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Camp Rex?
- Thread starter brock ratcliff
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Tree Monkey
Member
Mountaineer
Banned
Great pics for a low end cam. What was the determing factor for the locations of the cam? They seem to be pinch points or funnels. In the one pic, it looks like you used that fallen tree to your advantage for a cam location. I do the same thing when hunting..I look for things that force a deer to walk a certain direction.
Yep these where the cabins I was refering to. I have a 10 spot on one of those bunks.
This is going to be a absolute blast, I cant wait.
Yep, I am going to take a 4th one of the cabins. Just no Huck...he already offered to spoon me in Hoytmania's tree house. :smiley_bestfriends:
I don't really look for things that force deer to walk a certain direction. I look more for things that merely suggest...aka the easiest path of resistance. Wind direction dictates where a mature buck will or will not go and if he's forced to travel a specific way and the wind is wrong, he'll avoid traveling through that area completely.
Mountaineer
Banned
Yeah I agree to a certain point. However..if a mature buck based his travel habits soley on wind direction he would be walking in circles in the hill country of SE Ohio. Just because there is a west wind doesn't mean wind will be blowing west in the hills and hollows. West winds coming accross SE Ohio end up turbulent and swirl in every direction.
Wind direction really doesn't dictate when I hunt or where I hunt..if it did..I would end up having very few days of the season to hunt.
Wind direction really doesn't dictate when I hunt or where I hunt..if it did..I would end up having very few days of the season to hunt.
One time in 34 years of deer hunting, I encountered a deer that “had” to go through one of 2 pinch points to get from where he was to where he wanted to be…and he was a 180,” 7.5+ year old buck that my son killed the last week of the 2009 bow season.
We had wireless trail cameras set up at the head of both pinch points. The following graph represents 40+ initial photos over an 8 week period. The ridge ran east and west. The deer could only approach my sons set up(s) from the west. I have no idea how he got back to his bedding cover as we never had a single encounter or photo in the morning or headed in the opposite direction. The red line represents the first photo taken when the wind direction had included anything with a “W.” The blue line was the first photo where the wind included any kind of “E.” The “Y” axis is military time.
Even under the cover of darkness, this SOB moved an average of 2 hours later when the wind was at his back…again, in the dark!
This buck had a system and it worked really well for a really long time. He was probably the most well known deer in Athens County History as his summer range included an urban field just off a 4 lane highway. His fall and winter range was accessible from public hunting ground but not easily. There was no way to press him undetected.
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Mountaineer
Banned
Intresting data.
When it comes to wind direction, Ill adjust when i get to my stand early in the morning. If im hunting a particular trail, then ill position myself on the down wind side of the trail or funnel im hunting. Even doing this doesnt always work. It seems when those winds roll over the top of these ridges it creates a vaccum and rolls back towards the ridge in the direction the prevailing wind is blowing. Somestimes its a real nightmare. My policy is to stay out of the bottom of the hollows...Its either the Top of the ridge or the first bench down that i will hunt.
Also..I think using lure scents gets alot of hunters in trouble..why? well, in order for their lure scent to do its job the buck must be downwind..if he's smelling your lure scent then he's smelling your body scent. Seems its a contradiction to me.
When it comes to wind direction, Ill adjust when i get to my stand early in the morning. If im hunting a particular trail, then ill position myself on the down wind side of the trail or funnel im hunting. Even doing this doesnt always work. It seems when those winds roll over the top of these ridges it creates a vaccum and rolls back towards the ridge in the direction the prevailing wind is blowing. Somestimes its a real nightmare. My policy is to stay out of the bottom of the hollows...Its either the Top of the ridge or the first bench down that i will hunt.
Also..I think using lure scents gets alot of hunters in trouble..why? well, in order for their lure scent to do its job the buck must be downwind..if he's smelling your lure scent then he's smelling your body scent. Seems its a contradiction to me.
I'm pretty sure I was reading a book this summer with you in it, and you was explaining how you force deer to walk a certain area by taking string (I think?) and tying across a certain area or trails in order to funnel deer past a particular trail by your treestand?? Also, I really enjoyed the mugshot in that book, made me laugh. Do you still have those glasses??
When hunting big woods, my favorite stand site is a saddle. Usually on either side of the saddle there will be a drainage where water runs down to the bottom below. Depending on how "deery" the bottom is, my favorite way to approach my stand site in the crotch of the saddle is to walk directly up that drainage with the wind blowing either directly in my face or directly at my back. The drainage is usually quite walking and once you get in the saddle your scent will be blowing directly over one side of the saddle or the other, and far over the a deer's head if he happens to approach from that way. A crosswind is the worse wind when hunting a saddle because it will blow your scent directly at a deer's head level as he criss crosses down either side slope of the saddle, which is usually what they do to cross to the other side of the ridge.
And I agree on the scent thing. I never quite understood that concept either.
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I might be headed down Sunday if the weather is good to do a little scouting. I have my general area picked out, but I need to figure out how to get there first!
How far is it from you? Any chance we could do a little scouting during turk season?
Jim - Ryan killed the buck the day after the worst ice storm to hit this county in decades...the winds that day were light and variable and the air smelled like smoke.