dbltree's hing cutting thread

[Lost Arrow]

Hunting season is barely weeks away for many of us so habitat work will largely come to a screeching halt while we enjoy the fruits of our labors. One thing that should never stop however is OBSERVATION

We hinge trees to help create thick areas that become safe secure bedding areas that will hold whitetails year around and for the most part we are not going to be invading those areas. Depending on how your land lays however you can use hinging to create travel corridors through narrow natural bottlenecks leading between bedding and/or feeding areas.

I have been lucky enough to harvest a buck or two that showed himself in the waning moments of daylight at a field edge but by and large mature animals are more likely to be killed inside the timber where they feel safe moving in daylight hours. In Iowa where draws and narrow ridges or fingers are common it's fairly easy to set up and not have to be anywhere near their actual bedding area.

Bill Winke and Don Higgins have both written great articles on the importance of creating safe sanctuaries that are by and large left alone especially on small properties and then using great care to hunt the edges or connecting points rather then be tramping in and out of the timber. I follow those same principles and hunt only narrow corridors or creek beds so I do not infringe on a bucks safe area.

Even at that however, a corridor may be 60-80 yards wide allowing an animal to easily pass by out of the range of the average bowhunter leaving one frustrated and dissappointed. I have learned to "cure" that by hinging trees with a plan that funnels deer to a natural narrow area that I can cover with my bow. Those same narrow areas are also easy to slip in and out of and rarely used by bedding deer and that brings me back to my thoughts about observation.

Regardless is you have begun working on creating funnels or not....hunting season is when you learn by observing. If you started work on creating a funnel there may be flaws in it and if your merely curious about starting a project this winter...fall is the time to observe buck movements and problems that you encounter.

I have a trail cam on a corridor that has been up all summer so I slipped in to check it, change the batteries and swap cards.

Standing in one spot I took a pic of the thick hinged area on one side....



and the open area that deer use for travel



and the well worn trail that is evidence of how heaily deer are using the runway



Now keep in mind that this is NOT a bedding area but a narrow area leading between two bedding areas. The thick hinged area provides screening cover and an impossible tangle that deer prefer not to walk thru and that is especially true during the rut when bucks only want to get from point A to B! They are not interested in stumbling around in the brush but instead follow a safe well screened path inside of enough heavy cover that they can feel safe during daylight hours.

I don't have dozens of stands but instead a few well placed stands (for different winds) in narrow areas. I often have only to walk a few feet into these travel corridors and that insures I don't leave a "mark", yet I am still able to hunt deer where they feel safe...in the timber and not on a field edge.

As your hunting this fall...think about how you can utilize hinging, screening and other habitat improvments to funnel deer by you without entering their sanctuary. This winter you can begin to make positive changes that will up your odds of harvesting a mature buck the following fall....

 

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September 1st 2010

A year ago at this time you could see clear across this draw...now you can barely see more then a few yards in from the field edge! This hinged tree has sent up probably hundreds of shoots from the stump and entire length of the trunk providing both cover and browse!



It's a little difficult to see through the shadows but there are a whole series of trees hinged here creating a plethora of screening cover and reachable browse.



Those trees were hinged in very early April of 2010....there is very little a landowner can do to improve their property as quickly and inexpensively as one can by simply getting out the chainsaw...

 

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I slipped in past an area that I had hinged heavily to create a bottleneck by a stand simply to clip some growth out of the way so I wouldn't be stumbling through it in the dark.

I stopped for a moment to snap a couple quick pictures including this one of two young oaks...a white on the left and a red on the back right.



While oak regeneration is not my primary reason for hinging by any means, it can be accomplished with a little management by removing competing canopy where hinged tops impede growth of new seedlings.

The hinged area itself now is a dense screen of nearly impenetrable cover that funnels deer past my stand as they travel from bedding to feed.



