To go a step further and a little background info. Years ago, my uncle, who's land I hunt, had a deer biologist from Penn State come in and give him information based on findings he saw while walking and studying his land. He made the recommendation, based on data he collected, that a particular area of the property be off limits to hunting. It was a sanctuary, and to hold and keep on the property, it was beneficial to keep that area off limits to hunting pressure. Now, if they wandered outside that area, which they will eventually do, they're fair game. Its worked and payed off enormously over the years. The point is, deer, especially older class bucks have very little tolerance to getting bumped out of their sanctuaries. You want to ensure that you can hunt him during the rut when he will venture outside of it, and you also want to ensure that if you don't kill him that year, he'll be there and probably be using the same areas again. I personally do not like hunting close to beds. Too much risk. I'll take my lumps all season of not hunting and seeing him, waiting for the right time and place to setup and try to hunt him away from those areas.
I agree with fletch. Yes, they aren't truly "nocturnal", but for the little movement they do in their secure core area, they might as well be.
A lot of times it's hard for me to accept that people do things differently than I do. That's just my personality. And a fault of mine... Over the years I've hunted a lot of different places in ohio.... one thing I've noticed is deer bed in different places depending on the area and the terrain. A lot of the places I hunt the places where the deer bed are small.... and I have places I just don't go in because of it, or sanctuaries. Although, I will admit. I have a really bad habit of getting close to deer if the terrain permits. For example, this year the deer I killed on the second day was killed within 100 yards of his bed. After bedding in literally the same place for 4 months, he switched up on me the second day of season. I killed him, but a mistake on my part resulted in me not finding him till several days later. Something I'm not proud of..... My point is, some placed are more conducive to early movement movement from mature bucks than others.... I think a lot of my properties are that way..... Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk
Out of curiosity (primarily because of the statements you made and the fact that you hunt relatively close to where I do), where were you hunting this year when you killed your buck so early? Was he just traveling closer to a food source with more daylight? Still on early October pattern? I'm with you. I have quite a few sanctuary's on our property and one big sanctuary on our neighbors 150 acres (no hunting allowed). It's a bit frustrating at times during the early season, but once late October/November hits, bucks are cruising into our doe bedding areas from all of these spots. Staying out of them has helped in years past.
Honestly, I was doe hunting. This particular area on the edge or small ridge and has produced heavy acorns crops before so I knew I'd see some does in there eventually. The other part of the scenerio that is just now coming to fruition is the fact that not too far away, maybe 200 yards, from the ridge down, has been logged about 10 years ago. Its thick, nasty, now. Its also very easy to slip into the area I setup without being caught. So, I had bedding, and not far away acorns, on their way to the field/food plot. The bedding area is just starting to get good now and will be an off limits area. Its easy to not screw around in there, its pretty steep and knarly down over that ridge. The buck I killed, I'm fairly certain was responsible for the scrape line that popped up between the weekend before and the time I killed him. The line was through the acorn flat to the field via an old logging road. Was ultimately a text book, perfect setup really and I simply lucked out.
