Backwoods Whitetails
P.O. Box 372
240 West Main St.
Ipava, IL 61441
Phone: 309-224-2853
info@backwoodswhitetails.com
P.O. Box 372
240 West Main St.
Ipava, IL 61441
Phone: 309-224-2853
info@backwoodswhitetails.com
| Whether you are a serious whitetail hunter or just a person that loves catching wildlife on a game camera. People are always searching for that perfect spot to regularly catch weary whitetails on camera year around. Believe it or not, one of the best spots to plant a trail camera and just let it run for the entire year is under a community licking branch. It has never been a hidden secret to quite a few hunters as to what a community licking branch is or what it has to offer. But it is still something that has just gone unnoticed by many hunters for allot of years. Thankfully, due to the ever advancing technology of trail cameras, hunters are now discovering allot more about what a whitetail is really up too all of the time. So what is a community licking branch? For those that aren't aware of just how to go about picking one out. You are going to find it allot easier than expected. Most every hunter have already been looking to them for information on rutting buck activity. Some just innocently didn't understand what they were actually looking at or what other information that site had to offer. So go get out the aerials to your hunt sites and get some cams around. Because we are about to open up the whitetail window a little wider on methods used for understanding and/or scouting whitetails. Before the days of the trail camera, hunters could not spend 24 hours a day for 7 days a week in the woods. Therefore were only able to view, interpret and understand the location of community licking branch as a simple ground scrape. Because each community site only showed different levels of ground activity during just the hunting season. Hunters were left to define those sites as either a boundary scrape, a secondary scrape or the primary/community scrape. Fortunately hunters were able to somewhat monitor the aggression levels of bucks by looking for scraping activity in the same spots every year. And it was pretty easy to pick out a spot for hanging a stand during the rut as certain scrapes grew to be exceptionally large due to the daily pounding of buck activity. But regardless of the scrape size hunters can now know that ground scrapes mark the locations of community licking branches. Now in reference to the different ground scrapes, if you notice (especially over the bigger scrapes) there is usually always a branch that is broken up & beat to death that's hanging over those huge ground scrapes. Well that broken down & beaten up branch is the community licking branch that most all whitetails in the area are using to rub their forehead, nasal & pre orbital glands and lick on ALL YEAR LONG. Although community/social branches are mainly being used by adult deer. You will occasionally find that there are the occasional fawns that are using these sites as well. So because mother nature requires that all whitetails be social animals. Deer simply cannot resist stopping to lick on & rub their glands on these branch in order to keep in touch with other deer in the area. Therefore, this makes community licking branch sites the perfect spot to hang a trail camera and just let it run all year long and it is the perfect spot to catch a trail cam weary whitetail for seeing what he is up to. For hunters that were never aware, are just getting into using trail cameras or are limited to time in the field. You may have never considered placing your scouting cams over these sites until a ground scrape appeared. But if you know where there is one of those large heavily used ground scrape that always appears during the rut. Go hang a camera there and you will soon find that you have been missing out on some good information about the deer in that area. And because the same deer use these very sites each & every year. What better way to see if that specific buck you that you have a hankering for is still alive after the season. Even if that deer doesn't winter there he is sure to advertises his presence when he returns to the area in the spring. So because you don't have to wait till the rut to start getting results. Get your hunt aerials out, reference all of the spots where you find scrapes each & every season. Pick out the spots where the biggest & most heavily used ground scrapes appear to hang your cams. You will probably find that some of the more active sites will be where you found big ground scrapes close to bedding areas. But again, just to get started on figuring out which ones are producing the most results. Concentrate where you found the biggest & most active ground scrapes regardless if it were in the middle of a bedding or feeding areas. You are probably going to find yourself wanting/needing a few more cameras to cover all those spots. But just keep in mind that a man can never have too many trail cameras in the woods. A few things hunters will discover. 1st. You will find that these are some great sites for placing a trail camera year around. 2nd. You will also be able to detect when bucks are beginning to transition to and from other areas. You will know when bucks are beginning to expand their home ranges. You will probably even learn that specific bucks will move/transition to other areas even as early as August due to the sudden shortening of daylight hours. In several instances each year I have seen where the same bucks will leave a summer home ranges at the same time each year to then show up on cams I have placed on other farms from 2 to 4 miles down the road. Then around the end of September I usually discover a few more bucks that will transition into other areas as well. Then usually around the middle of October, an exceptionally large transition will take place signaling that the peak of the seek & chase phase is near. 3rd. You will discover that there will be several buck that come to a licking branch/scrape site during the peak of the rut that all display a different attitude or level of aggression. You will probably discover that most bucks won't even bother to paw the ground/leave a ground scrape. I have seen instances where 10+ different bucks had visited one specific licking branch (aka ground scrape) where only 1 of the 10+ bucks even bothered to paw the ground. Some just simply licked the branch and then carried on. Some licked the branch, rubbed Pre-Orbitals where others just showed up to only urinate into the ground scrape. So what are you looking for at these licking branches. I personally set my cams on video so as to monitor the attitude/aggression levels of the bucks. It not only tells me what the current transition of the rut may be. But if i see one specific buck that just rips the ever loving hell out of the scrape. I know that buck is one that can easily be grunted and/or rattled in for shot. So get your cams on these sites and leave them on these sites year round. Give your cams the opportunity to gather the knowledge that you will need to become a more successful hunt. 4th. Most importantly, I think it is going to teach/show you how to read & understand the activity on specific deer. You will find that for all those years you showed up at a traditional scrape site to see that the ground wasn't torn to shreds and leave thinking there wasn't a buck one in the are. You will find that there were bucks visiting those sites all along. And it will help you to determine the best place to prop up a stand in hope of bagging a specific whitetail buck. So don't wait to get started learning more about the bucks in your area. Locate the licking branches and get some cams hung as soon as possible. Best of luck to everyone this season. |