Hinged bottlenecks not only make hunting more successful but they also allow us to effectively use tail cam surveys by forcing deer in an out of a few runways instead of dozens. Habitat varies across the country of course but here in Iowa doe groups tend to use hinged sanctuaries heavily while mature bucks are more likely to prefer the solitude of large stands of tall native grasses.

Trail cams at a field edge where a hinged funnel moves deer in an out in larger numbers soon answers the question of what is using your hinged sanctuaries



Often some hinged areas have not a single buck traveling through them during the summer months but as the rut approaches....they know where the girls bedroom is and things change in a hurry...



Remember to keep observing deer as you hunt, look for problem areas that you can correct with a chainsaw this winter, then monitor your deer without invading sanctuaries on your property by using IR trail cams that can last for months without being checked.

Food plots are fun and important but your chainsaw you will find..is the most effective tool in your habitat program....

 

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Hinging cull trees is a great habitat improvement because it provides some of the most key and crucial elements that whitetails need...dense, thick, safe cover. In addition it provides browse even from the second a hinged tree hits the ground and with some common sense thought and planning it provides us with another important element...funneling.

Don, Tony, Bill and Jeff are just a few folks we often hear ideas from, some great...others we may disagree with but I think to a man they would agree that providing a safe secure sanctuary and then building into your program, travel corridors that allow us to efficiently harvest deer would be a "good thing".

There is plenty of bad or even worse, false information out there and quiet frankly much of it comes from well known "Deer Dr's" that hunters tend to trust. One tries to convince us that we have grave concerns about brassica toxicity while another tells people that if they double the planting and fertilizer rates in their corn...they will double their yield?!

If those were true then our deer would all be dead and farmers everywhere would simply double their inputs to double their yields! It is important then to be discerning and wise, making common sense choices in our habitat improvement and hunting choices.

Hinging then is a great tool and those in forested areas may need to rely largely on this tool but many of us who live in agricultural areas on farms with mixed timber and fields can utilize a multitude of options to provide those same key elements...safety and security year around.

Our properties should be insulated from roads and people as much as possible and tree and shrub plantings combined with NWSG's are two very effective ways to accomplish this. This is a picture of one of my own farms where I established a windbreak planting through the CRP program 15 years ago and established NWSG's in the same program at the same time.



Take note of the wide open fields on the opposite side...common sense tells us which place whitetails would feel safer on. Even if your property is vastly different or all timbered the same insulating effect can be accomplished using edge feathering and conifer planting around the perimeter.

One might argue with almost any consultant about a variety of things but screening and insulating your property and there by creating a safe sanctuary would be unlikely to bring about disagreement.

Travel corridors are a second subject that I also doubt would be cause for argument and the need for them is imperative because it allows us to harvest deer traveling to and from bedding and feeding without disturbing them in either. I've shared how we can create funnels and bottlenecks using hinging but there are also a variety of ways to accomplish the same thing.

A combination of Egyptian Wheat, shrubs and a high sugar ryegrass/clover planting provide an irresistible combination of safe, protective screening cover along with a tasty food source to further entice them. Bucks love this travel route as they circle property perimeters checking for hot doe crossings, they use the shrub limbs for licking branches/scrape sites and follow this right to a runway in a natural narrow corridor leading past a stand.



Creating travel corridors via chainsaw or plantings is a very simple common sense improvement that is IMO inarguable and a necessary element of your program.

Across the road from my home farm there are bonafide 180-200" deer that never set foot on my place. No one made them a bed, they have not yet seen a single hinge cut nor visited a tied down licking branch. They live there simply because there are hundreds of acres of solid timber combined with large hidden crop fields...the whole thing in itself a safe secure place to live.

There are things then that each landowner must discern for themselves the usefulness of some practices and it is not for me to say yeah or neigh as to the effectiveness. I can only say that while not 200" deer, mature animals do live on my farms and they make their own scrapes and beds.



