More important..Time on stand or pre-season preparation?

Stand time is most important for me as the places I hunt have been scouted quite a bit up to this point.

One thing I prefer is post season scouting. That way I get to see the winter patterns more so than the summer patterns you would see with pre season scouting. One thing I noticed especially is that their travel patterns change a great deal due to the woods opening up after leaves fall. They stick to areas that have more evergreen type foliage as opposed to during the summer when the woods are very closed in and they have cover pretty much everywhere.

 

My situation exactly. I only have limited acreage to hunt and I have a good funnel spot. I have 2 factors that greatly affect my hunts. the first is the quality of deer. However, I know from my trail cams that I have good deer that are on the property. The second factor is time in stand. Knowing you have good deer does nothing if you aren't there when they come through. Yes right now I know my good looking buck comes through early in the morning, and late in the evening, but it's not the rut when I've seen (by eye) more movement late morning / early afternoon.

Last year I was returning to stand at 2:00 only to see him jumping the fence into my neighbor's property after walking right in front of my stand.
Another day I was getting out only to spook a good buck a hundred yards away.
Both times, had I been in stand longer, it would have been the difference between venison and tag soup.

 

Time on the stand does it for me. Now finding time to be out on a stand seems to be a challange as a family man. I pretty much only have the time to do some speed scouting in this fast paced
life I live. *Wouldn't know it by the time I spend on facebook eh*

 

Time on the stand ... without a doubt for me ... more scouting is done from my stand ... or walking to and from it, than pre season.

 

Different for everyone I suppose. Early season scouting is nice, but for me, it just doesn't happen much. Those are the bust days for the resort, and by Oct. the game has changed so much. While I agree that you cannot shoot a buck from your couch, I believe the balance of your hunting/scouting focus should be on quality, not quantity. Being in the woods or stand at the wrong time can do more damage than an entire season of both can fix.

 

Give me time in stand.
Unless I am looking for a new spot to hunt, or trying to just learn the lay of the land for a new area, I don't look at pre-season scouting playing any real role in my success.
But time in stand plays a GIANT role in it

 

See, time on stand is making a strong come back in this thread! For me, scouting has played a major part in my continued success in the deer woods. Even though I am not putting down monsters, I am getting onto deer. I attribute that to walking and learning thousands of acres.

 

Time in a stand.

Scouting helps get that opening morning 'earn-a-buck doe' but after opening day... pretty much every thing flies out the window on public land.

Much better off scouting while you hunt. I can guarantee you that if you try to hunt bucks on pressured public land based on what the bucks are doing in late summer.... you'll be pretty unhappy.

 

Sure, but like has been said, when learning new land scouting is more important than time in stand but, once you know the land you are hunting, scouting doesn't give much whereas time in stand does.

 

Scouting right after the season ends is much different than scouting in the summer. I do hunt pressured public land.

Bruce, I agree. But things change on everyone's hunting grounds from year to year. One's personal hunting goals can also change from year to year, thereby increasing a hunters need to scout.

 

Late season, on the public land I hunt.... all the bucks are over on the neighbor's properties. Takes about 2 minutes of scouting to figure that one out.

 

I've scouted thousands of hours and still have not figured that one out.. me dumbb dum

 

Neighboring properties are very lightly hunted, have food plots and don't have dozens of joggers with dogs running loose running through half the property. It's a wonder the bucks ever show up. :D

 

Christine, I hunt where there might be 200 Marines tromping through my hunting area the day before so I feel your pain. But, I love the guys so I don't mind too much.

 

I'd much rather have the Marines. Even 200 of 'em.

Allerton Park has about 100,000 visitors a year. Granted, there's less of them as it gets colder out... but damn near none of them can follow the rules. (closed before sunrise/after dark, dogs on leashes, stay on trails.... etc..)

Still.. it's where I hunt.

 

We have a lovely rule in certain areas where I hunt that allow turkey hunters to use dogs to flush fall turkey. It is wonderful let me tell you when a dog runs up and pisses on the tree in which you are sitting, followed shortly by two elderly gentlemen who are yelling and screaming. Also, a couple of years ago I snuck in real early one morning in late October and had does and multiple 2.5 year old bucks come through the first hour of sun-up. The day held promise until....until an unleashed dog comes running by and barking all over the bedding area...awesome!

 

My most productive scouting is done immediately after season is over. Summer scouting is very difficult and most of what you find is irrelevant once the leaves fall, the weather cools, and the acorns start falling. Rublines, scrapes, etc. can be found easily as soon as the season is over and you can get a better idea of the patterns that they will be using during season.