ORIGINAL: jmbuckhunter
ORIGINAL: mobow
Well I don't kill bucks every year, hell, my first was this past season. But what I can tell you is that I've changed where I hunt, completely. I pay very little attention to sign anymore, and hunt funnels and travel corridors almost exclusively. I may not know exactly where they are bedded, and I may not know exactly where they are eating. But I DO know the terrain structure they will utilize to get where ever it is they are going. Since employing that tactic, my doe sightings, AND my buck sightings, have increased dramatically.
Until last year, I wouldn't see my first buck until the first part of November, the seek/chase phase of the rut. Last year, after learning about funnels and travel corridors, I started seeing bucks in mid october. I saw more bucks, and deer in general, last year than any other.
While I agree with your tactics Don, the funnels are also where I find most of my sign. Because the bucks know it will be seen by most of thedoes and other bucks there. So I guess I am still hunting sign but also hunting funnels and pinch points.
I just hunt the sign when it is in the right places.
John, you're not the first person that's told me there SHOULDbe deer sign in funnels. Now, maybe it's there and I don't see it because I just slip in and set up, or maybe I don't recognize it, or maybe I'm not hunting the "right" funnels and just getting lucky....I really don't know.....Much of the things I see don't match up w/ what most others see, like the fact that I see many more deer during a full moon....
Or, maybe it's just that I'm CLOSE but not quite where I need to be yet.....as far as stand position.....Maybe I'm on the right track, but I'm just around the other bend...I dunno, I really don't. It's exciting, for me anyway, that I'm at least beginning to do SOME things right........I've told Scott this before, and I'll say it here.....I just really think there's a piece of the puzzle I'm still missing, which is why it makes no sense to me. Or maybe it's just that deer are so completely random and we make them "smarter" than what they are......I hope nobody takes any of this in an arrogant fashion, or that I'm "defending my position" or trying to prove a point or whatever......I'm seriously just talking it out trying to make sense of it, because a lot of the things I see just don't match up with what I should apparently BE seeing......
Maybe, as Scott mentioned earlier, that the missing part of the puzzle for me is bedding areas. Hunting near bedding areas makes PERFECT sense to me, but I couldn't identify one if I were standing on it. So, I just don't pay any attention to them. As I said in my first post, I may not know exactly where they bed, and I may not know exactly where they are feeding, but I DO know they are gonna come through this corner to get there (or whatever the funnel I'm hunting is)......Sometimes I think I overthink it, and just confuse myself even more.....LOL.....if that's even possible...
I hope you and I get to hunt some more together this fall, because I would love to tap into your brain some more and try to figure this all out.