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Advice on where to focus. Hunting a big lake.

cartman

Member
Joined
Feb 10, 2020
Messages
74
Location
North Carolina
I have a small canoe with a motor so there is no limit on where I can go as far as access is concerned.
If you were going to go into this area blind. What areas would you focus on first?
I am liking the looks of the peninsula on the top left of the map with the small ponds.
WhereToFocus.jpg
 
Looking at aerial photos that peninsula looks like a relatively fresh clearcut replanted in young evergreens and the ponds are mostly not ponds. It's also easy to access via vehicle assuming the logging roads aren't blocked off. It looks pretty bare except for very specific locations.

In general it looks like a lot of logging and planting activity that I would take into heavy consideration (along with boots on ground). The land seems more shaped by logging than by topography and I'd look at aerial photos a lot.
 
General advice, deer love to bed out on those points if you kind find those little tips coming off of them that give water /wind to their back & line of sight in the front. May have to bump some to find them & scout good with binoculars from the next point over until you find the best ones. Great morning spot, have to setup a good bit farther away in the evening especially this time of year. Looks like fun!
 
Those clear-cuts can be good if the tops are still laying and have food, especially during the rut. I've had good luck hunting them up here when they cut the oaks and all the acorns are in the tops on the ground.

It's tough to tell that from the air though, boots on the ground would show what was cut and the sign.
 
Those clear-cuts can be good if the tops are still laying and have food, especially during the rut. I've had good luck hunting them up here when they cut the oaks and all the acorns are in the tops on the ground.

It's tough to tell that from the air though, boots on the ground would show what was cut and the sign.
Yeah - I'll leave it to @cartman whether he wants to post aerials as it's his spot. To me it looked pretty clean and planted a couple of years back. Could be good but would depend on weapon and on the ground details. There's limited edge remaining, and mostly I got a much different impression from aerial than the posted topo. There may be just enough cover along the points/bank to give some great spots...or not.
 
Thanks for all the input!

I have a few spots that are locked between a hunting club and the water that I have recent signs of tracks heading to a water hole.
My guess is the shoreline is too steep there. So they go to one of the runs offs to get a drink.

I will throw out a few Ariels, I am not really trying to keep it secret. It's a well-known reservoir. So a quick google search will out me!

I'll throw up my plan for tomorrow morning later when I have some more time.
I am trying to get some stuff done at work today so I can take off tomorrow morning.
The wind should be perfect tomorrow for where I want to sit.

The main point of this thread is to try and get some ideas on where I am going to be scouting this off season for next year.
 
Yeah - I'll leave it to @cartman whether he wants to post aerials as it's his spot. To me it looked pretty clean and planted a couple of years back. Could be good but would depend on weapon and on the ground details. There's limited edge remaining, and mostly I got a much different impression from aerial than the posted topo. There may be just enough cover along the points/bank to give some great spots...or not.
Another thing I have noticed around my area is the arials are not always up to date.
I have gone into areas that I thought were recently cleared that have 5ft tall pines growing and I have gone to areas I thought were wooded that were recently clear cut.

The land is owned by the local power company so I am sure they manage the timber for profit.
I am happy that they at least open the land up for hunting.
 
Another thing I have noticed around my area is the arials are not always up to date.
I have gone into areas that I thought were recently cleared that have 5ft tall pines growing and I have gone to areas I thought were wooded that were recently clear cut.

The land is owned by the local power company so I am sure they manage the timber for profit.
I am happy that they at least open the land up for hunting.
Yeah it's often not clear dating photos.

What can be VERY useful is going to e.g. the state GIS resources:
https://nconemap.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=2c8a9b366c4841f1be2b464347d04a2b in this case.
We can see that the state has photos from 2017, 2013, 2010, and my eyeballs suggest that I think looks pretty freshly cut in 2017 (and wasn't cut in 2013). Maybe planted but can't really tell, at least without downloading the full res images. So the plantation we see on google maps is maybe a couple of years old to say 5-6 years old max. (and we can see that they left the shoreline cover). Probably getting to be thick as cover but maybe without great food content. Boots on the ground or even a quick drive down logging roads will tell a lot.1607446541898.png
1607446880146.png
 
So this is where I plan on walking in tomorrow morning. No Canoe.
The Green Line is the border to the Private Hunting Club's land.
The Entire Shoreline and the creeks and runoffs are all Public Land.
The Red Arrow is the wind direction forecast for tomorrow morning.
I plan on parking near the Access waypoint on the map and walking down the shoreline with the wind in my face.
I do have a tree picked out to sit, however, I left that off the map and am curious as to what stands out to people.


Tomorrow'sPlan.png
 
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