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Morning Treestand approach ? with Map

Looking for a little treestand entrance/exit advice.

I'm looking to place a stand in the area on this map with the red circle. Its a slightly elevated area that is a key bedding area on our farm. Where the timber ends, just to the south of the red circle, is the property line but the all of the timber to the north (to the road at the top of the map) is ours) and i do have permission to enter our property from the neighboring property that borders us on the south and east.

The gold stars are current treestands and i killed a great buck hunting the far SE stand last year (prior to last year i did not have permission from the neighbors and could not access our "back 40" to hunt).

My question is: What method would you use for hunting a stand that will be placed in the red circle? It will primarily be used as a morning or all day setup during peak rutting activity here in Illinois. My concern is that by using approach 3 or 4 i'll spook all of the out of the crop field to the south of the red circle but i honestly feel that i would also bump all of those deer by entering via path 1 or 2.

Part of me thinks that i'm better off walking across the field and letting the deer spook early by seeing my truck and the start of my walk in; another thought is possibly getting into the stand an hour or so after daylight once the deer exit the field.

There definitely is no perfect method to hunt this stand but its a high risk/high reward setup to be used on a peak activity day in november with a N/NE/NW wind.

Any comments/questions/advice is wanted. Thanks

IMO the key to hunting a bedding area is to get there well before the deer and getting there through an area that the deer are not at at the time you are going in. If there is no way to get in w/o disturbing deer on the way in you just have to pick the route where the least number of deer are feeding. Going in early, say 2 hours early will probably mean that most of the deer may not head to the bedding area after being disturbed and beat you there. If you go in after light and push deer out of the bedding area the area may go cold very quickly.

Your path in will depend on where the deer are feeding at the time. If that means coming in from the north then I would come in from the north.

With the 3 wind directions you mentioned for this stand your wind will be blowing out into the crop fields so you will either spook the Deer walking in or while sitting.

For me that is a "mesopic" vision play.Which is the time where pink light starts and the retina receptors of deer are in a process of light adaption.(poor movement time)

That said I'd let the deer clear out of the field south and use 4.Just hunt all day to make up for the higher impact entry.It may be 7:30 before you are ready to shoot even but don't worry about it.

Don't work under the misconception that a buck is bedded in there before you get there.Far and away greater chance he comes in to check it in daylight hrs after 7:30 during the rut.

Deer will probably clear out when you pull into your parking spot anyways. I'd go #4.

I would get in later and hunt all day, say from 7 till dark. I think your exit strategy is far more of a concern

Have someone ride a truck in to push the deer out of the field at last light.

Either way you do it, I can't see it being a productive stand for more than a few sits without educating the deer. I have a place in Iowa and since I did not have a tag this year all I could do was setup cameras and watch. I hung a camera in the heart of a 30 acre timber patch where I was sure was a bedding area.This area is thick and nasty cover, always filled with Rubs and scrapes, huge beds and giant tracks. The thing is that there is not a low impact way to get there

I hung the cameras in june and just retrieved the 3 weeks ago, My SD card held at least 8 bucks over 140 on it and some real mature bucks as well.

I truly believe if I had been hunting that particular spot during the season there would have been far less activity, Access is a problem without educating the deer. In my case since I only have 100 acres, its important for me to hunt the fringes of great areas that way I can keep my spot "fresh"

If you have ample time to hunt why risk burning that area out?

I would go with number 4 and have someone drop off and pick up. Like said above will probably only work for a few sits but the bucks could be feeding to the fields to the north and coming back to bed from there. In my experience bumping deer in complete darkness they seldom go far and settle down soon as long as they dont smell you. I would also clear a nice path for entry as well.

How are you accessing your most of your other stands? From your map, it looks like the majority of your stands are in bedding areas as well. Is the field to the south of the new potential stand pasture/hay or crops, & same question for the field to the east of the stand? What is the terrain like in the timber, rolling hilly with ravines or relatively flat? Looks fairly flat to me but I could be wrong. From the starting point on routes 2 & 3, is that a residence or just a set of farm buildings? If there is quite a bit of daily activity at that location, the deer may not be as jumpy if you come in from that spot. (I doubt it though!)

For me, it would be a tossup between 4 & 2.

#4 for the same reasons as already stated above.

#2 looks like you would be exposed for a slightly lesser distance but could potentially bump more deer in the timber/bedding area getting into the stand. I doubt too many are bedded in there before daylight though.

My situation is very similar to your's. I hunt more bedding flats in some bigger blocks of timber than anywhere else during the rut & it can be tough to get in clean. I have some deep ravines that I utilize to help get into the stand without buggering too much up but none are foolproof. I would get in early-early & do a lot of all day sets during the rut to minimize exposure.

Kill him the first set & you won't burn that stand out!!...Good luck!

So i've added a second map with some clarifications. Other than the 3-4 treestands on the far north that i can park off the highway and get into the bedding areas before first light (and sit all day) its next to impossible to access or exit any stands without bumping deer.

The deer are used to human interaction, especially to the east with the cattle pasture. This has actually helped me beacuse it provides plenty of manure for cover scent, the farmer frequently drives the pature, and the deer rarely feed in the pasture because they have ag fields to the North, south, and west. It would allow a good exit strategy in the evening from the area i would like to put up a stand (just walk through the timber).

Obviously this is not an ideal situation, its a stand that i can get 2 or maybe 3 good all day sets in before the deer get wise. That said, i will only hunt it during peak seeking and rutting activity with a "proper" wind to minimize pressure.

The property is semi hilly, the timber is the same. Its certainly not flat crop fields so it does allow some decent topographical features for entrance and exit.

The stands with the new white arrows tend to be my morning or all day sets; as you can see they heavily depend on a S/SW wind which is another reason i'm trying to get a decent all day/morning stand for a north/nw/ne wind.

**Important note. The is somewhat of a rise in the field along the "path 4" arrows which may make it ideal to use path 3 and sneak in the timber before the rise starts to go downhill.

I like the "drop off, pick up" routine but getting someone to drop me off before daylight just isn't going to happen. I hunt on my own which is a good thing 90% of the time.

The red arrows would be my most likely exit routes from the stand after dark. As i mentioned, the deer do not tend to feed to the east of the timber due to the cattle pasture.

If the deer do not feed east of the timber you may have just answered your question. Use approach 1 and beat the deer to the bedding area. Stay in the bedding area until the deer leave in the evening. If you have not seen any action in the bedding area by 1:00 you may want to assume that the area in not being used much and move to a evening location. Otherwise if you want to hunt that location in the next two weeks it may be a good idea to stay until dark even if you have a better evening location.

You gonna bump the deer in area 4 from your scentstream so don't increase your footprint by using an easterly approach in the dark.It may make you feel better to go across the pasture but you have a huge linear scent trail for 300 yards (assuming that is an 80 ac tract).4 gives you a 100 yd linear footprint.

I undersand the variables but I'm walking in with the wind straight in my face to that spot in the dark.

In light thats glassable I could consider your other options depending on what it looked like.....thanks for posting,good stuff

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