I’ve wasted more time than I want to admit standing in my garage trying to figure out what I need for a three-day hunt. Digging through bins, questioning whether I packed my headlamp, wondering if that sleeping bag is in the truck or still in the basement. That friction is real, and it costs you. Not just time. Motivation.

That’s why I went all-in on building a truck camping setup that removes every excuse to not go.

The whole philosophy is simple: minimize the decision-making so the only question is whether you’re going or you’re not. Everything has a place. Everything stays packed. When a window opens and I’ve got two days to burn, I’m not running around the house trying to piece together a kit. I’m backing out of the driveway.

The tent topper changed the game for me. Sleeping in the bed of the truck sounds rough until you actually do it right. Off the ground, protected from wind and weather, and completely self-contained. There’s something about closing that hatch at night in the middle of nowhere that just resets your head. No hotel, no tent poles, no dealing with wet gear on the ground. Just you, the dark, and tomorrow’s hunt.

Food and water follow the same logic. I’m not out here trying to cook a four-course meal at 9 p.m. after a long sit. It’s calories that are easy to manage, water I’ve already accounted for, and zero time wasted on logistics that distract from the actual reason I’m out there. Comfortable enough to sleep well. Simple enough to not become a project.

Here’s what most guys get wrong about truck camping for hunting: they over-engineer the comfort and under-engineer the efficiency. The goal isn’t glamping. The goal is getting out more often, staying longer, and being sharp when it matters.

If you’ve been putting off short trips because the setup felt like too much work, this episode is for you. It doesn’t have to be complicated. It just has to be ready.

The past few years I’ve grown to really like hunting on the ground. I like it for obvious reasons when I’m hunting plaines states. With that I’ve used decoying when the scenario called for it however, I didn’t really like any of the decoys I had used. I wanted something that I could deploy anywhere, that was light, packable, and overall not be a hinderance. The HeadsUp Decoy was the closest off the shelf option I found, but still wasn’t quite right. So I saw a modification my buddy had used that thought I’d give it a try this year!

In life, as we know it today, it’s hard to slow down and smell the roses. Like most people who hunt, you want to make time for your family and friends, but work also has a place in your schedule. The ideas you had of scouting every inch of 5000 acres or hunting 41 days of a 42-day season might now seem like a distant memory. 

Happily, there is good news in the modern world of bow hunting. Studying ways to make your hunts efficient is the silver lining to quality time in the woods.

I took some time to seek out a handful of the most efficient hunters I could find so they could give their thoughts to you. What they shared with me is advice you’ll want to take to the woods on all your hunts. I’m sure you’ll enjoy what they had to say as much as I did.

Dan Johnson

Dan is the host of Nine Finger Chronicles Podcast Well known for being witty, he takes whitetail hunting quite seriously. He and I had a free minute to talk between some dad duties about his bottom line for hunting whitetails. Here’s what he had to say.

“You need to maintain the hunting mentality throughout the year. Something like e-scouting is a good way to do just that. You could be having your morning sit on the throne or in the waiting room at the doctor’s office, but pulling up HuntStand, or your choice hunt app is a good habit. That steady contact with a hunting mindset will make your wheels spin and keep you in the hunt. Researching access routes or assessing what the wind might do in certain places are good ways to guide your plan. It doesn’t matter if the parcel is public, private, overlooked, or underrated. Learning what ground you’d like to add or eliminate before you ever set foot in an area is efficiency at its finest.”

What Dan says in his quotes ring true. This part of the hunt is so important and can give you a head start without stepping into the timber.

Andy May

Does Andy May ( @bowhuntingdad) need an intro? The man is a bow-killing machine and is one of the best we’ve seen in our time. Well known for always being efficient, Andy said this.

“I can’t give a topic like efficiency what it deserves without discussing a few things—discipline, scouting, patience, and instinct. 

-Be disciplined in your ability to master your weapon. You have to be able to convert the limited chances that you’ll get each season. Making a clean kill with every arrow released should be every hunter’s main goal.

– Scout five to ten times more than you hunt. If I’m planning to sit in a tree, it’s because I believe there is a high percentage chance of killing that day. 

-Wait for the best conditions. Efficiency means more success in fewer attempts. If you’re patient and stay out of your best areas until the time is right, your chances get much better.

-Develop your instincts, trust them, and they will serve you well in time. Let your gut guide you to aggressive tactics. You will undoubtedly make mistakes. In the long run, you will learn from those experiences and be more successful because of them.”

Andy’s attention to discipline is not easy, but it’s a big part of what makes him prone to success. 

Billy Harvey

If you want to learn a thing or two about eastern big woods, you need to tune in to Billy Harvey’s Pertnear Outdoors Podcast. Though this group of hunters puts effort into all they do, their mastery of driving deer is hard to match. These well-planned deer drives are refined and unique. Later this fall, we will dive into this in a full post, but here we will look at a few things that Billy shared about becoming an efficient hunter.

