Hey guys. Sorry. Been busy! The header stand that I spoke of here worked out fantastic. Unfortunately I only got to hunt it one day due to wind direction. But the one day I sat there was great. I sat all day and saw 9 deer that day during the peak of the rut. Every single one of them walked directly underneath me and on the same trail. 5 of them were bucks and I could have killed any of them had I wanted to. Now when you see 9 deer and everyone of them ends up right underneath you well....it's a damn good feeling! As I sat there that day I realized that I would not have been able to figure out this stand had I tried to scout it during the summer or even during season. March is the time to do it! That stand is not only placed correctly but I also did some hinge cutting to further route the deer where I wanted them to walk. I also blocked the trails I didn't want them on. The access to the tree is perfect. As long as I can keep permission on the property I know I'm going to kill a big one out of that tree!
Towards the end of my hunt on almost the last day I killed a nice buck out of another stand that I also scouted out this past March. He wasn't a monster or anything but a nice 5x4 and he was the best buck I saw in almost 10 days of hard hunting. This stand also worked out perfectly just like I hoped. I'll try to explain the situation with this stand but it's a little difficult to explain without pics.
Basically this stand was placed in a ravine setting that ran through a cattle pasture. Picture a ravine running east to west through otherwise open cattle pasture. The ravine was not very wide but it is very steep. Almost like a gorge. At the west end of the ravine is a picked corn field. On the east end is the main chunk of woods. This is hilly terrain and the deer use this ravine to travel through the otherwise open pasture to the field at the end.
Now, in the center of this ravine is a "bowl". I guess a way to describe the situation is picture a long narrow eliptical shaped ravine with a circular shaped bowl in the bottom. The bowl is a spot where in previous years I had seen bucks cruise through during the rut.
Obviously setting up in the bowl won't work because of swirling winds. So instead I had setup stands towards the top of the ravine. You know how there is always a trail on the side hill about 1/3 down from the top? I had stands setup on these locations near where the bucks would congregate in the bowl.
I had moved stands around the area 3 or 4 times but was always getting busted either due to swirling winds or access to the tree.
To make matters worse, no matter what side of the ravine I setup on, the bucks would invariably walk the other side of it!
It makes sense when you think about it. If I setup on the south side of the east/west running ravine, with the wind in my face, the buck would always walk on the other side out of range. This way he can walk the trail that is 1/3 down from the top with the wind coming over the top of the lip while he can also easily see down into the bottom.
So, after reading about the stand that Ryan Rothhaar had setup with the wind at his back, a light went off in my head. The answer to my situation was so simple yet it never occurred to me. I needed to setup near the top of the ravine but I actually needed the wind at my back! This way the deer would have with wind in their favor which would encourage them to walk on my side of the ravine. So I hung the stand up at the top way above the trail and right near the bowl. The idea was that even though my wind was coming from behind me, I was high enough to keep it up above the "lip" and the swirling that happens down below. I gotta say it feels weird to setup with the wind at my back but I had to try it.
It worked perfectly. The first day I sat the stand was the day before Veterans Day. I sat all day. I passed up easy shots at 3 1.5 year old bucks that never had a clue I was there. All 3 came through the bowl and then continued past me at 15 yards or less. They were far enough below me that my wind just blew right over the top of them. And I was far enough above the lip of the ravine to prevent swirling winds. Bingo. I now knew it was only a matter of time.
With the winds forecast to be the same on Veterans Day and the fact that I did not spook any deer I decided to go ahead and plan for another all day sit in the tree. On Veterans Day I snuck in early. I altered my access route a little because I knew the deer were in the picked cornfield and I did not want to blow them out. Some does came through before it was even light enough to shoot. They came from the field and walked past me towards the main bedding cover.
After it got light I just kept watching towards the direction of the field which was a couple hundred yards off to the west. This was my 9th day of a 10 day hunt.
Somewhere around 9:00 I saw this buck coming. He was still 75 yards away when I became certain he would walk right underneath me. As he got closer he hit an area where I had hinge cut some trees to move the deer my way and he walked right into the trap. It was a steep shot but only about 8 or 9 yards away. My arrow went clean through and he only went about 40 yards before I saw him go down. Like I said he is not a monster or anything especially for the Midwest but he was the best buck I saw in almost 10 hard days of hunting. The fact that he followed the script that I had written to a T made the whole thing that much more satisfying!
Topic: Scouting a "header" and dreaming of November (Read 3942 times)
