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Thread: Scouting Strategies? Whitetail/Mule/Elk - 2024

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Aug 2023
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    Scouting Strategies? Whitetail/Mule/Elk - 2024

    As we are far from the hunting season I wanted to invite you all to share what your opinions and strategies around scouting are. I found after my first season that I wasted much precious time by trying to scout during the season, or going into areas blind.

    Specifically for whitetails, I wanted to spend a good amount of time in December when the information was still relevant to the season to understand what the deer are doing. Between troubles with my vehicle and the crap amount of snow this was not nearly as productive as I would have liked. I'm planning on going out in the spring to try to understand what game is doing then, and then in July or August approaching the next season.

    Some of my own goals:

    - Understand how to incorporate information in the spring when game patterns will have shifted by the fall
    - Scout extensively before the coming season
    - Start to approach the alpine to get my legs under me for approaching mule deer and elk in the coming years.


    Would welcome any thoughts/strategies/opinions about preferred time of year, and methods for scouting whitetail/mule/elk in 2024.

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  3. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2012
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    region 9
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    Re: Scouting Strategies? Whitetail/Mule/Elk - 2024

    Dynamics can change so much from season to season, and year to year it seems, with weather, precipitation, snowpack and melt changing from year over year, so there's no garaunteed method of scouting that will always translate to success in the hunting season... animals also adapt to hunting and pred pressure during the season as well, as well as changing their habitat and patterns at times based on forage and water...so many dynamics at play... know the land, know your prey, as mantracker used to say, really applies here...find the fresh sign, and hunt it... in many instances, earlier springtime areas where ungulates reside is a good indication of where they could be late season/ winter...summertime scouting may enable you to figure out where they will be early season..but not always...feel free to PM me with more questions as your scouting season progresses...

  4. #3
    Join Date
    Aug 2023
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    Re: Scouting Strategies? Whitetail/Mule/Elk - 2024

    Thanks Harry that is helpful - Of course everything is so heavily context dependent - I'm curious what general applications people get up to

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