Hey guys,

Today I decided that I wanted to move my ladder stand over in my "honey hole" property. I had it set-up in a cluster of three trees in the middle of a golden rod field with a pond about 15 yards to my right, bedding behind me, and thick brush in front of me with a corn field on the other side of that.

I took a walk over where my hang-on stand is. It is a thin strip of crab apple trees with a narrow (10 yards wide) swamp on the north side, thick beddingon the south and west side, and the east side is the golden rod field where my stand is. I was pumped when I walked in there (havn't been in there since June) and I started seeing rubs everywhere. All is good and normal, so I go check my hang-on to make sure that there is no trimming that needs done and to make sure the straps holding it are still in good shape. Everything is fine so I decide just to poke around a little bit and see how the area is looking for this season. I walked east towards the golden rod field to where I have a spot for my climber and wow, two scrapes that seem to have good activity. Ok, that was a big plus, so I keep poking around and I head towards a crab apple tree that was scrapped up last year and it is already surrounded in scrapes. I saw 11 different scrapes in this area with one major scrape (5 different scrapes surrounding a crab apple tree). I stopped there and looked around and saw a perfect tree for my ladder stand and I headed to the field, took my stand down and moved it.

My ladder stand is now set-up exactly 20 yards from this community scrape (the same scrape that I saw all of the bucks using last year that I couldn't get a shot at). Here are a few pics from my trail camera when it was set-up over that scrape last year...

Sounds like you have a money spot there. Best of luck to you.

Sounds like you made a good choice by moving. I hope it pays off. Best of luck to ya.

Awesome pics, that cuddeback works great. Never have used one before, but if I buy one, that will be it. Sounds like a great spot. I too have found scrapes early in the year. Some biologist in my area say that young bucks do this, still neat to see em. Thanks for the pics. Have a great season.

I was up at the cabin all last week and was surprised when found a scrape that was made overnight!

Wow...those last 2 pics are magazine worthy. Cudde does a great job!

Thanks guys,

I have seen scrapes pretty early before, but it seemed really early to see so many in one spot, especially to see the community scrape site already looking very active.

The Cuddeback takes great pictures, the first picture came out odd because we had a wind storm and a tree branch was nocked down right onto the camera and a limb/leaf was covering part of the lens. I really would have loved to have a good picture of that buck, I had him at less than 5 yards on the first morning last year but he never gave me a shot, he came in straight behind me and when he turned broadside there was a limb in the way and I didn't want to risk trying a shot. From what I know, he is still around and I will be looking for him in two weeks

GIT R DONE BUCK MAGNET!!! bEST OF lUCK TO YA, WILL BE AFTER EM oct1ST yeee hawww!!

I too found a few fresh rubs and 2 scrapes this past Sat. I think it's the younsters getting all ralled up. Just last week I found a fresh road kill at work still inpartial velvet.

I came upon a fresh scrape 1.5 weeks ago. Its in the same exact spot as last year. They must really like the branch that over hangs it. Good luck!