Lookin for some ideas. this is about 40 acres of what i hunt and i have a decent rub line along the river on both sides, but i didnt see any scrapes. The green dot is where my stand is, orange dots are the rubs i found last weekend, inside the red is all bedding area and the white dot is where i put up a mock scrape last weekend also. I have 2 bucks that i think it could be making the rubs, one is this guy. The picture is from last year, but my buddy glassed him in the bedding area while scouting 3 weeks ago. The other is a big 8pt in the 130-140ish range. I have pictures of him but unfortunately i forgot to upload them onto my laptop before heading back to college. I'll get them posted when i get back home tomorrow night. The pictures i have of him is off the trail that leads to the rub at the top of the aerial on the west side of the river. Deer cross the river just to the right of the green dot where the river is narrow. Wondering if its both bucks making the rubs, if i should keep the stand put, to rattle or not to rattle, etc. I'm usually more confident in myself but i really don't want to screw up my chances at either of these bruisers! Any advice is greatly appreciated!!
Chances are you'll never know which buck is making the rubs. If both bucks are in the area it's entirely possible that it could be both of them. As for what to do, there's no real good answer to that. Your stand appears to be in a good spot so provided you're seeing deer from it, then stick with it. Tell us more about this mock scrape. Was there a reason you set it up in that particular spot? What are your plans for hunting it?
The reason I put the mock scrape there is because if you drew an imaginary line from the tip of the little bend in the river directly south east, that portion of the woods is at an elevation close to 20ft lower than the woods to the southwest. Where the scrape is at is where the slope is the least steep and deer funnel from the lower part through there to get to the higher part where the oaks are and an alfalfa field is to feed at night. In the past few years I've traditionally seen scrapes in the lower part more than the higher part. Maybe since it's closer to the bedding? I used Tink's Power Scrape for the mock and hung a daytime dripper up to hopefully get some photos of which buck frequents the area most often and give me a shot at pulling deer out of the corn field and woods on the west half of the river since that's where the most deer have been seen lately. The bank of the river is anywhere from 5 to 15 feet and their best crossing is 20 yards north of my stand. I hope I answered your questions! Thanks for the input!