“A few key takeaways go into an efficient deer drive. First and foremost is safety, followed by a detailed plan, ending with being prepared to make a good shot. 

-Communication is an important part of safety. But it can be tricky in places without cell service. You also need to consider the legal aspect of using a device when hunting. 

-All hunters are assigned a number, route, or stand location in our drives. Paper maps with a hand-drawn blueprint and written notes create the base of our plan.”

-Review of the plan takes place with a fine-toothed comb before getting into position. 

-Choosing shooting lanes and creating a brace with a log or backpack should be done when setting up for the drive. Freehand shots are more likely to end badly on a drive.

Whether a drive is formed with six people or eighteen, the percentage of success is about the same. Match the number of hunters to the size of the ground you’re driving. Using too few hunters in a large area leaves a lot of ground uncovered and room for deer to sneak through the cracks.”

The success of the Pertnear hunters speaks for itself. This past fall, 2022, they took five good bucks with a group totaling eighteen drivers and standers.

Troy Dietterich

You’ll often hear of the ups and downs in bowhunting. From personal venture and as one of my closest friends, I’ve been riding the glory train as well as the struggle bus with Troy. Troy is one of the most diehard hunters I know, and he sure did have an awesome 2022 (check him out @dtrx_outfitters). We’ve learned a ton from one another over the last few years. You will relate to Troy’s approach to being the best he can be!

“Be confident and strategic. Plan for every hunt, but don’t overthink. Going with your gut is often the best advice making it ok to change a plan in the field by using the most recent intel (MRI). That intel can lead you to find the unexpected. The more puzzle pieces you have to back your hunt, the easier it will be to have confidence on stand. Hunting doe bedding in the rut without a buck encounter might be a bummer. But what if does came to that bedding, laid down for a whole afternoon, and didn’t detect you? Take that as a WIN. That day, a buck might not have used that spot; moving forward, you will know how to hunt there. If your hunt didn’t end with a kill, it doesn’t mean it was unsuccessful. Consider all your learning and pull the good out of the hunt.”

When I reviewed Troy’s notes, I couldn’t help but think I’d heard something else like it. “Consider it pure joy whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” James 1:2-3 NIV

Cameron Derr

If someone asked me to describe Cam in one word, efficient is the word that belongs to his name. He is The Deer Gear Podcast guy, but not enough people know that Cam is a plain old whitetail killer. Pure and simple, this is what he had to say.

“Always start by tuning your setup. The things you can control, from your clothing to your bow or an actual method of hunting, look at all parts with detail. E-scouting, boots on the ground scouting, and having a plan of attack are all important aspects of hunting. It doesn’t matter if you’re a ground guy, a saddle hunter, or if you pack in a tree stand. Your moving parts must work together for the best possible outcome.” 

Follow Cameron, and you’ll know what he means when he says things must work together. Every piece of gear he uses works with synergy to make all his hunts worth their weight in gold.

Taking It Home

There is plenty that we can all learn from these five stud hunters. Most importantly, they are driven to continually evolve their own skill set. Preparation, instinct, scouting, tuning your bow and making hunt plans. Of all the “things” we put into hunting, it’s important to remember what we take from it. The “why” we hunt in the first place.

If you get your hands on any deer hunting article from about ten years ago, you’ll see the uptick in hunting public land. But also, you’ll find all sorts of secrets on how to kill a big buck. 

Most of it is geared toward a specific technique or outworking the competition. But here is the reality check. Did you notice the keywords above? Ten years ago. Specific tactics and outsmarting secrets are great, and in the right setting, they still work! However, sometimes our little black book of secrets shrinks and will need revamping. A secret ten years ago has now grown and is rooted in new ways of thinking. Deer have grown accustomed to our tactics and are far more wary of things that have worked in the past.

These secrets are big and still work when applied to the right case. I always compare it to bass fishing. Every year a new lure comes out on the market that dominates fish. It might seem like you can’t keep them off of your hook. But the following year, you use that lure and find it’s a dud. That subtle change in presentation worked for a while, but the fish caught on quickly. 

What does that have to do with deer hunting and secret tactics? Let’s dig into the popular ones!

Hunt A Mile Back

I’ve been to my fair share of hunter’s safety courses. I’ve gone to my own, taken friends, and my wife. I was eleven when I sat at a table for my first course. I remember starting the day excited that I would finally hunt in the coming fall. 

At an impressionable age, I recall one of the instructors going over survival safety and how not to get lost in the woods. He talked about how easy it is to get lost in a mountain when cold or when tracking a deer. Flagging tape was popular then, but he mentioned how toilet paper was a better option as it is biodegradable and still easily visible. His last sentence was pleading. “Please, young people, please, use toilet paper!”

