When to start scouting for deer season
Scouting Whitetail Deer Part 1: Intro To Scouting
well it's officially the offseason for
us spring turkey hunting is right around
the corner and what I want to cover is
in depth not just quick brief you
anybody that's been a fan of our show or
watch episodes that I've done you know I
hunt a lot of edges points frontals and
I want to do something different this
year on do something very in-depth
really show you guys some of the stuff
that we're doing here and how we're
going about scouting and we're going to
be showing you a lot of different aerial
photos we're going to be going into the
field showing things that we're looking
for when scouting for this fall's
whitetail hunt now it doesn't matter
where you are in a country you could be
in the prairies of South Dakota you
could be down in Texas to be in
Wisconsin here in the Midwest and
whitetails they do the same thing they
have the same pattern and what I mean by
that is yes their food source is going
to change your bedding the type of
habitat they made better and changes but
they're always going to have the same
pattern what I mean by that is you're
going to have a point a that's going to
be their bedding location then you're
going to have a point B that's going to
be the travel corridor a travel route
that they're using the head to the point
C which is going to be the food source
it doesn't matter where you are in a
country you're going to have that point
a B and C and that's what we're going to
do we're going to break this down we're
going to show you the different stuff
that we're looking for an during that
travel route to the food source from the
beds now where they are between that
point a the bedding and Point C the food
source and where we're going to set up
is going to change throughout the year
and that's what we're going to kind of
cover is is during the early season you
don't want to be tight to that bedding
location at Point a it has the rut kicks
in these Bucks are looking for dough's
they're really starting to chase these
those you might want to start moving out
towards that point see that food source
because those Bucks are really going to
be kind of trading near those food
sources looking for those we're also
going to be covering where you want to
set up and scout for agriculture when
you're hunting corn soybeans different
food sources food plots we're also going
to be covering a lot of what I always
refer to as public land and I know
through the years people have you know
ki said ah Josh always mentions there
says the word public land I'm not
talking about hunting necessarily a
heavily pressured area
the people associated with public land I
use it to describe the geographical
location if that makes sense
what I'm talking about is your large
tracts of timber their unbroken there's
no roads no developments in there
there's no field in there or hunting
large swamps or cattail marshes where
you don't have the roads you don't have
broken up with a bunch of other pieces
of property I'm using it to describe a
large area 600 acres or more whenever
you can refer to public land that's
because here in Wisconsin when you find
those areas 99% of the time that's on
public land so we're going to go now
when we start breaking this stuff down
trying to show you what we're looking
for and how we go about finding our
spots for this fall we first want to
start our scouting by what we call cyber
scouting it's getting online looking at
aerial photos looking at Google Earth
looking at topographical maps and you
know hunting large blocks of property or
timber or marsh whatever it may be
we're don't we go and where do we start
looking by narrowing down where do we
start putting boots on the ground and
that's through a process elimination
what we mean by that is I want to look
at the areas that I don't want to be
hunting at so I want to start crossing
off those areas and pretty soon as you
start crossing off those areas you start
seeing a location or an area of where
you want to start further scouting so
those areas that we don't want to be
going into are going to be areas that
are very close to the road on this
especially true on your large timber
areas
the reason being is why would a buck put
up with pressure when you can just move
another mile two miles back in and get
away from pressure now if you're hunting
more agriculture property that rule
might be an exception you might find
bucks close to the road they're trying
to get away from the pressure that's
back in agriculture along the fields and
then timber where the terrain is more
broken up those deer might be closer to
the road but when you're talking big
timber you want to start looking further
back in if that makes sense they're able
to get further back into an area where
there's nobody going to be going into so
I want to avoid areas that are close to
the road I want to avoid areas that are
up to being like a trailhead meaning
you're driving down a logging road and
it just comes to a stop that has a
tendency to funnel hunters also
everybody wants to go far in everybody
wants to go deep any all access that
same point so when you find those trail
heads
chances are at night when you come
walking on I know a bunch of you have
seen this there's a bunch of trucks
parked you go in in the morning there's
nobody you come back on at night there's
a bunch of trucks their beer learn that
they know those access points what we
like doing it is not parking at a
trailhead start driving down a logging
road stop literally halfway in that
logging road and then cut in from there
park somewhere in there don't go all the
way to the end because that's where your
access points are for other hunters also
that theory holds true because I think a
lot of guys are just afraid of getting
lost you'll hear a lot of people talk
about how they get way back in there but
truth truth be told most guys don't go
more than a quarter-mile maybe even a
half mile back into the further timber
further into the swamp and you can
pretty much have that area to yourself
so start eliminating areas and you're
going to start seeing locations that is
not easily accessible that's low on
hunting pressure and where these deer
will start to get filtered and pushed
into
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