Beds in relation to water

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nathan5004
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby nathan5004 » Thu Feb 12, 2015 4:11 pm

checkerfred wrote:
So do you guys think they will only bed and travel like this when the water is low or will they still bed and travel when it has more water in it?



Your question made me think about a buck bed I found recently:

Right on the edge of a large reservoir, I found an excellent single buck bed. This bed is in a small thicket where a small stream flows off of the hillside into the lake.

Every fall and winter, the water level of the reservoir is lowered by a couple feet, which exposes a narrow land bridge that cuts through this shallow part of the lake and connects to another portion of the mainland woods. When I found this bed this winter, the water level was low and the bed on the water was being actively used.

But, up the hill about 50 yards from this single buck bed on the water was another single buck bed that was recessed into the ground from years of use. This bed was inactive at the time I visited it. This higher bed could certainly function as a satellite bed to the bed on the water, but I suspect that each bed is used when the lake water level is at different levels. When water is high and there is no back door escape route to the bed on the lake shore, this low bed is not used and instead, the higher bed is the preferred bed. At times of low water, the higher bed could also just be a satellite bed.

So I think it's all about how deep the water is around the beds you're talking about is and how comfortable the deer are crossing it.


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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Greg4579 » Thu Jan 12, 2017 7:35 am

Bumping this as I am making my way through the All-time best tactical threads. As I am fairly new to beast scouting I was hoping to bounce some ideas off the group to make sure I am thinking about this the right way. The areas I typically hunted in the best were hill country and well over an hour away from my home. As I am looking for closer opportunities it has me looking all around suburbia. Here is an example of a place I plan to scout this upcoming weekend. It is a creek bottom area that I am hoping is overlooked. The creek itself is maybe 25-30 ft wide at normal flow, and during normal flow I would think in most places a deer couple wade across. The red arrow represents where I would access, and the red X's are were I think I need to scout for beds based upon what I am reading. Do I have this right?

One more point to make since this view is not a topo...the hills on each side leading to the residential areas are pretty steep.

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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby dan » Thu Jan 12, 2017 9:52 am

Greg,
Those oxbows may or may not be pronounced enough... Best to get in there and look. Regardless I would be walking down that creek looking for thick patches, oxbows, or wet areas that are swampy.
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Greg4579 » Thu Jan 12, 2017 10:04 am

dan wrote:Greg,
Those oxbows may or may not be pronounced enough... Best to get in there and look. Regardless I would be walking down that creek looking for thick patches, oxbows, or wet areas that are swampy.

Thanks Dan. Will report back on my progress after my scouting. On a side note, I did see a good buck cruising the hill a while back above the shopping center in my photo.
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby tgreeno » Sat Jan 14, 2017 6:10 am

Guys, What about a lake with marshy cattails (maybe 100-150 yards wide) along the shoreline? I'm guessing any single or tree clumps that are dry will hold bedding?
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Outdoor814 » Sat Jan 14, 2017 10:09 pm

A lot of the areas I hunt look just like the picture Dan posted with the possible buck bedding in oxbows.

My question is, if the bucks are bedding in these oxbows how do you set up on them without being winded or spotted? Do you approach from down stream/river and set up on a cross wind, or do you set up on a known travel route that leads to staging and feeding areas?
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby dan » Sun Jan 15, 2017 12:09 am

Outdoor814 wrote:A lot of the areas I hunt look just like the picture Dan posted with the possible buck bedding in oxbows.

My question is, if the bucks are bedding in these oxbows how do you set up on them without being winded or spotted? Do you approach from down stream/river and set up on a cross wind, or do you set up on a known travel route that leads to staging and feeding areas?

In most cases the wind blows into the oxbow when they bed there. so if they are walking out thru the dry land mouth you need to hunt a just off wind, by looking at the wind direction and setting up, and accessing from the side that leans in your favor. If there crossing the river, just stay out of sight and sound.
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Outdoor814 » Sun Jan 15, 2017 6:02 am

I wonder if you could stack bed like these? In tight oxbows will multiple bucks bed in them if the cover is substantial or will a dominent buck lock it down?
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Aaron1987 » Mon Jan 16, 2017 11:03 am

Lockdown wrote:Great bump!! Love this subject. I have noticed that there is a MAJOR lack of buck beds on points near OPEN water. I think they are far more likely to run 100 yards out into cattails and stand, rather than swim across the wide open water. I can only think of one time I saw a buck swim to escape pressure, and it was late summer in a state park (aka refuge). He was cornered on a point and basically had no other option.