That safety course was twenty-four years ago, and hunting a mile from the access was a rare tactic back then. In fact, most hunters who said they hiked a mile never made it past 500 yards. 

Here’s the secret, ten years ago, one to one and a half miles bought you solitude. Maps and apps then began gaining traction in the bowhunting community. If you ran out of toilet paper in the first half mile, there was a way back to the truck. Ten years ago, finding hunters that far from comfort was still uncommon.

Today, the one-mile rule is no secret. It’s not even considered deep by most mobile hunters. I’m not trying to sell the idea that getting deep won’t help you. It would help if you had more pieces of the pie to understand the worth of that deep solitude.

Find The Bed, Kill The Buck

Bed hunting, some hunters live and die by that tactic. Because more and more hunters are using bed style hunting to wrap a tag on a big animal, more hunters are dying by this method. The Hunting Beast has perfected this style of hunting, and what Dan Infalt does, he does well. The catch is that you and I are not Dan. 

Again with mapping apps, almost any bowhunter with a bit of scouting experience can point to a spot on a map and say, “there is probably a buck bed right there.” 80% of the time, that is accurate. But what Dan Infalt understands ten times better than we do is which bed is worth hunting.

More studies have been done on the way bucks bed because of the increased popularity of bed hunting. Most have found that the same buck only sometimes uses the same bed. A buck will bed in any given location because he feels that spot meets his needs at that moment. That might be to have a better chance at doe breeding or food. Even more important, bucks bed to survive. 

Same can be true for buck beds. The more hunters in you’re area that target beds, the more likely a buck will be to bed in a different one every night. Today, you might not be the only hunter in the woods targeting beds. Big bucks pattern humans far quicker than we can pattern them. 

Bed hunting comes down to finding the right place and time to apply the tactic. It can be like throwing dynamite into a barrel full of fish. But otherwise, it could be a dud.

Water Access

For some odd reason, deer hunters are shy about getting wet feet. At least, they used to be, but that doesn’t seem to be the case anymore. Ten years ago, you might have gotten away from the crowd by crossing water too wide to jump, too deep for knee high boots, or if you had to take a boat. Water access almost always meant you’d have the woods to yourself. 

Social media has a huge role in this one. Pictures of a hunter wading in chest-deep water with a bow overhead or paddling a trophy down a creek are dope. Hunters want a distinct experience, and water access tends to give them just that.

The thing that water still has going for it is that deer need it, and deer use it. Instead of only thinking about water access, think about how the water meets a deer’s needs. Does it provide a fast escape? Is the water in a dry location where it meets the hydration needs? Some states have laws that protect deer that are using water as “refuge.” That means if you see a deer swimming, it is illegal to shoot it. Even for gun hunters, getting a crack a deer on the other side would be no small feet.

Overlooked or Over-Rated

Overlooked spots are great, but the misconception is you can find them by looking for them. A big majority of hunters are looking for the same thing you are! The skipped spots by the parking or the cover that seems to be nothing of importance. 

You could maybe find an overlooked spot during a scouting mission. A better way to find them is by randomly experiencing a deer using that spot. I spent a lot fishing a certain honey hole. One summer, as I was leaving, a buck chasing does crossed a roadway in front of me two different times. I didn’t spend time deer hunting in that area, but I did learn something from that deer. That buck spent much of his time on a bed to feed pattern just out of sight of the hunting pressure. 

It isn’t easy to imagine that area as overlooked. There is a defined crossing deer trail that is clear as day, and you can see a rub line running the edges of the deer trail. There is also plenty of recreational traffic, which makes it difficult to understand the human sign that’s present. 

If you’re stressing about finding an overlooked spot, a gentle reminder that you usually won’t find one by looking will go a long way.

Fix the Problem

Most experts in the whitetail space share the facts because they want to help other hunters. Every hunter once had another hunter teach them how to hunt. But the goal of most gurus isn’t for you to adopt every little thing they can do. It’s to help you get more creative and take bits and pieces from many avenues. When you’ve learned to do that, you’ll learn to have the type of hunt that fits your own goals.

Have you wondered how a shed antler can help you kill a buck next fall? Bucks are known to group up and winter outside their home range, so finding sheds would seem unrelated to your next wall hanger. But what about a year like 2023? 

To the disappointment of many ice fishermen, the winter of 2023 has been mild. In my neck of the woods, there’s been less than 5 inches of snow. That could mean good things in store for your spring 2023 post-season scouting and bring more meaning to the sheds you’ll find this spring! Throw off popular beliefs and think about sheds from a new angle.

Winter Habits

What many avid shed hunters hope for is an average to severe winter. Bucks are even more predictable in harsh conditions, which means sheds can be much easier to find if you have the right food and cover. When you get the formula right, it often leads to many antlers in the same spot. 

