Yesterday was a great day scouting. I'm closing in on a small herd that walking around near the Charles River. This piece of public land has some beautiful tracks around. I don't care about single tracks - any deer can go somewhere once. I'm looking for the "highways and byways" where the main traffic goes every day.
As I've explained I'm nowhere near a pro yet but deer are looking for some consistent things: food, water, cover, bedding areas. To know your piece of land and where these things are located can only help you. With fresh snow cover everywhere everything I saw was only a few days old. Just off a big "highway" of many deer tracks I saw this doozy - I hope the photo does it justice.
It's 2018 which means the season is closed for hunting. That means assuming no poachers and no car collisions - this guy will be around next year. I don't have huge hug - these are size 11 boots. This one track was the only one big enough I think to be a buck. Does and bucks will have dew claws - the "toes" on the back. Either way in Zone 10 any deer with this foot will fill the freezer.
I read this interesting article on the subject and this site is great. "Wired to Hunt"
I can't picture myself making plaster molds anytime soon but there were some good ideas in there. I do have a camera out there but I want to give it a month before I retrieve the photos. Every time you step out there you're leaving your scent and if you have a favorite area it doesn't make sense to keep dropping your scent everywhere if you want all the deer to hang out there throughout the year.
This spot does look promising - I have three really good public land spots. If I knew it were secure I'd drop some cameras on the other two spots but I'd imagine they'd get stolen pretty quickly and I'd be pretty mad if they did.
Well - the quest continues. If you want to see these posts as they come just click on the top right up there "Subscribe" and I'll email you when the posts go up. I'll have news soon enough!
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