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- Jan 3, 2022
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This is a spot I no longer have access to, so I don't mind sharing the details. I'm posting it so we can hopefully discuss the setup and maybe I can learn some new things and hopefully give some new folks an idea about how to dissect really tough terrain like this. The good thing about this thick stuff is that if you can learn to hunt it you will have it to yourself. The other hunters who were on this property hunted the plots and that was it. They swore up and down there were no good bucks in the area.
Around here we have a good bit of new growth pines. The logging operations leave some trees along the streams called SMZ's, streamside management zones. These are the places I concentrate on. The young pines are about 8 to 10 feet tall and so thick you can't see 5 yards. They are also choked down in saw briars. It took me a while to figure them out but here is the setup. I had three lock on stand locations in this block. All were 20-foot ladder sticks with Millennium brackets, and I always carried my M7 Microlite in with me.
Stand A was on a SMZ about 50 yards off a 4 wheeler track. I had a very well concealed entrance to all these spots. This is where I got the picture of the buck below. Stand B was at a creek crossing and stand C was also on a narrow strip of SMZ. I hunted these spots for several years, and although the food plots got hammered during gun season the deer just stayed in the thick stuff and traveled up and down those SMZ's. I never did get that buck, but I was in the game.
So, what are your thoughts? I feel like I can never get something dialed in all the way and there is always something new to learn.
Around here we have a good bit of new growth pines. The logging operations leave some trees along the streams called SMZ's, streamside management zones. These are the places I concentrate on. The young pines are about 8 to 10 feet tall and so thick you can't see 5 yards. They are also choked down in saw briars. It took me a while to figure them out but here is the setup. I had three lock on stand locations in this block. All were 20-foot ladder sticks with Millennium brackets, and I always carried my M7 Microlite in with me.
Stand A was on a SMZ about 50 yards off a 4 wheeler track. I had a very well concealed entrance to all these spots. This is where I got the picture of the buck below. Stand B was at a creek crossing and stand C was also on a narrow strip of SMZ. I hunted these spots for several years, and although the food plots got hammered during gun season the deer just stayed in the thick stuff and traveled up and down those SMZ's. I never did get that buck, but I was in the game.
So, what are your thoughts? I feel like I can never get something dialed in all the way and there is always something new to learn.