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Can-Am Headquarters ...Aurora Wheelers ATV Forum > Tips, Toys, Tires, Ads, Misc > Outdoors > Funnels and Structure, Keys to Bagging your Buck |
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| Funnels and Structure, Keys to Bagging your Buck - Outdoors - Tips, Toys, Tires, Ads, Misc - Can-Am Headquarters ...Aurora Wheelers ATV Forum | ||||||||||||||||
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outlandish AWF Admin 
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If you ever get a chance to walk through snow in a hilly terrain, look back when you get to a rise and observe where you’ve walked. We like to take the easiest, safest and most direct route we can. A whitetail is similar. With a whitetail however, it’s the easiest, safest, most direct AND most inconspicuous route between two points. Learning to read the terrain is a key to consistently filling your tag.
One of the first things that I will do when approaching a new spot is obtain an aerial photo or topographical map. The first spots to key in on are the funnels. I don’t care if you are hunting big timber, agricultural areas or big city suburbs, there are funnels in your hunting area. Wherever you can restrict their movement to a smaller zone there is typically going to be more traffic. Also, if you can restrict their movement to a smaller area it’s easier to position yourself to remain undetected from their nose. Normally whitetail will use the cover to their advantage. However, I’ve seen the opposite while hunting open areas out west. The whitetail will use the openness to their benefit and they seem to learn that “distance” means safe. That’s why I said the most inconspicuous route. If they don’t have thick cover to work with, they will usually then take the path least noticeable to us or other predators. Several times I’ve witnessed mature bucks travel in dried up or shallow creek beds. All you could see was the tips of their antlers as they passed by. When the chlorophyll drops out of the plants and the leaves start to fall. Their travel patterns will also change. Now, the path that they used so that they could conceal their travel may be wide open. Anticipate this change before it happens. This can be a key to bagging a buck during the “October lull” that many hunters talk about. When examining deer trails you need to remember that sometimes deer don’t use trails that often. If they want to get from point A to point B relatively fast then I believe they stick to the trails a bit more. Deer have possibly been using these same trails for generations, and through time they become well worn. Sometimes however, they seem to act like elk or other ungulates and just meander randomly along and not stick to trails. They are still using the wind to their advantage, but rather than a clear cut path to travel they just have a general direction or heading. Good advice is to do some late-winter and springtime scouting. The well-used trails are obvious at this time. These “main travel routes” are the trails that you want to concentrate on when positioning ambush sites. Common sense and the conditions play a large role in predicting deer movement. “During a forty mile-an-hour wind a whitetail will normally use travel routes that keep them protected from the gale.” “On an early September day, 75 degrees and sunny, a whitetail will more than likely stick to the shade while moving.” A lot of ground can be eliminated by using your brain and paying attention to the conditions. When looking over an area, I like to imagine it without any trees or brush. If you try and foretell their travel patterns this way first when you add the trees and brush back to the picture it can sometimes seem obvious where they will go. Look for the points, terrain breaks, edges and turns that will force or encourage the animal to go one way over another. We can actually influence whitetail to travel where we want. During the beginning of August I will sometimes go out and create my own trails, using a pruner through brush, and a weed whacker through the tall grass and weeds. Mature bucks can many times be found in the thickest nastiest brush you can find. BUT, when traveling through the thick stuff, they will almost always, unless spooked, travel the easiest route they can find - the path of least resistance. You can also fall trees across their trails to force them to go a certain direction. You can aid them in becoming accustomed to your man-made trail by adding some scent. I use Wildlife Research Center’s plain Select Doe Urine and create a trail with it. Periodically I stop and make a scent-post with Coon Urine and some of the Select Doe Urine. I don't mix them; instead I’ll pour some directly on the ground or on the base of a tree, two to four feet apart, near or directly on the trail. Many of the animals in the whitetail’s world mark their territories in a similar manner. Just like the fox, coon, cats, elk or moose, a whitetail will mark territory with urine and with other visual and scent oriented stimuli. It’s a sign to the other animals saying “hey, I live here too.” I’ve watched whitetail approach a sign-post created a couple days prior, sniff the ground, and urinate close to, or in a couple cases directly over, where I poured the scent. As with most animals, whitetail travel from place to place using cover and terrain to their advantage. Their travel patterns are greatly dictated by the lay of the land, conditions during that time of year, obstacles, and many other influences that govern how easy, or hard it is going to be to get from point A to point B. Learning to recognize the transition areas, access points, and travel corridors of whitetail can be a key to bagging your buck. © 2005 Outdoor Outlines, Inc.
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| Can-Am Headquarters ...Aurora Wheelers ATV Forum > Tips, Toys, Tires, Ads, Misc > Outdoors > Funnels and Structure, Keys to Bagging your Buck | |
