I'm curious to hear how you all go about this. I myself struggle with this not knowing 100% for sure where a particular buck Is bedding. Also, do you believe there bedding area's change through out the fall? How do you know this as well? I don't want to hear opinion's, I want to hear facts that have proof.
I'll try to answer this the best way I can. With 36 deer seasons under my belt, there are many times I'm still not 100% sure where a particular buck is bedding. Sometimes I think I know and I'm wrong. Sometimes I'm not sure, and sometimes I have no idea. Sometimes however, I do know for certain. When this happens, it starts with knowledge of deer behavior, and of the land. The deciding factor, the THING that makes it certain for me is the sign. The sign doesn't lie. Sightings help, but I beleive reading the sign is just as or more important. Rubs, scrapes, the size of tracks on travel routes and escape trails are how I put 2 and 2 together. Like I said, I can't pinpoint particular bucks all the time,{I wish I could more often} but the times when I do, that is how I do it. The sign doesn't lie. Hope this helps. Keith
I don't think I have EVER known FOR SURE where a particular buck is bedding. I guess a lot.......I hope a lot.......I honestly don't see how anyone can say they know 100% FOR SURE where he is unless you saw him lay down. The area I hunt simply doesn't lend itself to the simple breakdowns of "bedding area"......"food source"......."water"......"funnels, saddles, scrape lines, rub lines, staging areas" etc.... I wish it were that easy. The deer rarely bed on the farm I hunt........yet you may stumble across one bedded down literally anywhere. Hope that makes sense......many deer will plop down for a break on their way through and maybe even stay put for a couple hours but a CONSISTANT spot we consider a "bedding area"??? No such thing.........on the neighbors farms??? Maybe, but I don't have access so I can't say. Also, the pressure the areas I hunt get is off the charts high........not the farm I am on but the surrounding area in general gets beat to a pulp. If a deer stays in one place for any amount of time he is hanging from a pole.......this includes archery season. They have no choice but to be mobile and to be honest it is a roll of the dice where they will be on any particular day. Consistant, predictable movements by deer in general are not the norm where I roam.........I wish they were. My hunting life would be SOOOOOOOOO much easier.
Schultzy, I have the same problem as you, I am never 100% sure of a "particular" buck's bedding area on the place I hunt... The region that I hunt is basically all bedding area, thick cedar breaks with very few opening's, sign (scrapes, tracks and rubs) everywhere you look and I see no way to tell which buck or breed for that matter is making all the sign. You can't see over 20 yards on our place unless you have done some clearing to get some openings, this makes scouting somewhat confusing... Basically it's 1200 acres of thicket that we hunt (not to mention all the surrounding ranches are virtually the same), throw in several different species of exotics with the whitetail and all these animals making scrapes and rubs on the same land and it becomes virtually impossible to locate a single animal... Now, trail cameras help a lot to tell me what's in a particular area...
As one member on here would say "In Da Woods". But seriously, I know what direction they come from to get to my food plots, so I have pretty good idea where they bed. The neighbor has a grown up pasture that has acres of blackberry thickets and tall weeds in it. I know the deer bed there a lot and head to my food plots right before dark. I just need to be sitting on the right trail to intercept them. That is about as exact as I can get.
My lands contain lots of doe and fawn beeding areas, as well as a few places where yearling bucks bed. I hardly ever see, or know of, where mature bucks bed. But i do know a few places off of the propety lines where they do.
I've a good idea of the general "area" bucks are bedding near my property. I don't think they bed in the same location day in and day out, but there is about a 20acre section of deep softwoods at the bottom of a hollow, and that, to me, based on my scouting, is the most likely location for the bucks I see on our property to be bedding. Like Atlas said, though, deer will plop themselves down anywhere at anytime, so at least where I hunt, I have a hard time seeing the deer returning to ONE particular location every time to bed. Same general area? Sure.
In the summer and early fall, scout feeding locations in the evenings and try to spot a nice buck or two. Go back during mid day and try to find their tracks then back track. The use of maps (all kinds), cameras and some leg work should get you close. Then try observation stands. Advance slowly and carefully until you see where he gets up from in the evening. I have found the exact locations of mature buck beds/bedrooms by doing this and have seen them come out in the evenings. The more buck bedding locations you can find the better you are. You can possibly hunt a different one when the wind isn't right for the others. As far as finding antlers at this time of year, it tells you which bucks are still around. Also, the sign in the snow tells you how the area is being used after season..... why the deer are there. When the snow melts you should be able to see sign from the rut. With tons of year round scouting and observation, a person can put together the big picture of the herd in their area and get a good read on the mature bucks enough to put together a plan on how to hunt them. Not many people are able or willing to invest this kind of time in the pursuit of whitetails. Myself included. I have done this kind of scouting many times. Whether I get the buck I'm after or not, the scouting only helped me to become a better hunter. It never hurts you! Some years I don't invest this kind of time and hope for the best by hunting in accordance with what I have previously learned.
Much of the wooded areas I hunt are bedding areas. Basically I just assume the mature bucks use the densest most isolated areas within the overall bedding area. As for which spot exactly, its a dice roll, because there are several REALLY good areas that I know bucks will bed in.
What I do is if I know a good buck is in the area I try and back track him as far as I'm comfortable back towards the thickets. Then I'll st up a trail camera on that trail for a week and see how often he uses it. Other than that it's finding beds that smell like rutting buck and do the camera thing again.