There always exceptions to everything but suffice it to say that most mature bucks will not use scrapes in daylight hours. They rarely move in daylight except for two key times...the rut and late winter when hunger forces them out of hiding. They tend to bed in the thick, tall NWSG's making "bed building" or scrape making largely ineffective here.

If you have property enhanced to give them a safe secure place to live and well thought out travel corridors then bucks will live there and they will be far easier to kill using travel corridors. They will race down those corridors during the rut and feel safe staging in those areas in December when they need to feed and you can get in and out easily with some planning.

There is little need to visually see what animals are doing while hunting nor molest them in any way with the use of inexpensive IR cams. Used over a period of years at bottle necked points, they provide a wealth of information about what is living there, when they travel and which corridors we need to hunt when.



Handy, adjustable mounts allow us to mount cams up high where they have little effect on even the wariest mature whitetail and new models can last a year with lithium batteries and store thousands of pictures on 16G cards.

Common sense combined with factual knowledge gives each of us then, the information we need to manage our property and hunt it effectively. It also allows us to glean useful information from others and decide what elements may or may not be right for us in our situations.

When season is over we'll fire up the chainsaws and begin once again to utilize hinging as a habitat improvement but there is so much more, so many options in addition to hinging that you'll want to consider. Sitting in a tree stand is a great place to do some thinking and planning about some very common sense habitat and hunting improvements you can make in the coming year....

 

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I had to walk along the field side of a hinge cut area to take some soil samples the other day and took a few pics as I did



This area was hinged in March 2010 and you can see all the new browse and screening cover that has sprouted vertically off the horizontal hinged trees.



The leaves have largely fallen here in late October yet line of sight distance is pretty limited.



We still have some work to do in here but compared to the open park like atmosphere previously the difference is great!



Even though hinging has made a huge difference one can quickly see that if there were conifers such as red cedar or Norway spruce around the perimeter deer would feel even more secure....food for thought in your long term habitat plans....

 

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Someone asked about what the hinge cuts looked like so I took a few pics from my tree stand in hopes it would give a better idea as to the "mess" one can make.



You can see in this area I left few trees standing



and the ground area is a literal tangle of hinged trees and new growth



These views are from my stand and you can see the -V- shaped cut or open area across from me...open from afar but a tangled mess of hinged trees at ground level.



The corridor I'm in is between a crop field and my home



Looking down from stand there are some large trees that help form a fence like funnel that guide deer down the natural runway already there.



You can see here where two runways are funneled together because of my "hinging with a purpose" to block off runways



I can zoom in with the camera and look in my garage window



The runway is beaten to bare dirt visible behind the tree slightly to the right



Along the natural runway I have left the trees standing so it provides canopy for me above the runway and deer are underneath me before they could possible see me



It's almost not fair...they don't have a chance...

 

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and walk by only 15 yards away



Now photographs of bucks on runways don't mean a thing but...there no pics of bucks traveling anywhere in this corridor but on THIS runway.



How many times have you been frustrated by bucks that are 40, 60 or more yards away running a doe or just cutting cross lots?

It just doesn't happen when one has created a hinged living fence to funnel deer by your stand



I've already taken a buck so these bucks were only "killed" on camera...

This buck is standing exactly where I killed my buck earlier simply because it's the only possible place to come out for 100 yards or more due to my timber edge feathering (hinging alone the timber edge)



In this case an old farm lane runs through a narrow opening between woodlots creating a natural crossing both ways and a ground blind tucked into the brush has allowed me to take several nice bucks with my bow from that spot.

In years prior to edge feathering bucks came out helter skelter all along the lane and small field making it a crap shoot to ever kill one but now...it's like shooting fish in a barrel.

Hinging trees is not only an effective means of creating safe sanctuaries but also an extremely deadly means of harvesting deer consistently....

