All about accessing buck beds

Discuss deer hunting tactics, Deer behavior. Post your Hunting Stories, Pictures, and Questions/Answers.
  • Advertisement

HB Store


User avatar
kher
Posts: 91
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:21 am
Status: Offline

All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby kher » Thu Jun 25, 2020 5:25 am

I have a question about buck beds and accessing them. I have already read a lot on "the best tactical threads" page and have it in my favorites. I just want to have a better understanding of beds and accessing them as the season approaches. Do the trail(s) that head towards a food source like an ag field mean that is a bucks main path to where it will take before the evening to feed? Does it take the same path back to it's bed? I'm just wondering how you determine what makes a spot good for an evening hunt v.s a morning hunt?

Im also assuming that someone may determine or get entail how a trail is being used by using cameras or by just doing a observation sit from far away?

I feel like I get it but the more I think about it the more I get confused. Maybe im just overthinking too much.


“The more I practice, the luckier I become.”
Byron Ferguson
User avatar
<DK>
500 Club
Posts: 4484
Joined: Sat Nov 08, 2014 10:02 am
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby <DK> » Thu Jun 25, 2020 5:39 am

You are correct besides the buck entering on that trail.

Every morning can be different entry for them based on the wind/thermals and time of year. Generally they will down wind access the bed but they can come in in those side trails or even from up wind walk past the bed and back to it. Depends on the terrain and his comfort level. Also multiple bucks can bed there so everyone can enter different.

Don't overlook your local water sources. Even creeks or holes that hold water after rains are great spots. They knoe its there and they can smell it. Find those tracks and rub directions on the trails to determine whats going on.
User avatar
Lockdown
Moderator
Posts: 9957
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2014 4:16 pm
Location: MN
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby Lockdown » Thu Jun 25, 2020 2:44 pm

As far as main trails heading to food, I think you’ll get mixed answers on this one. It depends on the situation, but I think most often a buck will stage in any direction before heading to food. I have even seen bucks leave bedding the exact opposite way of the food. :think:

If there are trails that basically go strait from bedding to food, I would certainly try and cover them, but I’d also try and cover some of the “peripheral” trails at the same time. To explain what I mean by peripheral, if food is strait to the east, and there are trails heading north out of bedding, I’d call that a peripheral trail.

If possible, it would be a great tactic to push close enough to cover a peripheral trail and also the trail(s) that lead to food. Or at least be able to see the trails you can’t cover.

Regarding morning vs evening, normally if a bedding area is very small or super hard to get into for an evening hunt (like a small island in the cattails) then I will give it a shot in the morning. If I’ve got a spot that I consider “dead end bedding” (meaning it’s basically one way in, one way out) then I’m more likely to try it in the morning because I can ensure that I keep my scent stream in an area that I know he won’t be traveling. I shy away from a morning hunt if I have no clue what way he’ll access. They often scent check bedding before heading in. But not always.

The biggest piece of advice I can give is don’t overthink it. Come up with a game plan, go in and execute the plan. Anything that happens after that can be chalked up to LEARNING. Be aggressive and don’t be afraid to make mistakes.
User avatar
kher
Posts: 91
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:21 am
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby kher » Fri Jun 26, 2020 1:42 am

Lockdown wrote:As far as main trails heading to food, I think you’ll get mixed answers on this one. It depends on the situation, but I think most often a buck will stage in any direction before heading to food. I have even seen bucks leave bedding the exact opposite way of the food. :think:

If there are trails that basically go strait from bedding to food, I would certainly try and cover them, but I’d also try and cover some of the “peripheral” trails at the same time. To explain what I mean by peripheral, if food is strait to the east, and there are trails heading north out of bedding, I’d call that a peripheral trail.

If possible, it would be a great tactic to push close enough to cover a peripheral trail and also the trail(s) that lead to food. Or at least be able to see the trails you can’t cover.

Regarding morning vs evening, normally if a bedding area is very small or super hard to get into for an evening hunt (like a small island in the cattails) then I will give it a shot in the morning. If I’ve got a spot that I consider “dead end bedding” (meaning it’s basically one way in, one way out) then I’m more likely to try it in the morning because I can ensure that I keep my scent stream in an area that I know he won’t be traveling. I shy away from a morning hunt if I have no clue what way he’ll access. They often scent check bedding before heading in. But not always.

The biggest piece of advice I can give is don’t overthink it. Come up with a game plan, go in and execute the plan. Anything that happens after that can be chalked up to LEARNING. Be aggressive and don’t be afraid to make mistakes.