Wintering bucks prefer to seek high-calorie food and dense thermal cover. Of course, there are outliers, but for a higher chance of finding more sheds, these are the places to look. Pine stands or thick clear-cuts with an overhead canopy paired with bordering ag fields are the leading choices.

In a heavy winter type of year, searching edges of the above areas and their travel routes will help you find antlers consistently. But remember, we’re talking mild right now.

Comforts of Home

Ever enjoy a staycation? Sometimes my family loves to take time off and enjoy the comforts of home. There’s no booking hotels, packing, or a need to find a dog sitter. That often translates to less stress, healthier habits, and feeling rested. 

Mild weather directly impacts how much stress a deer feels. Lower stress and less need to leave home can mean more dispersed deer herds. Typically, it’s common to find a few antlers in one spot. These spring-like winters may require putting on a few more miles. Put on your bed hunter thinking caps and focus on micro food sources. Bucks often take on their late summer to early fall habits, making antlers harder to find.

Finding a specific buck’s antlers could be easier during this type of year. You’ve already spent the fall chasing him around, learning his routine. By this date, enough time has passed since gun season to allow a buck to drift back to his normal stomping ground. Because you’ve pinpointed his patterns, you’ll know where to walk to be more successful.

Scout, Scavenge, or Both

Even though sheds are spread far and wide, good things come from this type of shed season. The “right way” to shed hunt is to focus your eyes on the ground. Keeping an eye three feet in front of you and to your right and left, walking slowly, and constantly scanning is the best way to build the miles for piles. 

If you’re post-season scouting, the “right way” is to keep your eyes always forward, looking for rubs, scrapes, trails, and beds. That means finding fewer sheds because your eyes aren’t on the ground.

All the conventional methods are good, but there’s only so much time to do it all. I want to scout efficiently to have the best fall possible, and at the same time, I want to pick up a few pieces of bone. Winters, like we’re having this year, make both possible.

Scout your way to an area with all the right ingredients for a perfect hunt. Once you’ve found it, slow down! Mark up your Spartan Forge map with as many deer sign waypoints as you can. Weave around the area and scour the ground. More miles doesn’t automatically mean you’ll find more sheds or better sign. The content of what is in those miles matters the most. Fall sign, in combination with fresh tracks or rooted-up leaves, is bound to make you bump into an antler or two. If you find rooting areas take a minute to kick piles of leaves around. You’ll be pleasantly surprised to find a few sheds covered up by the feeding frenzy. 

Spring to Fall Bridge

More time spent in a buck’s core area equals more understanding of his habits. Where does he go when pressure is heavy? What is the likely route to or from his bed morning and evening? Does his sign give any clues to his character? How does he interact with does? By scrapes in between bedding, or does his movement take him far away in search of the right lady? 

I love post-season scouting and shed hunting in winter patterns like this one. Spring and fall habits are so similar that it makes your scouting efforts twofold. You see the sign from the past fall, note fresh sign in a desirable area, and have better confirmation of a core range with shed antlers. 

Driving it Home

Sheds may not point you toward a good hunting spot during a typical winter. As fun as it is to find them, they can be misleading. A big shed is good information but usually requires more questions to connect the dots. It’s often better to erase the memory of your find to keep it from influencing your hunt.

But in these mild winters, open your memory bank or handwritten journal because you’re about to learn a few things. These are the years when a shed antler can lead you to a mature buck’s perfect sanctuary.

To hear more about killing next year’s buck with this year’s sheds, check out this podcast with Troy Pottenger!

Feeling like a mustang about to bust out of the gate at full speed? The anticipation of finding sheds is exciting, but nothing should hold you back from getting a jump start for next fall. It’s time to get stomping, and for a different post-season perspective, I cashed in on a phone-a-friend.

Between his business with podcasting, content creating, and being the best dad he can be, Dan Johnson, host of the Nine Fingers Chronicles Podcast, was happy to drop some knowledge for us to enjoy. This guy knows whitetails, and you’ll find that what he says will fit right into your bucket of strategies.

Get Out Now

Some ideas fly around social media on the right timing for walking around the woods post-season. Start time is even more of a sore subject when shed antlers get thrown into the mix. Lucky for us, Dan doesn’t care much about what people on social media think. 

“You’ve got to get out now. Post-season scouting isn’t all about sheds. The effort placed into post-season scouting holds more weight than most hunters realize. Right now is the perfect time to walk around the woods. All the ground you’ll cover is bare, and trails are defined. It’s also easy to see other deer sign from a distance in the surrounding terrain.”

“A little snow really helps to follow deer around. Snow could mean a change in the way deer move or the food they will eat. The thing about starting post-season scouting early is that you’ll have time to learn. If you start now, you won’t feel like you’re wasting time following deer tracks. Those tracks on the ground will tell you so much about how a deer thinks if you keep chasing them.”