 

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November 22nd, 2010

Fortunately gun seasons here in Iowa are still several weeks away and normal rut activity is still going on and it's a great time to really monitor how the hinged bottlenecks and funnels have been working. These are just a collage of pictures from my stands and trail cam showing some of the buck movement in daylight hours through these funnels

Funnel #1 in a 100 yard wide stretch of timber where hinging has reduced a dozen runways to one...

I've taken pics of them from my stand...



and the trail cam monitors the runway when I'm not there









Funnel #2 is a "cross hairs" comprised of edge feathered timber and an old farm lane and I have killed two bucks from a ground blind at this bottleneck.







Same runway, different cam position ...(wrong date)



Funnel #3 where I used a shrub and Egyptian Wheat funnel to "lead" deer to small narrow patch of timber and my stand

From my stand...

 

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Funnel # 4 is a natural funnel created by a field edge and a steep ravine utilizing some minimal hinging to narrow the bottleneck.









It is of course impossible to force every deer down any runway but you can significantly increase the odds that bucks will have to travel within 25 yards of your stand by creating funneled bottlenecks. Combine hinging trees with shrub and conifer plantings, annual screens and food sources to bring consistently bring deer by your stand.

I put the telephoto lens on and took more pictures from my stands to give more of a birds eye view of some of the hinge cutting.



It's thick...



but full of little pockets where deer bed





Tons of new sprouts and suckers that provide more screening cover



and new easily reached browse





When trees are hinged "with a plan" they can easily create the funnels and bottlenecks that bring deer past your stand like those in the beginning of this post.



Hinging offers huge benefits in the way of habitat improvements and increased encounters with mature whitetails....

 

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Cover

Hinging trees provides browse and creates bottlenecks but the most important aspect is COVER! Despite all that has been said on this subject I still see hundreds of landowners with wide open timber and fields that wouldn't hide a rabbit let alone a whitetail! Right now...everyone has either been hunting or are still and your timber or wooded areas and the lay of your property and amount of cover is fresh in your mind and a great time to discuss the topic in general.

how does one tell which information is useful to them and which is not


Good question because regardless of where information comes from we need to know it is not only truthful and helpful but really in our best interests if we hope to improve our properties for whitetails.

Why believe me...after all, I'm just an ordinary man with an extraordinary penchant for wildlife habitat. How can anyone, anywhere trust or believe that the information I share will actually help them if their goals are to consistently harvest mature whitetail bucks? I share hundreds of pictures of not only the habitat I create or help others with but the whitetails that utilize the habitat on a daily basis year around in hopes readers will see it's not just "talk"...I share.

Yet another way is when multiple people have consistent success utilizing the same habitat improvements that makes things not a coincidence but rather a set of proven principles that can work literally across the country. I have many good friends in the real estate business all of whom have great habitat programs and are very successful hunters but since my friend Rich Baugh ( A recreational land sales specialist for Whitetail Properties) recently wrote an excellent article for QDMA's "Quality Whitetails" magazine called "Cover is the Key" that parallels to a -T- my own thoughts on cover I wanted to highlight Rich and this years harvest.

168" 5 1/2 year old whopper buck taken with archery equipment on Rich's SE Iowa farm



This isn't the first huge buck Rich has taken nor will it be the last simply because he has put together all the elements of great habitat and put COVER at the top of the list, rather then thinking a food plot was the answer. Some people are successful because of intense pressure on properties around them that forces deer onto their place but if you are looking for the very best advice....look to those who consistently whitetail bucks on their property from 2 1/2 to a mature harvest, because f the habitat they have created.

Rich has done that very thing by creating awesome cover through hinging, TSI, NWSG plantings, smart hunting strategies and the use of many trail cams to monitor his whitetails.

This picture is evidence that Rich was able to hold this deer on his farm from 2 1/2 to 5 1/2



and then successfully harvest this beautiful buck this fall



Some of you may have watched Rich take another beautiful 5 1/2 year old buck from his farm last fall, on Realtree TV so it's not an accident or a fluke. I asked Rich for permission to use his photographs and I urge you to read his article in Quality Whitetails, for great common sense information that you will find very helpful. You won't find anywhere that Rich made individual beds or tied trees down but instead hinged on south facing slopes, logged mature trees and hunts travel corridors....just as I do.

