Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

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Mossberg90MN
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Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Mossberg90MN » Thu Jan 23, 2020 10:32 am

Forgive the ignorance as I’m a fresh hunter.

Are heavily worn trails with fresh sign, night trails? Versus lightly worn trails being more daytime?

This past fall I noticed that every trail I got set up on that had fresh scat and very heavily worn trails, I saw zero deer.

Versus some more lightly used trails, almost unrecognizable at times, I saw deer every sit.

Am I correct that those heavy trails are mainly nocturnal travel?

I’m talking about public land if that adds to context. Marshy public land.


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may21581
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby may21581 » Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:26 am

Gonna have to hunt it or do your homework. No way to tell. Deer do what they do reguardless but too many other factors.
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Grizzlyadam
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Grizzlyadam » Thu Jan 23, 2020 12:03 pm

In my experience I would generally agree that those well defined heavily used trails are used mostly at night. There are a lot of things to take into consideration such as where the trail is coming from and going to, if it is going through a wide open place near human pressure, if it is used year round or just seasonally like when a certain crop is being hit hard. I usually find those trails to be used mostly by family groups of does fawns and yearlings when they are on the move to get somewhere. I find they get some big buck travel during the rut if a buck is following a doe or searching. Actually sometimes I'm surprised at the amount of use they get from big bucks in the middle of the night. In my younger years I wasted plenty of time sitting on trails like that seeing nothing and wondering why because they looked so good.

It's fun and easy to slap up a trail cam on those trails and see what you can learn from them.
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Merritt » Thu Jan 23, 2020 2:29 pm

It’s funny you posted this because I was sitting a spot tonight where the trails weren’t beat down at all behind me, but the trail I was focused on in front of my setup was a well worn down trail. None of the five does I saw that came from bedding near dark walked on the heavy, beat down trail. They just sort of staged their way out of bedding on no specific trail at all, and waited until the cover of darkness to step into a field. I’ve seen this type of thing several times now, and am starting to think those worn down trails are used during the night, but primarily in the morning when the deer are heading back to bedding. These trails are probably used before daylight, most of the time, when the predominant wind is blowing because they often circle around their bedding before they lay down to detect if anything is around them or if a deer is bedding their already.
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Mossberg90MN
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Mossberg90MN » Thu Jan 23, 2020 2:52 pm

Well seems my observation has some truth to it. Which makes sense... I too believe it’s groups of does fawns and yearlings traveling in groups. And yea some 2 year olds maybe checking those trails.

I found some fresh scrapes coming out of the marsh onto one of those trails this past November. I got set up before sun up that morning and I thought to myself... that fresh looks very fresh, and so does the scat. Which means it’s was probably made at 5am.

Those heavily worn trails lead from a marsh, to a field, which then crossed over to a cornfield on private.

Maybe those heavily worn trails mean that it leads to a doe bedding area. Or definitely a night time deer highway.
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Merritt » Thu Jan 23, 2020 5:38 pm

Yea those beat down trails in the marshes seem to be pretty universal throughout the white tails range. I’m in southern NJ and the marshes down here are saltwater and the tide is another factor when it comes to bedding and staging. Pretty much any island or block of woods around here with cattails and marsh around it has those muddy highways going all around the perimeter, but once they come through those trails onto high land in the evenings, they seem to meander a while until dark on the transition line. I just try to get as close to bedding as I can without spooking them while putting myself between them and their food source or wherever I believe they’re going. Pretty simplistic way of explaining it, but that’s the jist, at least it is for me in the evenings.
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Tennhunter3 » Fri Jan 24, 2020 2:34 am

Mossberg90MN wrote:Forgive the ignorance as I’m a fresh hunter.

Are heavily worn trails with fresh sign, night trails? Versus lightly worn trails being more daytime?

This past fall I noticed that every trail I got set up on that had fresh scat and very heavily worn trails, I saw zero deer.

Versus some more lightly used trails, almost unrecognizable at times, I saw deer every sit.

Am I correct that those heavy trails are mainly nocturnal travel?

I’m talking about public land if that adds to context. Marshy public land.


From what I have seen.
Most heavy trails are used only during specific times such as the thermal tunnel trail. This is a nighttime trail at least in my area. Hunted along them for several years.

I think most are used nocturnal only because bucks don't travel far in daylight.

Deer populations also change this a heavy trail in 40 dpsq mile are all over the place. Hunting a heavy trail in a 10 dpsq is a good way to see nothing if a buck isnt bedded within 80 yards of it.

You should look at it in a different way.
Find a buck bed , take a topo map and draw a circle around that bed 100 yards out. Consider everything out of that circle nocturnal. If you want big bucks early season you have to basically live in the bedroom with them.

Walk a circle around the bed and mark the lightest used trails exiting it. The heaviest trail should be the bucks bed entry trail obviously you can't hunt down their due to thermal. I find exit trails are lighter because food sources change.

You should basically have a map of your hunting area with 1-5 circles and alot of land outside of those targeted locations.

Keep in mind beds shift and most areas have more buck bedding areas then you think. Some buck bedding areas overlap and they bed very close to another batchelor group. Their will be heavy trails going from a bedding area to a different wind bedding area.
The good news about hunting swamp or marsh is the bedding is much more consistent and predictable.


1-20 acres is how far a buck moves in daylight make sure your in that .

A mature buck is a very different animal then a doe or young buck.

Sounds crazy but I've seen more bucks in areas with no visible trail
Hunting lightly used trails are great if they are in the targeted location. .
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Evanszach7 » Fri Jan 24, 2020 5:06 am

Not that much experience with marshes, but a couple things Ive picked up here that have helped me alot are: the majority of sign is made at night, and mature bucks are different animals.

As a newer hunter your goals might be to get a few deer under your belt, which is great. If you're targeting a mature buck, he's probably not going to be doing what the other deer are doing (using the same trail). If you're finding fresh sign on a trail, just ask day or night? If you're not really close to bedding, its probably night. If you're seeing deer, but not the bucks, you're probably not close enough to the bedding.
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Mossberg90MN
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Re: Heavily used trails, nocturnal?

Unread postby Mossberg90MN » Fri Jan 24, 2020 9:01 am

Awesome thanks for all the responses. I wasn’t so much referring to a mature buck, more so deer movement In general.

I suppose what I can pull from this is that a heavily used trail lets you know there’s a decent amount of deer in that area.


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