Next Year's Hunt

Fred Bear said, "Next year’s hunt begins the minute this season’s hunt ends.” Take that to heart. Prepare for next year’s hunting as soon as the season end, use the knowledge, take the mistakes and observations and apply it to how you hunt next year. However I am going to share a philosophy I follow .

This really applies if you're someone who doesn’t have access to their own property to hunt, or it's too small or you live in an urban area. This post will be shorter than usual because it's a simple message.

As soon as seasons are over, open up your mapping app you use( OnxHunt, Spartan Forge, Huntstand, Etc.) And look at your local region you hunt. Find the public hunting lands, leases, or private land you hunt. And pick ten to fifteen spots on the map. Then start zooming in and looking at the Topo, trees, timber cuts, accessibility , and water sources. Personally, I highlight large areas in a particular area I'm hunting 100 acres or more and start marking. After all my areas are marked I'll start narrowing down to seven (seven days in a week.) to focus on wind directions and how to hunt based on wind with those land features.

Basically this boils down to having backup locations in case the hunting pressure is hitting the particular spot hard, wind is off or you don't have the time to hunt all day and can't afford a 5 mile hike in. So to summarize

Pick 10 to 15 locations
Narrow those spots to 100 to 500 acre areas
Find the saddles, ridges, water, food sources, etc..
Watch the wind with theses areas

Then get boots on the ground and start looking, look for beds, and shed hunt the areas.

Narrow down those 15 to 7 areas (the best ones based on activity)
Set up Trail Cameras and scout scout scout until Hunting season begins.
Hunt your areas never more than two days in a row ( don't spook the game)
Rotate your spots based on day, time, wind or weather

Simply Organize your hunt areas before Hunting season is here. It cannot guarantee success but you will at least learn more and be better equipped going into the season.

From the Bush,

Andrew