So...before I give my friend a big head....we'll move on to the subject of cover and the reasons it works for Rich and I and hundreds of other landowners...

Hinging cull trees and/or killing competition around crop trees (Oaks) via TSI in most cases is one of the most rapid means of improving cover but not a single inch of your property should be wasted. Recently I acted as cameraman for a friend of mine as he hunted his new farm near mine and we watched as more deer then we could count popped out of the thick red cedar/shingle oak bedding area into a corn stubble field. He has only owned the farm a few weeks and is still learning it and planning new habitat improvements.

We looked over an aerial map of the bedding area and he noted a 4-5 acre field of cool season grass (once pasture) that deer skirted and rarely used (observations from his tree stands) so I encouraged him to consider converting the field to NWSG to not only add to his overall cover but create a place where a mature buck, intent on solitude would be inclined to bed. Nothing to do with hinging per se but everything to do with adding as much cover to his property as possible and that means turning otherwise wasted area into better habitat.

As we watched deer pour out of that bedding area we also noted at least 5 bucks that probably ranged from 3 1/2 to 5 1/2....all from one 40 acre patch of cover.

I'm not aware of a single consultant or adviser who would not be in complete agreement that cover is extremely important but there are of course differing ideas or opinions on hot to create the best cover and actually hold whitetails from 2 until maturity. That's the part that many landowners are confused by...they see the buck harvested but no evidence (such as Rich shared) that they had made improvements that keep whitetails there for years....not just when pushed there due to high pressure on surrounding properties.

In heavily hunted/pressured areas like PA and MI even a small property becomes a sanctuary to deer during November but such is not the case in Iowa where nearly all farms (at least in SE Iowa) become sanctuaries. Large tracts of land are purchased solely for hunting and managed as such so 1-2 people are likely to quietly hunt bow hunt 400 acres in Iowa versus 5 people on any given 40 acres in eastern states. That means people like myself with small farms must work even harder to hold whitetails because they don't come here because throngs of hunters drive them here.

My farms are separated so they involve different deer and different terrain but the principles are the same...thick timber created by TSI and hinging, NWSG, shrub and conifer planting, centrally located food sources that feed deer year around and...bottlenecks that allow me to kill bucks away from feeding areas.

I enjoy sharing trail cam pics as living proof that the habitat improvements that Rich, myself and literally hundreds of others employ...work perfectly!







What kind of cover should you have?

Thick! The kind you can't see through...the kind deer feel safe in, that they can see under but you can not see them!



I'm standing at a fence line taking these pictures of naturally regenerated cover (over grown pasture)



and what we don't want...wide open timber!



One thing rich notes in his article is that when deer reach 4 1/2 they stop appearing in the open timber areas of his farm...so this we want to avoid (note some minimal TSI has been done)



and create this instead

 

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I encouraged the landowner to have the forester doing the TSI to do some hinge cutting but because they don't understand it...they just cut it all down!



The side with the tremendous cover is made even better because it is screened by red cedars



There is no need to make deer a bed in a safe sanctuary like this...heck you couldn't keep them out if your tried!



When you hunt narrow corridors leading from thick bedding areas to either more bedding or feeding areas you can easily kill mature bucks without hoping they'll expose themselves in open ares before dark. Knowing that there is no real need to "boggle" your mind with minute details abut hunting itself. Create the funnels, hunt the wind and kill some good deer as they travel them...







If you wonder if you can believe the habitat advice given...look for proof the the habitat enhancements actually hold young bucks like these...









until they reach 4 1/2, 5 1/2 and older...









