Scouting 2011 season stand sites down in the riverbottom....

[highpoint forge]

Took the wife with me down to the riverbottoms in East Texas on my friend's place to scout for next year's treestand/tripod sites. These bottoms are full of mature huge oak trees and they carpet the ground with acorns. After getting skunked this season on corn feeder set ups, I'm going where the acorns are (and literally nobody ever hunts here) to ambush some big deer. Found a few great trees and one awesome spot that was literally crisscrossed with game trails, leading between bedding areas, cover, and two giant oaks about twenty feet apart, not 50 yds from the river. I think this will be my go to spot during the rut. It was a beautiful afternoon and we hiked about 7 miles. I only fell into the creek once.


   

   

   

   

[highpoint forge]

Hogs are a major problem on this vast ranch. Across the river we noticed serious pig tracks and looked around more:


 

 

 

[FEIK77]

Great pictures, scouting is also a year round process for me too. Hope your new spot works out in 2011.

[lpcjon2]

Great pics, I like the skins on the bow as well.

[Big Ed]

Thanks for sharing!!!

[Covey]

That big ol downed tree looks like a good ground blind!   :D   Cool pics, Thanks' for sharing! Jason

[Huntschool]

Alex:

How big is the ranch and how far into "East Texas" are ya.  Doesnt look like you are way over in the Piney woods....

Nice pig track.

Marilyn and I took our bows for a walk on Saturday.  The weather here was great.  No pigs
(that was kinda iffy anyway) and no pictures (battery in camera went south) but a great day out.

Great pics man....

[Shedrock]

Nice pictures! I had forgot what green grass and leaves looked like.

Man, your creek is not froze! We hit -42 this morning with wind-chill, and the wind was only blowing 11 mph.

[Possum Head]

Alex,I guess I'm always going to have a preconcieved idea of what I think a place looks like.Definitely not what I thought Texas riverbottom to look like.It's a beautiful place and reminds me of the place I hunt right here in south Ms.Keep up the hard work it'll be here before you know it.

[highpoint forge]

Hunt we're almost past Tyler, on 7000 acres, and this bottom is mostly oaks, 100 yards north and south of the river are mixed THICK pines. As you can see the area is wide open on either side of the river. Get up in a tree and you have a seriously good view of everything and I mean everything up and down both side of that river. I'm going to put myself in a high traffic spot/choke point.

It should be interesting.

[jonsimoneau]

Oh yea.  You are on the right track.  Whitetails will normally eat white acorns every time over corn.

[highpoint forge]

Hey Jon, besides corn feeders, there are foodplots here on the ranch too, and the deer use them. I'd set up ground blinds on the approaches and exits to those, but down in the bottoms the deer are 99% undisturbed and you would not believe the amount of acorns washed down or dropped on that area. It's super thick alders and post oak except for the immediate area that floods and that's where the huge oaks are. It's a deer's paradise down in there, and the owners don't go that far to shoot anything or even really venture down there. Something tells me I will see some wild stuff there come October....

[Huntschool]

Lord Alex... you should have some in there.  That sounds like a good property.  Are ya restricted on kill by size or age?

I have heard of some good deer coming out of that part of the state.

[highpoint forge]

I usually take pictures of deer that are shooters and show my buddy to get the OK or send a text message, and he's never said no. Nobody has quantified the bucks in this part of the ranch as the bottoms get little attention because it's 4 miles from the ranch house, often muddy, hard to get to, and a long quad ride then walk in the dark......the kind of stuff that I love!

If it's not easy to get to and a straightforward shot, these guys won't hunt there. Lazy. They hunt for about an hour and a half and go back in, didn't see anything.....Remember these guys also hunt their feeders mainly, and this year the acorns were EVERYWHERE. Another thing is the ranch hands are allowed to hunt putting even more pressure on the feeders. Nobody there uses real whitetail tactics/strategy beyond "It's really cold so they'll be coming in this morning" or the like.

For a trad hunter, finding the hairiest, thickest stuff is the best part, right?  I wanted to find 4-5 spots where there is primo deer habitat and no feeders, etc.

They are supposed to kill something like 25 does annually according to their biologist. Any buck I am going to shoot at must to be a mature animal.

[crotch horn]

Sounds like a really nice spot. Enjoy & we need pics when you score!

[Huntschool]

Good spot and sounds like good management. I assume they are talking 5.5 and above for mature. Are they "culling" 8 points?

Think ya may have found a gold mine or at least a "better mouse trap."  Go get em man.....

[highpoint forge]

I think my definition of mature and theirs differs...for them it's more like bigger than the last one, horns only, body secondary. I don't speak up when they say how old a deer is.....I know better.

I wouldn't take a buck there unless it was a monster I'll never see again (and beg for forgiveness) or it's a cull with goofy antlers or a spike.

I was after a dual left side beamed 4pt+1pt, with a regular 5 right side = 10pts, this year. HE looked to be about 3. His left side was a long separate single tine alongside another typical 4 pt antler. Really weird.

The owners are very focused on a few high tine count bucks on the accessible parts of the ranch, of which I have seen a few.

Again, they don't venture into the really hairy stuff, the deer topography, funnels, trails, deep in the woods and brush, so who even knows what's in there......they certainly don't. Sitting out there all day in strategic spots is not their cup of tea.

I am just the guy with a 60# wooden longbow and no sights, who disappears for 8-9 hours at a time, shoots very little, but sees a heck of a lot more deer!

[lablover]

Great picturs good to see something not covered in snow. Thanks for sharing.

[highpoint forge]

Covered this week.....wish i was there.