Whitetail Strategies

The deer above are my three best. 202, 212 and 210. It took 18 years of living in the Midwest and three moves to find an area I really liked. There’s a few things each of these deer have in common. They all were in heavily hunted areas, people knew about them and they had small daylight cores. I knew of several people that had pics of each buck. But all failed to narrow down his core for different reasons.

I tend to hunt on the aggressive side and scout more than I hunt. For each of these bucks. I consistently moved cameras throughout the summer into the fall trying to narrow down movements. If a camera didn’t produce a picture of them in a week or two. It would get pulled and moved again. The ones that would get pictures would stay. I always start close to food and back track in towards cover or isolated, overlooked areas. I like to cover all the trails leaving thick areas. Each of these bucks had a very specific routine and would only use two to three trails on a regular basis. It took multiple trips moving cameras to figure out these trails. That’s where a lot of people fail. They won’t go the extra steps to really narrow down a bucks core or they fear of pushing in too far. With smart scouting and thinking about access while scouting and setting cameras. You can get aggressive by being smart about your ins and outs of the woods.

Each of these deer had a daylight core of no more than 30 acres. The rest of my pictures were nighttime outside of that core. They knew these areas I found were safe, hard to access and everyone around overlooked these spots. Most big deer find locations like this and that’s why they age. Most hunters don’t get aggressive or push in to find deer in fear of bumping them. I’ve seen guys with hundreds of acres and only hunt the edges and never push in and wonder why they never killed the target bucks. Or guys satisfied with a trail cam pic every now and then and think they will just wait him out.

I want the odds in my favor. I keep scouting until I have that deer every few days, daylight and have his bedroom narrowed down. I’ll look at all my access points and go a mile around to access a stand just to slip in the back side of a bedding area or trail he uses every 3rd day.

The amount of time I scouted and searched for these bucks core areas was weeks upon months, leading up to the days I harvested them. The amount of time in the stand for each buck was less than a week for each buck. I’d rather scout more and find high odd spots than grinding it out hoping he slips up outside of his core.

So as the summer goes on don’t get complacent with your same spots. Keep scouting, searching and moving cameras as you find the bucks you want to target. And start looking at places most guys miss.

Todays Job Hinge Cutting. I’m a firm believer in this method for several reasons. It provides instant cover, it puts browse on the ground. Opening up the canopy will allow the under brush to start growing, making some of the best bedding you can have. A hinge cut will live for years when done right.

So rather then cut your trees down like a clear cut and wait years for the under growth to take over. Why not hinge cut the open timber and create immediate bedding for the deer now and then it will get complimented with the undergrowth in year two and three.

I walk my hinge cuts every spring to touch up and shed hunt. There’s not one area that hasn’t turned into a major bedding area.

Points to remember..
Open timber is bad in terms of bedding so these areas can benefit from hinge cutting.

Cut your trees belt line high so the trunk provides more cover along the ground. If you cut too high, deer can walk under these, defeating the purpose of the cut.

Cut 3/4 the way through once the tree starts to fall forward stop and let the last remaining bit stay connected to the tree. This is what allows the tree to survive years to come. Producing more browse.

When cutting smaller trees you’ll want to cut several in one area to insure good bedding cover. Larger trees you can cut a few together to get the same results.

Don’t box deer in, always drop a few trees and move over 30 to 40 feet and cut another section. Deer need an in and out they won’t use these if you make a tangled mess you can’t even walk through.

After your cuts always check the canopy make sure you have sunlight from 9 to 3 to allow the cuts to live and this allows the sunlight to hit the forest floor to generate new growth. If you have big canopy trees blocking your cut areas, take them down.

Below are some pics that show the cuts and open skyline of my recent bedding area I created. Hope this helps good luck.