Too many people have "food plot on the brain" and they completely forget the need that COVER is the only way they will ever be able to consistently hold whitetail bucks on their property to maturity. Trust in whom you will and believe what you wish but those pics are from two different farms, each with less then 40 acres of timber a piece...not unlike a whole lot of other farms across the nation........

 

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Here's a couple pics of some timber that's sorely in need of some habitat improvement and it's the perfect size to allow hinge cutting!



Maple is a pretty invasive tree and while there is plenty of it in this stand, it can also provide some high quality browse when hinged. Right now however it's a barren wasteland for deer....they have neither cover nor browse.



The landowner does have some oaks that could be released by hinging the invasives around them which then becomes a "win win" for both improved timber and greatly enhanced whitetail habitat.

Once hinged the whole area will explode with new browse



and deer will feel safe and more likely to bed near feeding areas



If timber is too open deer are likely to move far into the interior and that means it's often after dark before they walk by your stand. I've seen deer walk nearly 2 miles to get to cover they felt safe in and that makes them very vulnerable to neighboring landowners as they travel back to food sources.

Provide plenty of thick cover on your property and that's where they'll stay...

 

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Let's talk about funnels....what they look like, why we need them and how we can make them...

If you have never been frustrated watching deer traveling down a runway 50 yards away or popping out into the field in a different spot every night....raise your hand! I doubt in a room full of hunters we would see a single hand go up, so suffice it to say that everyone who has ever hunted deer, especially with archery equipment, would love to know that ALL the deer within a reasonable distance would have to travel down one runway.

This is an example of some natural funnels and while this is not my land I have hunted here many times. I have had encounters with gigantic whitetails but never once have I killed so much as a doe in this spot. Look it over and pick out the natural narrow areas we refer to as funnels, bottlenecks and pinch points and pick your stand spot!



I didn't mark my stands on this picture but circled a couple narrow spots that naturally bottleneck deer but I also marked the many runways that make hunting even this great funnel extremely frustrating. I hope it is obvious by the way that this spot connects larger areas of timber and during the rut traveling bucks are constantly cruising through here. The question is....how can we funnel them down to only one runway?



if this were my farm I would make some fairly simple changes by edge feathering/hinging trees along the line fence (assuming my property was the one to the south). The creek along the west side is naturally deep a with very steep banks so it is somewhat of a natural barrier and open fields to the east tend to keep deer traveling within the timbered areas.

The red line then is were we would hinge to block multiple runways, the blue lines would be lines of travel, the yellow stands for E or NE and W NW winds. The orange lines would be hinged areas that create a cushion around the stands to keep deer from coming in downwind from a field area.



Deer don't like to exert necessary energy and very quickly adapt to taking the "easy way" and soon every deer will travel through this spot just as easily as they did multiple runways beforehand.

Note that the hunter can easily access this narrow corridor without spooking deer bedded in either of the larger timbered areas. If deer were feeding in the hidden bottom field, the hunter can easily slip out to the east after dark without being seen or heard.
Deer can be picked off in a narrow spot like this without alarming every deer in the area and because it's not a field edge, mature bucks are far more likely to appear before dark.

These illustrations are just meant to plant seeds of ideas so that you can first recognize natural funnels and then pinch movement further by blocking off other runways. Hinging cull trees is just one method that happens to be the easiest and most economical way to bottleneck deer and lower your frustration levels next season....

 

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Kinda funny how this part of our farm and the one you have posted look kinda alike. By the number 18 we hung a new stand this year. It ended up being an awesome spot...we just need to do some hinging along the fence lines.

 

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We have had several people say that our south border looks like the border patrol. But, we have a lot of S winds during early and mid seasons. These are 30 yr wind roses that show over 30 years we have a prevailing S wind till December.

October:



November:



December:

 

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I'm learning how to color..so here is an updated version with water, food, and other things. Fields 2,3 and 10 are crop fields and hopefully # 3 will be CRP next year. Green lines = access, small green areas = food plots, white areas = production fields, blue areas = water, yellow = CRP type areas or screening areas, red dots = tree stands, black dot = home, red lines = no access.

