Help with big woods of the south

[VanceCollins708]

I need help finding deer and turkeys but it’s hard to me to find anything much off satellite maps when everything looks virtually the same

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[iamcorey]

Based on the pic below, I’d start with water source. Walk it and look for sign. When you find where they are coming in to drink, push into the woods a bit and look for more sign. If there’s an obvious food source not shown on the map, that’d be good too.


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[Nutterbuster]

The sooner you learn to use maps to navigate and not to base stand locations off of the better off you'll be. Deer can't read maps. Start walking. Jump deer. Go hunt.

 

[VanceCollins708]

The sooner you learn to use maps to navigate and not to base stand locations off of the better off you'll be. Deer can't read maps. Start walking. Jump deer. Go hunt.

That’s what I do most of the time, I was just curious if anyone had any tips for a sat or topo map to make it easier to find game. It’s not anything like you seen THP do on YouTube because nothing is no where even close to the same


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[Nutterbuster]

That’s what I do most of the time, I was just curious if anyone had any tips for a sat or topo map to make it easier to find game. It’s not anything like you seen THP do on YouTube because nothing is no where even close to the same


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This is an unpopular opinion, but THP has become the thing everybody who likes them hates. It's not a "real" view of hunting. The guys do it full time, edit out the boring stuff, and travel to the best locations available. Same as "conventional" hunting TV, for the most part just with public land. Nothing against them but comparing your hunts to theirs is just gonna leave you upset.

There's a reason they didn't do so hot deer hunting Alabama. The deep south big woods are tough. The best advice I have is to honestly evaluate your hunting ground. If you take a weekend to scout it and don't see a single buck, they're not there. If you can't walk it for a few hours and jump a few does, they're not there. Either lower your expectations or go hunt somewhere that isn't thousands of acres of monoculture.

 

[VanceCollins708]

This is an unpopular opinion, but THP has become the thing everybody who likes them hates. It's not a "real" view of hunting. The guys do it full time, edit out the boring stuff, and travel to the best locations available. Same as "conventional" hunting TV, for the most part just with public land. Nothing against them but comparing your hunts to theirs is just gonna leave you upset.

There's a reason they didn't do so hot deer hunting Alabama. The deep south big woods are tough. The best advice I have is to honestly evaluate your hunting ground. If you take a weekend to scout it and don't see a single buck, they're not there. If you can't walk it for a few hours and jump a few does, they're not there. Either lower your expectations or go hunt somewhere that isn't thousands of acres of monoculture.

I like the way you put that. Thank you sir


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[Tjraley2]

Homogenous habitat is tough. You can still use topography, access points, and that creek to narrow down your scouting.

When I hunted places more like this, I would pick an area of 100 acres and basically just grid scout the property. Helped me eliminate a lot of bad and eventually I got a really good understanding of the whole property, which will make you more successful.

Growing up hunting in Alabama, I was always told we had a ton of deer. That may be true, but they’re not evenly spread out across the landscape. I moved to Wisconsin this last year. Population is much more evenly distributed.

 

[JakeFromVirginia]

If you want to do a Zoom call I’m happy to spend up to an hour one night helping you e-scout. Just message me. I love this stuff.

 

[Bowonly]

Have a topo view of the same area?

 

[VanceCollins708]

Have a topo view of the same area?

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[gumby]

I hunt this kind of mountain woods in the south, deer can eat, bed and water in a small area and be a mile away the next day doing the same. It is very hard to get a good reading on them but the one thing is for sure the big ones love the ridges and can pick up on you from a long distance and not come back to the area for a long long time. That's why boots on the ground don't help much in the south big woods. I was scouting bout a week ago and found a good food source where it wasn't very much anywhere else and yep they were bedding there also.

 

[raisins]

I would be looking at topography that will funnel deer movement and provide vantage points for bedding. I would also look at where the easy access is and where humans hunt most and cross that off the map. Then start walking around and taking notes and putting pins on ONX to review later.

PS. I find it is much better to review your pins and figure stuff out by logging into Onx on your computer and then viewing the pins etc you placed using your phone in the field.

 

[JCLINE84]

I need help finding deer and turkeys but it’s hard to me to find anything much off satellite maps when everything looks virtually the same

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I’m in eastern Kentucky so it’s very little agriculture and more woods and terrain hunting. We have a lot of elevation changes here in the mountains. I have access to a lot of fields but never hunt them. The best thing to do is find deer trails on the edge of fields and then follow them back into the woods (preferably immediately after season so you can still see the fall sign) and hunt the timber, not the fields. The deer use those fields at night but most of their activity is going to take place in the woods. I try to hunt several hundred yards to a mile away from fields so I can avoid other hunters and have continuous deer movement instead of the very early morning and very late evening. Deer move in cover pretty much the entire day. Once you’re in the woods deep enough get on top of the ridges and just walk looking for sign. Be sure to pay attention to the benches (flat trails like logging roads) that are on the sides of the ridges or hills because those tend to be the best travel corridors. Once I’m on the ridge tops it becomes all about looking for deer funnels such as saddles or low spots on the ridge tops where deer will cross the ridge. The other terrain feature you’ll want to find is where two or more ridges come together. If you can find a saddle or low spot where two ridges come together that’s where you need to be. You might not see much sign but that’s where they will cross from one ridge to the next (especially when bucks are cruising). Once I forgot about food sources and began hunting terrain features that funnel deer travel my deer sightings not only increased but shot opportunities went way up because I wasn’t on the edge of a field watching deer feed hundreds of yards away. The only time I consider food sources now is looking for acorns. If you can find trees dropping white oak acorns on a ridge top that’s an all day spot until the acorns are gone. Now here is the unpopular opinion part of my strategy, I don’t own a trail camera. Once you find those spots in the timber they produce year after year as long as you hunt them cautiously, which means you don’t want to be in there checking trail cams and crap. I have spots that I only go into the last week of October and see deer all day because I haven’t been in there messing around. I go hunt and don’t worry about which deer I have pics of or any of that stuff and I’m much happier because I shoot deer that I’m happy with when I see them, instead of passing deer I should have shot so I can save my buck tag for that monster I have one 3am picture of. But I also don’t watch hunting shows which give people unrealistic expectations.

