Nice break from the traditional approach (at least amongst the hardcore crowd) of the need to put in hours upon hours of post season scouting to be successful. While I know you're not dismissing the notion of it being a valuable practice, it has its place. For me, I hunt the same properties each year, and after a while, you start to learn much of what you need to know to be successful. I still get out and scout, but I'm not putting int countless hours trying to re-invent the wheel. For those hunting large tracts of land, or different parcels each year, I definitely agree that the post-season scouting is a must. For me, though, when I get out in the post-season now, it's mostly for exercise, checking on plots/stands, and trying to find sheds.
See, this is where I don't think that's entirely accurate. While post-season scouting CAN give you some valuable information it's not a MUST. I've hunted properties and killed bucks from them having never set foot on them before October or November. IMO using aerial photos/topo maps will give you a good starting point, and then a little bit of in-season scouting and some intelligent stand placement can be extremely effective. Having "real time" information of where those deer are NOW is infinitely more important to me than where they were last spring. Just because you don't know every nook and cranny of a property doesn't mean that the general concepts we use to kill deer don't apply.
I consider reading/using aerial photos/topo maps "scouting." Like you said, you have to have a starting point. With that being said, I've learned almost everything I have from my property from in season observations. The topo/aerial knowledge came in well after I had multiple seasons under my belt on this property.
I hunted the same farm for 4 seasons, had a good idea of where to hang stands. But it wasn't until I started shed hunting and seeing all the muddied trails from the snow run-off that gave me a much better idea of how the deer traveled, more importantly where big bucks were traveling by finding their sheds and beds. I found the sheds of a typical booner last year and that put me in a new hot spot where I killed my mid 160 class buck this season. I owe that to my efforts of getting out shed hunting and doing alittle walking around after season. Plus it's good to get out and get fresh air and the exercise. I never new how good you can see and learn the layout of the land until a couple of seasons ago when I started focusing on after season scouting. I use aerials and topos like justin stated, but like he also mentioned it helps to get out and scout, even if you think you have your property figured out!
Off-season on the ground scouting (Jan-March or so) has been the biggest boost to my success in terms of locating deer. A second yet very important addition to that scouting has been topographic maps. For me, I am more of a "show me" guy and want to see the hunting grounds up close and personal before I hunt them each year. Looking at maps then scouting has provided me with a really clear picture of how topo maps correspond to the actual terrain. My brain must be wired differently than most because it took me a long time to link topo maps and actual terrain into a working model. Good article and points taken. The last two years I have really delved into topographic maps and have learned that deer given a certain wind/time of year/etc will bed/feed/hide-out in certain spots that are "predictable". I have been forced to branch out of my comfort zone and have relied heavily on map study to give me an edge on properties I have never stepped foot on before hunting that day. Thanks to much tutoring and mentoring from guys on here, my results from relying on topos to hunt new grounds in-season have been really good. Again, good article. It is always good to question why you are doing something instead of just blindly doing it, especially if your time is valuable.
