I remember the first year I began putting a major effort into shed hunting. It was during my college years while I was home on spring break less than a decade ago. While finding sheds was the goal, I remember noticing the obvious similarities between the early spring woods and those cold, sunny November mornings with a bow in hand. I couldn’t help but notice the beaten trails and rubs that littered the steep hills of my family property — and the now exposed scrapes made just four short months ago.

Fast forward to the present. I now rely almost exclusively on spring scouting and the previous year’s hunts to guide my future strategies on the small properties where I hunt. Yes, trail cameras play a role — but most of my killer stand sites have been set or planned for by March or April based on spring scouting clues and the previous year’s observations.

If you hunt small, private properties, late winter and early spring scouting needs to be a big part of your planning strategy. Knowing when and where to start scouting is the critical first step. From there, interpret your findings and apply the intel to your hunting situation, no one else’s.

The When and Where

When to begin your spring scouting might depend on a variety of factors. If your deer season extends well into January or even February, it would be wise to consider your neighbors’ hunting plans. You would hate to unknowingly provide them with a complementary deer drive if you are on a time crunch and can scout last year’s deer sign only during the later parts of the current season.
If you are fortunate enough to have the time, scout once while snow is covering the ground (if this applies to your region) and again immediately after it melts. The benefit of snow cover scouting is being able to see preferred deer movement around terrain features. Do deer move the same during January and February as they will come September and October? Not always, but if you focus on key forced travel routes such as steep ridges, rock outcroppings and water or swampy areas, deer will most likely travel the same routes around these impassable terrain features year-round.

Scouting with snow on the ground is also an excellent strategy when attempting to identify bedding areas. If you locate melted deer beds littered on the crest of a ridge, you might have found a future stand location over a doe bedding area.

Pay close attention to urine deposits in and around deer beds as well. If you see a heavily melted urine spot in the snow, and drips of urine continue forward from the main spot, typically a buck was occupying that bed. A doe’s urine tends to not drip as she walks forward. Bedding habits do not always remain the same year-round, but at least you have a great starting point.

Scouting After the First Thaw

After a mid-winter or early spring thaw, immediately head to the woods for a snow melt scouting trip. If you’ve never scouted during the post-season after a snow melt you might experience an aha moment like I did nearly a decade ago. The absence of snow will expose main trails, and scrapes and rubs will still be very visible. A spring scouting trip allows you to walk trails and dive into bedding areas guilt free, and do some serious thinking about why deer do what they do on your hunting land.

Jump right in and begin by scouting current stand locations, taking into consideration past deer encounters. Is your stand placed 20 yards too far in one direction based off multiple deer encounters there? If so, move it. Walk around your stand in bow range, and just out of bow range. Examine the flow of your property from bedding to feeding areas, and back again. Match up those observations with stand locations for morning vs. evening sits. Certain stands might shine during a morning hunt, but see little movement during the afternoon. Being aggressive and making changes sooner rather than later will pay dividends come fall.

Gathering Intelligence

In today’s age of information overload, it is easy to take every bit of intel as an absolute. In the whitetail world, there is hardly a cookie cutter way of doing things. Yes, deer have tendencies, but each bit of information you gather from your spring scouting must be interpreted and applied to your situation only.

For example, just because states such as Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are considered high pressure hunting states, that certainly does not mean your personal observations on properties in those states fit that blanket statement. I know hunters in those states who can sit on a field edge scrape and see daylight action, while a hunter a half-mile down the road might not see a single buck. The takeaway is to not think of deer behavior in general terms. Apply your deer sightings and intel to your land parcel only.

This past fall, I played cat and mouse with a few nice bucks on a hot ridge-top scrape located deep inside the timber. You can bet come the fall of 2019, I will focus on this stand as much as possible during late October, and hunt it day after day if necessary. Starting October 22nd, a younger buck hit the scrape six days in a row during daylight. I was able to sit there only a few times during late October and as luck would have it, I failed to see a buck I wanted to kill. Clearly, my presence did not stop mature bucks from hitting this scrape.

Someone hunting a high pressure parcel in Pennsylvania might not be able to get away with repeated human pressure that comes with hunting a stand over and over. This spring, I will be back-tracking that hot scrape, attempting to find out where exactly bucks that hit this scrape came from. I have a good idea, but my spring scouting will hopefully provide confirmation.

Making Sense of It All

You might be asking what all of this deer sign and scouting actually means to you. This is where trail cameras become a critical component of your scouting efforts. You can guess all you want, but somehow you must confirm your suspicions.

For example, while spring scouting after a snow melt, you find a heavy trail coming from a thick side ridge overlooking lots of territory, which leads to a crop field. There is a high probability bucks are traveling this area. If you have never sat near this spot during hunting season, your only option is to hang a stand or trail camera to find out if daylight action is taking place there.

However, if you have a stand somewhat close that hasn’t produced in multiple years and you think your spring scouting warrants moving it to this new trail you found, what do you have to lose? Use your spring scouting clues to determine where this stand should be hung, then use your trail camera intel to decide when and why you should hunt this stand and dive in when you have a high percentage chance of seeing a buck you want to pursue.

Another excellent time to invest in spring scouting is a year or so after a major timber harvest, food plot installation or tree planting have taken place. Your old reliable stand location might not be so reliable now. Logging can greatly alter deer movement and preferred bedding areas due to the forest floor being opened up after the timber harvest. Travel patterns might also change due to downed tree tops and the installation of new logging roads.

Have you recently planted a new food plot? Maybe it has altered deer movement. Tree plantings that have matured might now offer bedding security or a seasonal food source depending on what you planted. Observing, internalizing and then applying your spring scouting clues will increase your chances for success, if you hunt a stand at just the right time. As I said, there are very few absolutes in the deer world. Take your information and apply it to the lands you hunt only.

Spring scouting might be the eye opening experience you need to take your understanding of deer behavior to the next level. The process of acquiring concrete information through spring scouting and fall observations might take a few years, and just as soon as you have something figured out, deer might do something to cause second guessing. The best you can do is play percentages and take calculated risks based on your best information. Most likely, some of your best information comes soon after the season has ended.

— Paul Annear is an avid deer hunter and freelance writer hailing from the Driftless region of southwest Wisconsin. He currently lives in northeast Wisconsin where he enjoys the challenge of acquiring, scouting and hunting new property.

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Public Land Hunting: Advantages of Natural Ground Blinds

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