Stack the Intel

I often wonder how many pieces to the puzzle need to be put together to have a successful fall. Some seasons make it seem easy, while others feel like you can’t catch a break. Dan sold his thoughts on compiling intel in the following ideas.

“Your scouting is a slow stacking of odds. This spring, look for edges because that’s where deer live and move. Your goal should be to find sign made not only this past season but also for a few years prior. The more history you can find in one place, the better the chance of a repeat story. Stacking the intel needs to cover a wide range of things. What happened when you hunted there this past season? How many years of rubs and scrapes can you find? Do deer continue to use the same old crossings and trails? What about trail cam intel? Have you soaked a camera in there for a while? Keep notes and pair all your findings with a map, and you’ll begin to recognize patterns that will help you know what to do next.

Project the Data

Now that you’ve begun to compile data or have built a well-rounded history, the scene will start to make sense with the more time that elapses. Dan’s broad scouting approach is much like a day on a smallmouth lake. Find what the fish are doing and replicate that pattern on the rest of the lake.

“Scouting and finding success boils down to wash, rinse, and repeat. The principals that worked for you in one location, well, you will want to pay those forward. It makes sense to apply those tactics to areas similar to something that worked before. As mentioned earlier, now is a time to pair the sign, terrain, and mapping together. Find that sign that pops. Even in southern states, deer sign is more defined than it will be at any other time of year. Now is the best time to replicate things that worked for you in the past or to repeat a strategy you suspect will have a good outcome.”

Go Against the Grain

Scouting, research, and deer sign are invaluable. Overlooking them is a mistake. But hunters should also pay close attention to their gut feelings. 

If a spot isn’t showing you obvious sign, but something about it speaks to you, give it a go. With maturity as a hunter, Dan has learned to trust his gut.

“So many times, the makings of a good hunt start with a gut feeling. In my younger years, I may have skipped scouting land that didn’t have much sign as soon as I exited my truck. Now I hunt smarter. Ever think about this? Deer live outside all year long! Scrapes that you find during post-season scouting missions are great. But what do they mean? Most of the time, scrapes are where does are. They are where bucks expect to find something specific. How about the locations bucks live? There might not be intense sign in those places. They are still worth investigating. You don’t know what you don’t know, but observing is always necessary.”

Putting it All Together

We all need a finisher, something that makes us know we’re prepared well in advance. Dan had some great parting thoughts on how to bring your post-season into the new season.

“Scout a lot, and then don’t scout at all. You’ll always need to consider subtle adjustments. Food changes and crop rotations will be different. Remember, deer move throughout the year, but the only reason to re-visit something you’ve scouted in the post-season is to smooth out the details you need to clinch the title. Scouting is finding; hunting verifies that what you saw is accurate. All hunts may not end in a dead buck, but you will succeed more when you put the work in upfront to document, stack data, and refine your conclusions.”

Learn More

To hear more from Dan, check him on Instagram and tune into his podcast @ninefingerchronicles For more content with Dan listen to the latest episode he recorded with Clint! Episode #319

Is your New Year’s resolution to excel as a bow hunter? There’s no better time of year to kill your buck than the post-season. Of course, we don’t mean the physical shooting of a deer. But if you want to find the buck or the area that makes you happy, it’s time to get your boots on.

There are hundreds of ways to put yourself in the right situation. The four listed below will offer a good kick-off to get you started.

Edge Cover Transition

An edge is some of the best cover to find during post-season scouting missions. Edges come in all shapes and sizes, but the two basic forms are soft and hard transitions.

A soft edge is an area that holds two different habitats with almost seamless separation. They are tricky to find on satellite images because they lack definition. It may look like hardwoods that change to the mucky ground with slightly thickened cover before dumping into a full blown swamp. That middle of the road cover between the two worlds is where you’ll find the most concentrated deer sign. The transition I’ve described will often hold deer sign that relates to all phases of a hunting season. Take notes on the sign and its suspect timeline when walking these transitions. That will help you know when to target the specific waypoint for a hunt. 

A hard edge made up of a defined seam. The easy way to describe an edge like this is a heavy pine forest that meets hardwoods. Their definition makes these edges very easy to find on satellite images. Learning how deer use a hard edge may be easier, but there will be fewer times of the season a deer will choose them. Hard edges tend to hold rutting sign and often cater to late-season action, so keep an eye out for fresh sheds!

Pre-Rut Hot Spots

Think about how bucks change from summer through the entire fall. They act like a couple of senior college fellas going to the gym to workout together. They spot each other and get themselves hyped to work harder, like a group of summer bucks. As time passes, some of the college gents get job interviews, and their focus shifts. They continue going to the gym, but it becomes less about the frat boy experience. Focus shifts to the task at hand, much like the buck anticipating the coming of the rut. 