I have a story that might open a few eyes and minds... although I view this as extremely rare. :think:

When I was probably 14, my Dad and I headed out for the Youth waterfowl opener. I'm guessing it was early September, as I know for a fact bowhunting wasn't in season yet. I think shooting time was after daybreak, possibly even noon on opening day. We sat and killed time at the slew edge before we headed out to set our dekes. We talked for a half hour or more. When we went wading in, we were knee deep 20-30 yards in, and all the sudden something started crashing and bounding thru the water around us, toward shore! :shock: Obviously it had to be a deer, so we went over to where the sound originated from. There it was... a deer bed on a muskrat house!

It had to be a monster swamp buck. The crazy thing was, there was no good deer habitat anywhere around. Not even a grove within a mile. It was wide open minus a public CRP field and open slew near by. The bucks bed was probably 3/4 mile off the road in a 2 mile x 2 mile section, which is pretty rare around here.

Dad hunted him a few times but never saw him. I'm sure us duck hunting that slew through out the year was why.


I totally agree on the lack of buck bedding off points surrounded by open water.

We hunt a large lake (over 10,000 acres) and find the best bedding to be in the bowls or coves NOT the points. The lake is deep and fairly wide in most spots. These coves in this specific lake are created by gradual runoff ditches and low spots off the main ridge. On the points (where the runoff is steep) there is not as much thick cover and edge growth. However, up in the coves there are willows, marsh grasses etc that grow in the shallower areas.

It seems in this situation the bucks always bed in the center of these coves with wind blowing off the ridges towards water. It's thicker there, they rarely see danger come from the water, and they have more escape options than the points. These deer are easy to observe of an evening from across the lake but very hard to hunt because of the swirling winds down in the bowl. Still trying to figure that one out! :)
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby cougar » Mon Jan 16, 2017 2:53 pm

Greg, I'd bet on the top most X on ur map, especially if that area gets a lot of NW wind. It seems to be the farthest from the visible human travel routes on that aerial. clearly there's plenty of people around that area, i'd pay attention to how much traffic those trails / railroad beds / power lines get from dog walkers, dirt bikes, etc. An oxbow is useless if there's a trike bike trail straight through the riffle just adjacent to it. Depending on the width, and what's just outside the picture, the whole corridor could set up more as a funnel between better cover / bigger blocks of cover, which would turn it into a rut spot IMHO
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby ghoasthunter » Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:10 am

I'm heading out the door to check a remote back woods beaver pond right now I always see rubs along the one bank on a brushy point it never dawned on me to check it for a bed its even on the right side for early season winds when the rubs are made I might of just found Mr. big
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby JAK » Thu Feb 08, 2018 3:04 pm

Glad I read this got my gears turning on a river bottom I used to hunt. Always saw bucks comeing and going from the same area . I was to stubborn to hunt it right. Sets up perfect with a big oxbow and swampy area to South of oxbo. That's where I saw all the bucks going to and comeing from. Great stuff guys :dance:. Just when I thought I kicked the scouting bug I always read something on hear that makes me want to get out and go again :lol:
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby crossfitcarpenter » Wed Jul 25, 2018 10:17 am

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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Swampbuck » Wed Jul 25, 2018 12:34 pm

Marshes- something I have put together the last few seasons is bucks bedding near potholes in the swamp/marsh. Most the terrain I've been focusing on lately is marsh to swamp transitions and one of the most consistent things I've found is bucks bedding up against potholes that are surrounded by bog. It has to have particular features, small, boggy, and some type of cover. But it's a consistent pattern. If they are too big and have too much high spots it would hold multiple deer but usually not the mature one. They want that small secluded one. Not sure if others see this in different types of marsh but it's become the feature I look to when I'm looking for the bucks bedding.
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Re: Beds in relation to water

Unread postby Cchez » Sun Aug 11, 2019 3:58 am

I know its an older thread, but just wanted to add to what i've seen as far as bedding on points into water. I've found that if they do bed on a point that juts out into lets say a large pond or small lake, they bed back far enough towards the mainland so they can escape along the edge. They use the point as a barrier knowing they have the protection at their back. I've attached 2 pictures showing what im talking about. The bucks beds are marked with pin drops, and the escape trails marked in red. 1 picture only has 1 route, because in that scenario i was going out to do some duck hunting as a teen and jumped a big 10 point that was bedded down there and took off when i got too close. That was long before i knew anything about bedding haha. The second picture is a little more defined, showing where he has multiple escape routes, one even going straight across the peninsula.
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