I heard JoeRE say that once it seemed to help me find beds in rolling hills type terrain.

I'm in North Jersey too. Go figure!

[Greg4579]

Excellent points!

I will keep the area behind my work in mind for the rut and try to locate where those does are bedding. What I tend to see is a good size "herd" of them, between 8-10 when I see them. I drive that road above my work on my way home everyday and when I do see them it seems to be scattered.

On the top of the hill where Dan told me to scout it looks like easier access near a park. I see a parking area and it looks like baseball fields. I am hoping the access is posted up top, so I am going to do a drive there this week to check it out.

While I don't (yet) have twice as many spots as I can hunt being a new beast, I have to keep reminding myself that this is about making more opportunities for me to hunt locally and hopefully not overhunting the spots I do have scouted already.

[Grasshopper]

I'm guessing part of why Dan liked the intersection of draws is because there's a spot that is advantageous for any wind within a small area and it's also brushy looking and in the biggest block of cover pictured.

[Greg4579]

Just adding a new image link since I removed the old one.