Less than 24 hours! Help me think out my morning strategy. Since my place is virtually unhuntable in the morning without bumping deer I thought I'd slip over to National Forest land to hunt. There's an area that I've turkey hunted several times over the past couple of years and I see great deer sign each year (but no deer). There's two fields (orchard grass/clover mix I think) down low below a knob with one field a couple 100 yards uphill from the other. Leaving the backend of the upper field is a old road (pin #2) that winds around the side of the knob and deadends400 yards away. It is bordered with honeysuckle, paradise trees, and small hardwood trees approx~ 10 years old. Off the back-right corner of the upper field, maybe 90 yards away is a sinkhole with a pond (pin #1), presumably a seeping spring. You can see an area justto the left of pin #2that is a blowdown. Must have been a microburst or tornadoe sometime last winter. Between the trail and the sinkhole I have found rubs every year and a trail going up to a oak bench (pin #3). This is where the gobblers roost. The trail goes on up to the left of pin 3 to a small opening at the beginning of a ridge, then follows the ridge top (pin #4) to where it T's into a large mountain. The terrain here is mountain laurel and stunted oaks. I've seen bedding areas and rubs along the ridge.
My thinking is the area is used during the fall when acorns are on the ground and for night-time grazing in the fields. Plus we've had a dry year so the water should be an attractant too. The winds tomorrow are predicted to be prevailing fromthe East (picture right). I plan on parking just off the forest road and walking down the road and up the draw (trail pin #5) up to the ridge and setup on the west side of the trail somewhere up on the ridge, perhaps near the opening. The draw is thick but I'm counting on the deer being over in the fields or on the bench. Does this seem like a solid strategy? Do you think the buck will move through the ridge area to bed before shooting light?