The best pre-rut hotspots often come from community scrapes tucked into cover. Most of the time, you’ll need more information to confirm dates and the best time to hunt them. This is where soaking a trail cam through a whole season comes into play. The scrapes to focus your hunts are the ones that have a burst of activity during the “October lull.” Generally around the 12th-16th of the month. 

The activity should occur no matter the weather. It will often set up outside of doe bedding and should include sign you can trace in the direction of buck bedding. Via the trail cam, it will seem like bucks and does are playing phone tag and leaving messages for a callback.

Keep track of these dates and consider going straight to those areas the following year. Remember, history often repeats itself, but your chances are at their highest with similar conditions.

Rut Cruising 

Cruising ground looks like more than plain unbroken timber tracts with random deer sign. The rut is your best bet if you plan to just walk into the woods, pick a tree, and hunt. What if you spent just a few hours searching for that needle in a haystack spot? For better rut hunting, go to that big unbroken track or a maze-like farmland piece. Get specific in your search for the perfect rut funnel, and keep that game plan during scouting trips. Deer sign can often lead you astray.

While deer will use an entire landscape and leave sign wherever they go, there are spots that they will use most. To find it, ask yourself the right questions when you see the evidence. Does the sign run through cover or on a terrain feature that makes deer travel through that spot? Is the sign related to the downwind side of doe bedding? Can traveling bucks smell scrape lines from a long way off? Why does that area seem ideal for a rut cruise

Take a look at scrape lines. They see a lot of action during the earlier parts of the fall. When bucks begin the active search for love, scrapes still see the action, but it isn’t the same. Instead of hitting licking branches, and working scrapes, bucks are reaping their investments. They are cruising downwind of those scrapes.

In big woods or mountain country, that might be a scrape line on a bench below a ridge edge or a saddle that connects one side of the ridge to the other. Bucks will travel the leeward side of the terrain and scent-check all those scrapes from afar.

Think about what that might mean in farmland. One of the most common places for a deer is field edges. Bucks prefer to avoid running to the middle of an open field. They will do it if a hot doe stands out there, but only to corral her back into the cover. A scrape line on a field edge can allow them to run interior timber to scent-check scrapes while remaining safe. Scout your rut zones by recognizing what makes sense for the buck that you assume is using it.

Crossings

There isn’t much of a better funnel for bowhunting during any timeframe than a crossing. The formula doesn’t matter. You name it: trail crossings, creek crossings, fence crossings, ditches, rivers, powerline cuts. Crossings are easy to find, and scouting them with a bit of snow on the ground makes it even easier to see their definition.

Crossings have the most variety as far as hunting goes. Deer unfamiliar with an area are bound to use them, and the regulars will feel relaxed when using them on a pattern. 

Because crossings may not border bedding ground, they can be low impact. They are likely places for daytime movement and are ideal for using a cell cam to keep tabs on the action.

Post Review

For bow hunting, entering a season feeling prepared is one of the best confidence boosters time can buy. If you want to kill your best bucks consistently, start the process as soon as the last season ends.

Gun seasons are opening all over the country. Maybe you’ve spent your fall trying to kill a trophy class whitetail. But often, with a gun in hand and a drive to fill the freezer, all bets are off.

Maybe it’s been a tough bow season, and you’re ready for easy hunting. Should you stop grinding now after all the work you’ve already done? Gun openers can be the last best chance to kill the one buck you’ve been watching. 

There is no doubt that mature bucks know things are about to go down on gun openers. They hear the truck tires running over gravel, doors slamming, and deer scattering around them.

With your state’s gun season approaching, jump ahead of the crowd. It’s time to have a mature buck’s frame of mind, just like the ones you’ve spent time learning so much about this fall. 

Don’t Settle for Traditional Cover

There are rare incidents of a brute hitting an open food source on first-day gun hunts, but relying on a spot like that, is a sure way to dwindling encounters. Take the extra steps to hunt the right cover. The spot you need doesn’t have to be behind the pressure or 5 miles away from access. However, it should have the perfect hiding place and a quick escape when the heavy pressure arrives. 

The cover you want will probably be ugly and not the dreamy stuff. For example PA, everyone loves to hunt thin-ish mountain laurels with a nice oak stand nearby. It looks like good cover, and sometimes it is, but if that cover is the crowd’s focus, a big buck will catch on quickly. 

Be where the deer want to be, not where you would like to hunt them. Places like a thick buffer strip of leafless sassafrass in the middle of a rocky ridge line, a bench with tangled green briar, or a creek bottom choked with rhododendron are all excellent hiding places for a buck that’s lived through many gun seasons. That’s the wisdom he has over his two and three-year-old cousins.

Lunch Time

Many hunters say it, but only a few do it; skip going back to camp for lunch! I’m not telling you to forget to eat, but if you want to see something cool, wait until later to eat that sandwich you packed. 

