Any scouting tips?

[Ryano]

Y'all want to share what kind of scouting you do to pick that favorite hunting spot or tree stand location? This should be interesting and might help some of the newbies.

[Hillbilly]

Early in the season, I'm usually looking for white oaks that are dropping acorns-a lot of the deer I've killed have had a mouthful of white oak acorns when they died. The best oaks are those little white oak groves that you find sometimes out in the middle of pine woods or somewhere else isolated from other oaks. Later in the season, I'll hunt near red oaks, persimmons, grapes, or green browse.
In general, I like edges and funnels. If I can find a good edge between hardwoods and pines, hardwoods and laurel thicket, grown-up clearcut and woods, or old field and woods, most of the time, deer are traveling it. If I can find a corner in that edge, or a place where two edges intersect, even better. I also like little strips of woods between fields or clearings that connect bigger patches of woods. Another place that always seems to produce in mountains is a low gap in the ridge, especially if it's along a natural edge. I like to hunt fresh tracks better than hunting scrapes or rubs. But if you get lucky and find one of those perfect spots with a lot of tracks, fresh droppings, plus a line of rubs and scrapes in a good natural funnel between a feeding area and a bedding area, it's definitely time to hang a stand.

[FlintWalker]

'Ol Steve took care of what I was gonna say.  I will add though...Don't overlook those little patches of cover right out in the open or close to houses.  Deer are very adaptive creatures and have no problem living VERY close to dwellings as long as they don't feel threatened.
  Sometimes it pays not to ignore the obvious.

[DanaM]

I will add don't bother hunting an area where a pack of wolves are active Unless yer hunting wolves

[GregB]

Like Steve said, I like hunting travel spots between bedding and feeding area's. With what we're using, you need to set up for a close shot, so I'm looking for a funnel situation and if possible some cover for myself. Often a steep gulley will run full length down the side of a wooded ridge, and the deer may only be crossing the gulley at one or two locations. Hunting the approach to one of those crossings is always good. Sometimes woods themselves narrow down to a bottle-neck and provide close shooting opportunities. These type of stand locations are good year after year typically as long as they're not over hunted. It's always good to find a white oak dropping acorns with a "hog lot" look underneath the tree with a lot of good deer droppings around. 

[mullet]

 I like to set up an ambush spot on a well traveled trail. Usually along the edge of planted pines, between a wet area with water oaks. Thats the set up I have this year with a small food plot to help out and a feeder later in the season.

[Ryano]

OK, some good stuff here. Here is what I do in nut shell. What I usually do a lot of first is spot lighting since its legal in Pennsylvania. I try to pick out a couple of property's to concentrate on for the season by checking the # of deer using the area and if there are any mature bucks. The area of PA I live in is mostly farm land so we start out by checking the farmers crops as well as some other food sources. Some of the crops the deer like are clover, alfalfa, corn, and soybeans. Also we have a lot of old over grown apple orchards as well as wild apple tree's which can produce big time.  You can usually catch The deer using these fields at dusk and well into the night. This is a good way to see how many deer are in a particular piece of woods. Once I have identfied the food source the deer are using curently(keep in mind this may change through out the season) I do basically the same as the rest of you. First if its a crop field I'm setting up on I usualy find a good trail comming from the woods out into the field and try to follow it back as far as I can and see if I can find any thick cover where the deer may be bedding.  I would then take into acount the wind direction (always try to aproach the stand with the wind in my face and keep it there while on stand if posible) and any natural pinch points or funnel area where the deer have to go to get from the feeding to the bedding area and vise versa. Hillbilly also made a good point. Deer are creatures of edges..they will often times follow a old fence line or work a trail just inside the woods from a field edge. Even better if you find a place where the deer are traveling up and down a old fence line and you find a spot where the fence is down and they will often times cross there as well. These are places I alway look for as well. 

[Hillbilly]

Or if you can find one of those places out in the woods where there's a big pile of corn on the ground, those are usually pretty productive, too.

[Ryano]

That would be illegal in Pa Steve....    
I don't think our deer even know what a Acorn is here......There's no white oak around hear and very few red.  Wild apples are very hit and miss this year because a late frost wiped most of them out.

[woodstick]

i get luckey iam on my hunting land all the time i use binoculars alot to look at draws. plus i know alot of travel areas, and a bunch of bedding areas. my main way is to hunt travel routes, i like to find the ones where you got 2 or 3 trails funnel down to 1. plus like everybody said acorns, or the main food source. if you find the food you will find the deer, or the girls and there will be the boys. good luck. dont know if this will help.

[mullet]

 I put a feeder up Sunday. It's legal here. 

[DanaM]

Baiting is legal here in the UP, also lots of folks have food lots planted which is the same as baiting to me.
I planted a small patch of winter rye, hope it grows. I will also use apples and some corn to try and draw some deer into my area.
There are not any farms where I'm hunting, lots of red oaks but I don't see many deer using them as a food source, must be to bitter.
There's not many deer in my hunting area especially with the abundance of predators and a pretty severe winter kill last year.
Just bought a quad so I will have easier access to more areas and I plan on more still hunting this area in clear cuts and edge habitat.

[recurve shooter]

I like to set up an ambush spot on a well traveled trail.

same here. got two good places, one where they cross a ditch to get to a food plot, the other n  the edge of another plot covering the direction they travel. both are set up for 5 to ten yard shots.

[Timo]

We (the landowner and myself) have 4 digi cams out, and rely heavily on them for numbers and quality. We've hunted this farm for many years and that helps tons. We perty much know the travel corridors, and funnel areas,which we set up on alot during the early part of the season,all that changes, is food sources which we rotate annually. The cameras help us to keep tabs on them as work keeps us away for to many days. Being in touch with your hunting area is a great key to success. Things can and do change fast as the rut nears.

Any mast crop gets attention also,but late frost this year will limit that.

Scrape trees get camera attention but see little hunting use,as most all of our mature bucks only use them during darkness. We do however hunt rub lines with great intensity. Especially when they start popping up near doe feeding areas.