 

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So, for anyone who wants to play...where do you see natural bottlenecks? Where would you attempt to hingecut to create your own bottlenecks?

Some of our favorite stands are along the south fence. In the evening the deer travel N out of the neighbors timber through the alfalfa/clover field to get to our field # 10. We have the #9 small plot edge feathered from the creek to the far edge of the number 9 plot with funnels at each stand.

The area NE of plots 14 and 15 shows as timber...but it basically pasture. We hope to make it switchgrass or shrubs.

The timber that sticks straight up to the north was timbered about 15 years ago and is thick and nasty understory. Several huge buck have been taken by the neighbors as the bucks come out of the timber into their crop fields to eat. In the 5 years we have owned this farm we have only hunted the area a few times. It is very hard to get to with the open crop fields and although we can enter through the neighbors property it is a super long walk and not a favor that we want to abuse. This is the enlarged area.

 

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Imatreehugger wrote:I'm learning how to color..so here is an updated version with water, food, and other things. Fields 2,3 and 10 are crop fields and hopefully # 3 will be CRP next year. Green lines = access, small green areas = food plots, white areas = production fields, blue areas = water, yellow = CRP type areas or screening areas, red dots = tree stands, black dot = home, red lines = no access.




Starting with just the basic picture and looking at this from a little different perspective, let's start anew.

Let's assume the #1 goal here is to increase the odds of killing a mature buck, so let's put aside harvesting does and food sources for a moment. Only rarely have I taken a mature buck from the same place I take the does so while we can surely kill them both in funnels...let's place the importance here on hunting rutting bucks in November.

In November then bucks are going to be traveling between bedding areas and the mature animals are always reluctant to enter open areas before dark, This means we want to concentrate on funnels that are in A) Cover... B) Connecting largest areas of timber.

This picture...very roughly...is where I would envision mature bucks traveling cross country "in search of"



Looking at it from that stand point...we want to focus on a few very key areas where it is narrow, accessible and we can create a funnel forcing all deer to travel by a stand within 25 yards. Once the funnels are created trail cams will verify usage...

Tell me if you have noticed any mature animals traveling (roughly) thru the area travel areas noted?

 

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This is some of what we have noticed. The incomplete line at the west end of the farm is not finished because we have not ever seen bucks traveling that far to the south.




The main object of funneling is to force as many deer thru one opening as we can because if there are multiple openings obviously we are going to miss too many bucks.

The lower blue mark would be one that stands out as a single spot where traveling bucks could be funneled the most. The blue line would be either hinged trail blocking or some sort of fenced blocking with the main runway of course left open.

The yellow indicates where one might "make a mess" with hinging to keep deer from approaching with a SW wind for instance



You notice looking at both maps that the lower point is the one spot that you can "bottle em up" so to speak and catch virtually all deer moving through your farm. The exception is along the creek so I guess you and Marty will have to flip for the best funnel...

 

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What about places with no trees...what then?

Personally I am ethically opposed to using any form of "high fencing" and by that I mean something so high that deer cannot possibly jump over it. Deer being basically lazy however will go around fence that is too much effort to jump over, so knowing that I use 16' foot cattle panels along old fences or places with few trees.

Usually I can just wire them to old fence pots already in place....just slightly higher then the fence and that is always enough to divert deer towards an opening (usually where I lower the fence) leading to a runway by my stand.



Pretty simple and easy to use and it does provide an option where trees are not...

Some funnels are just amazingly simple....like this spot where I mowed a path through a corn field that never got planted this year. It grew up to a mass of weeds and grasses so i mowed a path from one side to the other and it leads right to food plots and within easy range of a ground blind.

Deer pour down this simple funnel on a daily basis



Don't make funneling complicated...it's not...use anything available to block off multiple runways and funnel them by your stand. Make a "mess" and they'll avoid it....