From hours of 11 AM-2 PM, hunters are breaking out their PB&J for a little pick me up. Be the hunter who eats first or last. If you can’t focus without eating, eat an early lunch while remaining on stand. Let everyone else lower their attention or leave the woods for a hot meal. Deer sense the lull in pressure and, on the opener, will feel comfortable moving around at that time.

One of the biggest bucks I’ve killed happened because I stayed on stand when everyone else was ready to eat. A hunter from our group told me he was going to leave his stand and walk past mine. He needed to get the lunch that he had left in my truck. I bluntly told him that I had seen people walking around the woods and that I’d appreciate it if he’d curb his hunger for a bit longer. Thirty minutes went by, and a few does lead a heavy-antlered 11-point right to me. 

This private land farm buck felt the pressure of the day but also the lull in human activity. He only required a little extra patience and the knowledge that the typical lunch hour on surrounding farms happens between eleven to noon. Big bucks often die at noon during gun season, and most of the time, it’s due to letting everyone else eat first.

Embrace the Pressure

Gun season hunting pressure is why so many bucks live to see another day. Bucks that catch wind of all the racket know where to go to be safe. Stay aware of that surrounding pressure.

A drop in hunting pressure after the first few days of the season will cause bucks to let their guard down. Bucks who sense the lack of invasion will get lazy about bedding before light. Some may take longer than others to forgive the offense, while others may feel like they are the king of the forest. Daylight might cause speedy travel from point A to point B, but they won’t make it far when you’re there to intercept that vulnerability. 

Deer Drives

Should you run to the woods when you hear of a drive happening? Yea, that’s a good idea. But not how you might think. While the front side of another person’s drive may be a good place to see deer, bucks don’t get old by being fooled during deer drives. 

If you see a drive forming, it will often work in your favor to get behind the drivers and wait. Most mature bucks have been through a drive or two and know what to do. Those bucks know to stay put in tight cover and wait until the drivers have passed. After the intrusion, a buck often leaves that resting place for untouched safety. That is when your ambush comes into play. 

Bucks will slip away behind the drivers to flee the danger in the opposite direction of the drive. But they usually have a destination in mind. Make sure the place you are waiting is on a hidden terrain feature that can conceal a mature buck or on the travel route to that hidden gem.

Deep Freeze

It’s not a secret that cold fronts are good days to be in the woods. When the front starts, there is a big increase in deer movement. But a cold front with heavy hunting pressure may hamper the expectations. 

Let’s say the orange army invades the woods on a Saturday, and then in the wee hours of Sunday morning, a front moves in. Deer may move but will likely bed before light breaks the sky. The hunting pressure will keep them tucked into safety as long as their stomach can tolerate it. 

A mature buck smart enough to bed inside edible cover could remain in the same spot until after dark. But as the hunting pressure dissolves during the week, that buck will begin to feel more comfortable again. If the cold trend continues, his need to feed will override his need for safety. The cold weather will push him from bed earlier every day. Bucks can be killed over food at a time like this if you know the closest source to his preferred bedding.

Keeping it Simple

Creativity during gun season is only sometimes a necessity. From the tips above, you probably noticed the common theme that less pressure means better hunting. That could be as simple as taking a drive around access points and learning which ones are popular. Or it could mean a silent hike into the woods after everyone else has already been seated. If you know where the pressure isn’t, then you know where the deer will be.

The weeks we’ve all been waiting for are here. Just yesterday, a small buck in my backyard was making rubs and having bristled staring matches with my 3D archery target. Deer are now moving more during daylight, and tensions are mounting. This time might be the best time to kill a big deer. Check out this podcast about killing big deer during scrape week!

With all the sign making, how will you know which pre-rut sign is worth hunting? That question is the right one to ask. Much of the sign made at this time of year may not hold value. Understanding the sign is the key to a successful hunt.

It’s Everywhere

Deer sign is all over the place this time of year. From rubs that popped up in September to scrapes opened by tense young bucks, it can be tricky to choose which sign to hunt. 

While I’m not condoning passing by sign without checking it, there is sign you’ll want to spend more time reading. The name of the game is the right place, right time. But if you get one of those wrong, you’ll be out of the game. 

Worth The Price

Your time is valuable, and no hunter wants to waste it hunting the wrong thing. Big sign often draws considerable attention, but despite popular belief, that a signpost rub doesn’t always carry its weight in gold. 

Let’s use the example of a rub and the details you need to pick apart. One big rub is all you need to get your mind excited, but if that rub doesn’t give you direction, it’s not worth much. Small rubs leading to a bedding area, or better yet, to and from a bedding area, should get you excited. Saplings rubbed on both sides with a green hue and bark shavings at their base reveal a key travel route. Dig a little further; any buck can make a little rub, so how aggressive are those rubs? Are the saplings snapped off halfway up their trunk? Do the rubs go from the bottom of the tree to about chest height? How shredded is the wood, is it smooth, or does it look like spaghetti hanging off the tree?

