Bowhunting Beginner - Stand Placement Help (Pic)


MNhunterr

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Hi there, this will be my first year bowhunting and I need some help in determining stand placement. I took a picture of the land I will be hunting using Google Maps and outlined some features. Here are some details:

  • The red triangle at the top of the picture is where I would be parking.
  • The green box is the land I am able to hunt.
  • Because of the wet spring we were only able to plant half of the field in corn, the other half is black dirt.
  • We have fields that are not planted on the east and west sides of our land and a small soybean field to the southwest.
  • The red star at the top right of the field indicates where we have a large box stand for rifle season.
  • I outlined some major travel areas with red lines in the top left (tall grass where you can see the trails on google maps.)

I have a perfect tree for bowhunting right next to our box stand, but I know that getting in and out of a stand in that area would be impossible without spooking the deer on a nightly basis. Would like suggestions on other stand placements. Let me know if you would like some more explanation on anything!

Land layout.jpg

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A south wind I would hunt that finger on the northwest side of the property. A north wind, I would hunt the north end of that south patch of woods. East wind either patch of woods. I wouldn't hunt it in a west wind. I wouldn't hunt it in the morning unless I had a south wind, and then I'd be in the upper right corner of the green box. Looks to be a better evening spot to me.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Bump - Need Help!Bumping this thread because I have a question. I have done my fair share of scouting on this property on both the North and South sides but I am having an incredibly hard time finding ANY bedding areas as well as major travel corridors to the food. As I couldn't find any travel corridors to place a camera I decided to place it along the north edge of the corn, I noticed a lot of tracks. I've had the camera out for 3 weeks and have not gotten a picture of a single buck. My very first trip out I jumped a nice 8pt right where the trail camera is placed but have not gotten a picture yet. I have attached a picture (messy, I know) that shows what I am working with. The blue star at the north end is where the camera is now. The pink circle at the bottom SW corner is some tall native grasses where I jumped a buck while scouting 2 weeks ago - He was bedded maybe 10 yards from the corn. I identified a trail at the corner of the woods on the SE side that I believe may be a better place for the camera. I have a hunch that the deer are primarily using the bean field to the east as it is still early in the season. What are your guys thoughts on this? Where should I place the camera in your mind? I believe the bedding areas may be to the north as there is swamp and taller grasses that I am not able to access. Let me know what you think! (Sorry for the long post)!

camera placement.jpg

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i'd put it in the treeline/hedge row between the unplanted field and corn field. you'll want to know if deer are using it, especially later when the corn in harvested. i'd bet they would. another spot is on any trail that goes around the edge (just in the wood line) of the prevailing down wind side of either corn field or soybean field.

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i'd put it in the treeline/hedge row between the unplanted field and corn field.

Good idea...that way you should catch deer going back and forth between the 2 food sources. The other option to do the same thing is just E of the SE corner of the corn field to do the same thing. There you can face the camera N and avoid problems with the sun messing with your pictures. Whichever one of the 2 has more tracks is what I'd consider. Also, right now they are more apt to be one the soybeans than the corn. That will change around a lot once the beans start turning yellow.

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I went and scouted a lot yesterday on the north end of the property near the swamp. Needless to say I have found the travel routes to the bedding areas (although I wasnt able to find the beds). I am still trying to find the trails to the field, but am encouraged by the travel cooridors that are bordering the swamp/woodline edge. I set my cam on the edge of the woodline and grassy area near 2 trail intersections. We will see how it goes.

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Bumping this yet again.

Checked the camera after a week and a half and had roughly 10 pictures... all does once again. Disapointed, I decided to do some more scouting (I know it's getting late but I'm determined to find these deer.) I checked the north end of the property extensively, and found little to no sign, besides a few trails. It has been extremely dry the last month or so and there is a creek that runs along the north end, I checked that and found few deer tracks.

I have decided to move my efforts to the SE portion of the property - With the idea that the deer are using the bean field as the main food source right now. Hopefully I will have some more pictures when i check the cam in 2 weeks.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Bumping for an update/advice. I placed my camera in the SE corner of the property and have a lot more deer activity than what I saw on the North side. The camera is marked by a white star on the image attached. The deer are coming from the south woods and crossing the unplanted field to get to the beans (green lines).

Current Set Up.jpg

I had the camera out for 2 weeks and have pictures of roughly 4 bucks, most of them are small, but I did get a very blurry picture of a monster (attached). [ATTACH=CONFIG]13601[/ATTACH]What I want to know is how I should approach this for bowhunting. It seems as if there are more deer coming from the south chunk woods and crossing the unplanted field than there are deer coming by my camera/out of the corner. If I placed a stand in the SE corner the shots would be 40yd+.

Buck2.jpg

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Buck2.jpg.02f9648905b32624881168dfd06951aa.jpg

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