WOW, that is some great advice. I like the way you say be aggressive and don't be afraid to make mistakes. From some of the other post I've read I remember one in particular that someone said "if you don't bust deer, you aren't hunting close enough".
“The more I practice, the luckier I become.”
Byron Ferguson
User avatar
kher
Posts: 91
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:21 am
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby kher » Fri Jun 26, 2020 1:49 am

<DK> wrote:You are correct besides the buck entering on that trail.

Every morning can be different entry for them based on the wind/thermals and time of year. Generally they will down wind access the bed but they can come in in those side trails or even from up wind walk past the bed and back to it. Depends on the terrain and his comfort level. Also multiple bucks can bed there so everyone can enter different.

Don't overlook your local water sources. Even creeks or holes that hold water after rains are great spots. They knoe its there and they can smell it. Find those tracks and rub directions on the trails to determine whats going on.


If I am getting bucks showing up 1 hour before sunset on cam, does that mean their beds are close by? Food source is just less than 500 yards from where im getting photos. Also I haven't seen any what I call buck beds in that piece of parcel because it is small, I believe they are bedded on private.

On some other piece of land I get photos very late like 12am to 2 am, so I know those spots are too far from where they bed.
“The more I practice, the luckier I become.”
Byron Ferguson
SplitG2
Posts: 160
Joined: Sat Jul 29, 2017 2:56 pm
Location: Ohio
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby SplitG2 » Fri Jun 26, 2020 3:03 am

kher wrote:
If I am getting bucks showing up 1 hour before sunset on cam, does that mean their beds are close by? Food source is just less than 500 yards from where im getting photos. Also I haven't seen any what I call buck beds in that piece of parcel because it is small, I believe they are bedded on private.

On some other piece of land I get photos very late like 12am to 2 am, so I know those spots are too far from where they bed.



The time in which you get the pic, in my experience, if it’s 30 mins to an hour before sunrise or after dark no doubt puts you in the ballgame of knowing the vicinity that a buck is bedding. This doesn’t necessarily hold true everytime because all bucks are different but for the most part it does.

I’ve killed a few bucks thru the years in there bedding area based solely on this tactic. Their beds were really hard to pinpoint so I would go into specific areas when the wind was wrong for that buck to be in there, move my cams all around til I got that pic within 30 mins to an hour before sunrise or after dark.

SIDE NOTE: to go along with what others have already said about accessing/leaving their bed. Rarely, and I mean very rarely have I ever gotten a pic of a buck accessing/leaving on the same trail.....at least not with any consistency to get excited about. But also I hunt hill country so the whole one way in and one way out thing does not apply to me as the vast majority of bedding in hill country I’ve hunted typically has multiple access/exit.
Hunt Hard or Go Home
User avatar
kher
Posts: 91
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:21 am
Status: Offline

Re: All about accessing buck beds

Unread postby kher » Fri Jun 26, 2020 3:36 am

SplitG2 wrote:
kher wrote:
If I am getting bucks showing up 1 hour before sunset on cam, does that mean their beds are close by? Food source is just less than 500 yards from where im getting photos. Also I haven't seen any what I call buck beds in that piece of parcel because it is small, I believe they are bedded on private.

On some other piece of land I get photos very late like 12am to 2 am, so I know those spots are too far from where they bed.



The time in which you get the pic, in my experience, if it’s 30 mins to an hour before sunrise or after dark no doubt puts you in the ballgame of knowing the vicinity that a buck is bedding. This doesn’t necessarily hold true everytime because all bucks are different but for the most part it does.

I’ve killed a few bucks thru the years in there bedding area based solely on this tactic. Their beds were really hard to pinpoint so I would go into specific areas when the wind was wrong for that buck to be in there, move my cams all around til I got that pic within 30 mins to an hour before sunrise or after dark.

SIDE NOTE: to go along with what others have already said about accessing/leaving their bed. Rarely, and I mean very rarely have I ever gotten a pic of a buck accessing/leaving on the same trail.....at least not with any consistency to get excited about. But also I hunt hill country so the whole one way in and one way out thing does not apply to me as the vast majority of bedding in hill country I’ve hunted typically has multiple access/exit.


I wasn't much of a believer of wind until I got the Intel I did from pics on my cam. It seems the area I hunt the wind majority of the time blows NW winds. Usually that is when I get trail camera pics. Im just trying understand what that means and how I strategize my way to that area. Also trying to understand how the bucks use that wind to their advantage when it is a NW wing
“The more I practice, the luckier I become.”
Byron Ferguson


  • Advertisement

Return to “Deer Hunting”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: T. N. Buck and 68 guests