 

[JCLINE84]

I would start on that main ridge that has all of those finger ridges coming off of it, looking at where they connect as well as the low spots on the main ridge or any other terrain feature you can find that funnels deer movement. But you have to get in there and walk it. I’ve Never had much luck hunting off of maps

 

[raisins]

I’m in eastern Kentucky so it’s very little agriculture and more woods and terrain hunting. We have a lot of elevation changes here in the mountains. I have access to a lot of fields but never hunt them. The best thing to do is find deer trails on the edge of fields and then follow them back into the woods (preferably immediately after season so you can still see the fall sign) and hunt the timber, not the fields. The deer use those fields at night but most of their activity is going to take place in the woods. I try to hunt several hundred yards to a mile away from fields so I can avoid other hunters and have continuous deer movement instead of the very early morning and very late evening. Deer move in cover pretty much the entire day. Once you’re in the woods deep enough get on top of the ridges and just walk looking for sign. Be sure to pay attention to the benches (flat trails like logging roads) that are on the sides of the ridges or hills because those tend to be the best travel corridors. Once I’m on the ridge tops it becomes all about looking for deer funnels such as saddles or low spots on the ridge tops where deer will cross the ridge. The other terrain feature you’ll want to find is where two or more ridges come together. If you can find a saddle or low spot where two ridges come together that’s where you need to be. You might not see much sign but that’s where they will cross from one ridge to the next (especially when bucks are cruising). Once I forgot about food sources and began hunting terrain features that funnel deer travel my deer sightings not only increased but shot opportunities went way up because I wasn’t on the edge of a field watching deer feed hundreds of yards away. The only time I consider food sources now is looking for acorns. If you can find trees dropping white oak acorns on a ridge top that’s an all day spot until the acorns are gone. Now here is the unpopular opinion part of my strategy, I don’t own a trail camera. Once you find those spots in the timber they produce year after year as long as you hunt them cautiously, which means you don’t want to be in there checking trail cams and crap. I have spots that I only go into the last week of October and see deer all day because I haven’t been in there messing around. I go hunt and don’t worry about which deer I have pics of or any of that stuff and I’m much happier because I shoot deer that I’m happy with when I see them, instead of passing deer I should have shot so I can save my buck tag for that monster I have one 3am picture of. But I also don’t watch hunting shows which give people unrealistic expectations.

This is very similar to WV. The added kink in the system though is that baiting for deer is allowed year round on private land, and hunting over bait is legal for deer in season on private land. Baiting was legal pre-season on public land until 2 years ago (had to stop 1 month before season starts). So, you have to either get far away from private land baiting stations or know where the bait is located and intercept deer on their way to it (without the ability to go onto private land this tough to figure out). Almost every impressive looking bow kill in WV is made with a crossbow on a deer eating from a corn feeder, so that helps you keep things in perspective. EDIT: Meaning, 9 out of 10 times, if someone shows you a nice buck, and you ask them about it, then they'll say something like "he'd been coming to the feeder at night but this day I got lucky"...or something similar.

 

[GCTerpfan]

This is very similar to WV. The added kink in the system though is that baiting for deer is allowed year round on private land, and hunting over bait is legal for deer in season on private land. Baiting was legal pre-season on public land until 2 years ago (had to stop 1 month before season starts). So, you have to either get far away from private land baiting stations or know where the bait is located and intercept deer on their way to it (without the ability to go onto private land this tough to figure out). Almost every impressive looking bow kill in WV is made with a crossbow on a deer eating from a corn feeder, so that helps you keep things in perspective.

Just curious, what part of WV are you from?

 

[raisins]

Just curious, what part of WV are you from?

North central near Morgantown.

 

[JakeFromVirginia]

North central near Morgantown.

Hows the CWD up there? I know the bordering states up their have it bad. Surprised baiting is legal. CWD i heard from a state park police officer came from a pen deer farm in WV near berkley springs.

 

[Jimdude]

View attachment 46192
I would start on that main ridge that has all of those finger ridges coming off of it, looking at where they connect as well as the low spots on the main ridge or any other terrain feature you can find that funnels deer movement. But you have to get in there and walk it. I’ve Never had much luck hunting off of maps

I second these locations. And on the opposing ridge on the other side. This looks similar to where I hunt deer and turkey. I follow the little creek up the gorge. The running water helps disguise my noisy walking. Then scout off to the sides of it.