Target Buck Located

Discuss the science of figuring out our prey through good detective work.
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danimal_f
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Target Buck Located

Unread postby danimal_f » Mon Jul 27, 2020 10:28 am

Hello Beast Forum Members,

I want to start off by saying I am new to beast tactics, and this will really be my first season putting them in to play. I wanted to reach out to the forum to see if there's any tips that can help me in this situation I find myself in.

I braved the heat (92 in Michigan today) to check out a piece of public property today. I was about a mile in to my scouting session when I jumped a bachelor group of bucks. I watched them get out of their beds around 50-60 yards in front of me. One spike ran past me, while the other three, larger bucks ran about 10-15 yards away from me and stopped. I watched them through my binos for a solid 15-20 minutes. The other three deer included a very tall 6, a short and wide 8-point, and what I believe to be a nice 10-point (I didn't get as good of a look at this one). All three of these deer are much larger than any buck I've killed on public land. Their beds were about 20 yards from a small river in a tall grassy area. There was a huge deer run that I had been following that lead me to this area. This whole area was tall grass with mostly dead poplar trees, but did have some clusters of mature oaks dispersed throughout it. There was actually a group of large mature white oaks that was probably 120 yards from their beds.

I have a suspicion that they exit the beds from the area I approached, moving to the mature oak trees as a staging area, but at this point that's all I really have to go off. I am going to study some maps of the neighboring properties to see if I can get a better idea of which way they'll exit their beds. My thought is to put a trail camera up on the run I walked in on, as far from their beds as possible to not disturb them, but I don't want to blow these deer out of the area.

Any insight on how I can gain some more intel without alerting these bucks that I'm onto them would be appreciated.

And just like that, a sweaty and miserable walk through woods lead me to some shooter back and got me even more excited for the season to start.


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Hawthorne
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby Hawthorne » Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:11 am

Check those oaks to see if they have acorns. Hunt the closest producing tree to the beds. Opening day if the wind is right
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Grizzlyadam
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby Grizzlyadam » Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:21 am

One big takeaway from it is that you were able to walk up to them before getting busted. Your wind was good. What was their wind? If you think they are going to head to where you came from sounds like a slam dunk. Just wait for the same wind and go throw a sit.
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Ghost Hunter
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby Ghost Hunter » Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:27 am

Did you stay long enough to see where they went before you left area? They very well may change patterns in about a month a half.
I'm reason they call it hunting and not shooting.
danimal_f
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby danimal_f » Tue Jul 28, 2020 5:53 am

Grizzlyadam wrote:One big takeaway from it is that you were able to walk up to them before getting busted. Your wind was good. What was their wind? If you think they are going to head to where you came from sounds like a slam dunk. Just wait for the same wind and go throw a sit.


I was walking in from the South. The wind was out of the west. I was trying to make sense out of why they would bed there with that wind, and I couldn't. I'm thinking these beds were not wind direction specific, but that's just another guess of mine.
danimal_f
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby danimal_f » Tue Jul 28, 2020 7:09 am

Ghost Hunter wrote:Did you stay long enough to see where they went before you left area? They very well may change patterns in about a month a half.


I was unable to get a good look at where they for sure went as they kind of disappeared off into the brush. I suspect they crossed the river, but can't say for sure.
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Ghost Hunter
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby Ghost Hunter » Tue Jul 28, 2020 11:24 am

You should check into where you think they went or if they did cross river. It took a long time for me to figure out where they went in some ways is more important. I was always under impression that they will be back. One day it hit me like a sack of potatoes. It is more important to know where they were gong after you jumped them than where they been.
I'm reason they call it hunting and not shooting.
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Boogieman1
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Re: Target Buck Located

Unread postby Boogieman1 » Tue Jul 28, 2020 4:11 pm

Every piece of public is different so just keep doing what u r doing and beat the bushes and take note.

From what I have to play with it’s pretty useless this time of year. Usually isn’t a soul in the woods this time of year. Deer even good bucks will set up as close to the food as they can. The week or 2 b4 the season opens is when (the serious hunters) make there play while looking for the magic tree. Surely someone else has witnessed the magic tree phenomenon. For some reason this tree is good all season, any time of day, and great for any wind. I need to find me one of these!

What you recently saw may repeat. Deer will work there way back to the more preferable areas that were used in summer during windows of light pressure. Wouldn’t surprise me if u found em back in that same spot middle of the week.

On the other hand I have much better luck finding where they are at when the heat is on. Anyway good job! Keep working at it sooner or later the big picture will be revealed. And that’s when u can consistently run one in the jiblets.
Life is hard; It’s even harder if you are stupid.
-John Wayne-


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