He made it!

[massey]

Seasons are closed and he’s still going strong.
I have around 60 pics of him this season. He’s around every other day or so. I have exactly zero day light pics
Question: how do I find his bedding area?
I’m thinking about buying 8 or ten cell cams and covering all the likely spots. I have 5 out now, but he’s completely random in his travels. There’s no discernible pattern that I can see.
Help?!


Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum

 

[George]

nice buck, when you get it figured out let me know.

G

 

[Native Hunter]

I go about this a little differently. I don't try to find a buck's bed, because if I do find it, he will likely move once he has been found. I just like to hunt at places that appear to be the best opportunities for a shot, with the intention of never getting close enough to his bedding to spook him.

All of my cameras are out in the open, and I never put one close to bedding. It doesn't bother me if all of the pictures are nighttime unless all of them are in the middle of the night. If they are, he is probably bedding far away on another property. If that's the case, there's not much you can do in the short term to change that. For the long term, you might try to improve bedding opportunities on your land.

That's a good looking deer. I wish you the best with him in the future.

PS - The deer I killed this year was on camera over 2 miles from my property 4 days before I shot him. Hard to say how many beds that deer had.

 

[George]

In the kind of terrain that were dealing with bucks tend to bed where ever they feel like within their core area.

G

 

[massey]

I go about this a little differently. I don't try to find a buck's bed, because if I do find it, he will likely move once he has been found. I just like to hunt at places that appear to be the best opportunities for a shot, with the intention of never getting close enough to his bedding to spook him.

All of my cameras are out in the open, and I never put one close to bedding. It doesn't bother me if all of the pictures are nighttime unless all of them are in the middle of the night. If they are, he is probably bedding far away on another property. If that's the case, there's not much you can do in the short term to change that. For the long term, you might try to improve bedding opportunities on your land.

That's a good looking deer. I wish you the best with him in the future.

PS - The deer I killed this year was on camera over 2 miles from my property 4 days before I shot him. Hard to say how many beds that deer had.

Yeah, I’ve thought about that. He may be bedding 1000 ft up in the mountain laurel thickets. Our place has tons of great cover and bedding and I’ve patterned smaller bucks before. Almost got a shot at this guys little brother after a good guess where he spent the day. Maybe, like G said, some deer just wander and bed down wherever.


Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum

 

[Drycreek]

Like Native, I don’t get too involved in thinking about bedding areas. I try to offer the does a good place to stock up on groceries and hunt that area hard during the chase and rut phases. Sometimes it works, other times it doesn’t. I generally manage to kill a decent buck each year, but I’m not a trophy hunter, at least not in inches. I’m more of a “don’t shoot the babies” guy.

 

[HB_Hunter]

Good luck on finding his bed. As mentioned, with my terrain/cover I think they have many different bedding areas. The abundance of oaks don’t help things as far as early/mid season patterning is concerned for me either. They could leave their bed and eat acorns in 10’ and the terrain makes it almost impossible to get close enough to kill them. Not worth the risk of bumping them to me.

You might be able to nail down a bed to feed pattern late season on a good food source or early season on a good food source.

I’ve had the best luck on mature bucks hunting pinch points between doe bedding areas during the rut. Late October through the end of November.

Good luck with him!