Scrapes shouldn’t be a problem determining their freshness since leaves are falling. That means bucks will open the best scrapes daily. But the right time is difficult to catch. Scrapes can be a perfect trap for daylight activity, but many are used and checked at night. If you’ve noticed scrapes with loose earth, becoming a muddy pit, or dust on newly turned leaves, consider throwing a hunt at that area right away. If you’re not so sure, this is a good area for a cell cam.

As a helpful hint, if you find new scrapes on your way out of the woods, hunting them right after a light rain is an excellent plan. Be patient; a buck reworking scrapes after rain will have many to check. Don’t be afraid to be on stand through mid-day hours.

Soak It In

Gawking at sign and moving along won’t teach you much. But overthinking can hurt you as well. Take a quick look at the sign and ask some questions. What pattern is it showing? Does the sign make sense for the time of year? A buck’s interest is shifting toward does, so better movement will happen from buck to doe bedding. Food is still important but does and security cover rule.

When you find a few things that catch your eye, take at least 5 minutes to read that sign. Think about why a buck would make it, when he would travel it, and how you might hunt him there effectively.

Flip a Coin?

Sometimes even the best hunters have to make educated guesses. If you’re in an area where you’ve found minimal sign, it might mean you just need to take your chances. Find the best sign you can. If that sign is in a funnel, pinch point, or good travel terrain, it’s probably a good travel corridor for a pre-rut hunt. Flip the coin and take your chances at your educated guess. You’ll be surprised how often you might be right.

Solution

Bucks will do some cruising this time of year, but they are more likely to be caught setting themselves up for success with does. Establishing their travel routes and rooting out doe bedding is a priority. Finding their travel lines and areas of intense sign making can often be like a connect the dots picture. Find the correct number in the sequence and hunt!

Scrape week seems to get here faster every year. I’ve said it before all scrapes are not equal. Most scrapes work well for trail cam pictures, but that doesn’t always mean good hunting. Scrapes that are the “odd man out” can help you put a deer inside shooting range. 

What do I mean about the odd man out? It’s much like finding Waldo on the back of a cereal box. Those details that make one scrape different from the rest are so important. A water hole, thicker cover, and terrain advantage will make a scrape more valuable.

Below you’ll find three ideal scrapes for a hunting situation. These scrapes should spur your own thoughts from previous hunts or from your scouting efforts. If you need more scape info, here’s a podcast with Troy Pottenger to learn how to use scrapes as big buck traps!

The Bottom Of a Ditch: Ditches are usually made by two finger points sticking out from the main ridgeline. They often have water at their base, whether from a mountaintop spring or runoff. Bucks like to bed or travel across the top of these fingers because they offer the best escape and cover. 

As they travel over the top of the small points, they can use thermal scent to keep them safe in small increments. The scent advantage is also useful for scrapes at the bottom of the ditch. A buck traveling or bedding on a point system like this can move along fast. 

The best ditch bottoms for a scrape have a flat base and are wide enough to support saplings for licking branches. Ditch scrapes can be hard to find after rain because of runoff, so keep your eyes open for the licking branch. The licking branch is what keeps these types of scrapes active.

The Unique Tree: Depending on the region, maybe you’ve noticed that bucks often make scrapes under the same type of trees. Maybe you’ve seen most of the scrapes you’ve found develop under hemlocks or beech trees. 

Of course, the strength of a scrape is based on what’s around it; cover, water, food, etc. But sometimes, when a scrape is under a tree that doesn’t fit the pattern, it has more drawing power. The tree that falls outside the pattern usually has the most evident licking branch. 

In 2021, many of the scrapes I hunted were under laurel bushes. Sneaking in the dark, I noticed a brand new scrape relating to the line I was going to hunt. An oak branch had snapped, and the ends of that branch were splintered and chewed. The ground was bowled out and as black as coffee grounds. In that pattern of scrapes, this one was the most unique and most used. Hunting close by that scrape paid off.

New Cluster: Fresh earth is something I love to see on the way into the woods. When scrape activity starts, it may often seem like frustrated activity. Walking into an area with 3 to 10 scrapes in a 20-yard circle probably doesn’t mean much when the best scrapes are already established. But if you find a place like this in the first half of October, you’d better get into a tree. 

This spot signals bucks getting ready for the rut. They have pent-up testosterone, and they are rearing to go. Agitated scrapes like this pop up the most in staging areas. During this time, bucks still follow a bed-to-food pattern and don’t know what they want. But that usually means a few return trips to the same spot. If you’re in a tree above fresh sprinkles of dirt on the leaves, you’re giving yourself higher odds of the buck returning.

Ahead Of The Curve: Consistent bits of information will have you up to speed before the season begins. Want a good process and to know what to do in every situation as soon you come to the point of decision? Feed yourself the information you need to stay one step ahead.