freeder

Hello fellow hunters,
My wife and I just moved to Caledonia, MN in SE MN. We are renting a house that has some great hunting land right behind it. But I am a bit confused on where I should set up my stands this fall for bow and muzzleloader seasons.
Here is how the land lays out. It consists of alot of rolling hills, with clumps of trees that are probably about 110 yds long by 15-20 yds wide. With corn and alfalfa surrounding the all of these groups of trees. Here is my question. Do I focus most of my stands on the edges of the trees in order to watch the activity coming from the other clumps of trees or do I put most of my stands in the tree clumps? I am starting to get things ready to roll here, and would like to get a couple stands set up before Sept. It also helped that I saw two nice bucks about 150 yds from my house tonight. Just looking for some advice on how to tackle this new land? What are some of the things to look for when you are hunting new land? There are some oaks amongest the trees so that should help.
What are anybody' s thoughts on using a blind during muzzleloader season? Should I get the blind set up here soon, so the deer grow accustomed to it. Well getting a bit long winded hopefully someone is out there to give me some advice.

Freeder

jred

Sounds like you need to locate your stand between where the enter and exit, given you can gain access with out disturbing the deer.

The find thier bedding area and or water source. That would be my fisrt start.

good luck!

jred

Two Beards

The first thing I would do is get a aerial
photo of the land you' ll be hunting around
your house. This will really help in locating
potential stand sites-inside/outside corners,
bottlenecks/funnels in the timber, etc.

Though hunting edges can be productive, I
prefer to hang my stands inside the timber
anywhere from 15-40 yds. The land I hunt
I can see a lot of deer on the edges of
cover/fields, but the majority of the time deer
will move inside the timber/cover edge,
especially mature bucks. Needless to say, this
is where I' ve taken most of my deer. I' ve
hunted few areas where mature deer will move
through open areas during daylight on a
regular basis. During the rut, they will move
throughout the day....but it' s usually through
cover.

Try and learn as much about the deer movement
on the land as possible. Glassing from a distance
and walking the field edges after a rain will give
you a lot of information as to how and where the
deer are moving through the property.

I' ve got a friend who is able to set up his Double
Bull blind a couple months before muzzleloader
season. With time, the deer will get used to it
and will not associate it with danger, provided
you are careful with leaving scent.

Sounds like you' ve got some excellent hunting
ahead of you this fall.....best of luck.

TB

skeeter 7MM

It would be best suited you do some scouting in the evening to try and determine where the deer are coming from to feed(aka find the bedding area). Once you have accomplished this you can decide to envoke a plan that would maximize your odds. I would suggest if possible to hunt the cover in betwen bed and food. Try and locate funnels or bottlenecks that seem to force the deer down a certain path. Overgrown fencelines or tree rows can be dynamite in the area like you mention, if you can find this type of spot set up on the first section of cover either before or after the funnel, depending on access, etc. Now being an area that has rolling terrain and small clumps you may find the deer sit in these small patches of bush and don' t really have a pattern to where they bed on a daily basis. In this case I would try and pattern them at the most productive food source and then as two beards suggest set up inside the bush line, deer (especially mature bucks) love to hang in the shadows near food source and enter near, at or after dark.

For ML season with the rolling terrain idea, you may find the deer travel the valleys between the hills during daylight times. ML will provide more range so you can set up to try and catch them moving this way. Bow may prove to be a fruitless effort of doing this, but it depends on the cover in the valleys/travel routes. Also in ML I hunt exclusively on the ground and do build some natural blinds, but will often sit in areas that allow me concealment with the natural cover. I guess i am saying I think you would be ok to pick spot that allow you natural concealment and not have to worry about building or constructing a blind before hand. Also if you do have stand up, keep the productive ones and use them as alternates.

I hunt many areas that sound similar to what you are faced with, the key is to constantly be scouting, even while hunting. I keep a log or journal to allow me to see patterns and adapt appropriately. I think the first thing you need to do is scout the area for bedding locations, travel routes and dominant food/water sources, this will narrow your prospective location down considerably and will lead to more productive time in the field.

Good Luck!!

outdoorsman09

thats good deer country in that part of mn... heard any wolves yet... there should be some in that part of the state??? lots of coyotes... but find their water source... and u' ll find the deer... there should be a crick... u' r in bluff country and theres lots of little cricks and rivers in that part of the state