After scouting the lower forty (a piece of property I have hunted the past couple years) I placed my ladder stand in between two common deer trails with several scrapes along it. How important is stand placement? I will be on a three day bow hunt and had hunted this area the year before and saw five bucks in just a couple of days. The area is about a five hour drive from my home. Everyone knows deer patterns can change from year to year, but hunters continually hunt the same stand location. By leaving your stand at that location, you disturb less cover. On the other hand like me, sometimes we hunt several areas far from home and only can afford one or two stands. So we must move them and re-hang them every hunt or every year. With limited time to hunt, I had only walked the first couple acres of the forty and didn’t want to disturb the area much. I placed my stand in the same location I had placed it the last couple of years. The wind was ideal for my location.

The lower forty is a parcel owned by a friend of mine nice enough to let me hunt. Its located in north central western Wisconsin and is about three hundred miles from my home in southeastern Wisconsin. Set in a low land with large ridges surrounding, it harbors many a deer. The forty was logged three years ago and now has lots of new growth for the deer and grouse that live there.

After two days of sitting and seeing just a couple of doe’s I wondered what had changed from the year before. I decided to walk the forty looking for sign to see what the deal was. In a short time I found 13 active scrapes, lots of rubs, deer pellets everywhere and a two foot wide trail six inches deep in the earth that ran through the last two hundred yards of the forty, this was three to four hundred yards from where my stand was. Now with only one day left, should I move the stand? Well if you guessed "yes" your right. I should have. But, I didn’t, and I went home buckless.

Why doe’s are laziness get in the way of harvesting that buck. We should learn by our mistakes, but time and time again we don’t.

I was on a bow hunt in central Wisconsin some years back and virtually all the deer in six different outings were paralleling my tree stand at twenty yards, but off my right shoulder. Being right handed, I couldn’t draw, much less shoot to that side. I decided to turn my stand around for the last days hunt. After arriving early in the morning to move my stand, the laziness again fell upon me. No, I didn’t move it. It had snowed the night before and made my tree steps a little icy. I decided that if the deer would again come from my right side I would simply stand up and turn to my right to shoot. Well it cost me a nice ten point. Sure enough he came from behind me off my right shoulder. When I tried to get up to turn, I made just the slightest little squeak. With the woods totally silent, he heard it and bolted twenty yards before stopping. Now at forty yards away and behind many a bush, he just sat there staring and analyzing the area like so many monster bucks do. After a couple minutes he let out a snort and took off. If only I had moved it.

My last laziness story about stand placement I’ll discuss begins and ends about the same. I was on a three day bow hunt some three hours from my home. I quickly scouted, found an acceptable tree for my portable stand and hung it. I saw two doe’s walk behind me about thirty yards away. Then an hour or so later saw another three doe’s walk on nearly the same tracks as the ones before. "Ok", I thought, "I will just turn my stand around", "it shouldn’t take me but ten minutes". Yeh well you know the rest. I didn’t. Mister eight point walked the same trail an hour later. I grunted and grunted, bleated and rattled, but forget it. He could smell the doe’s ahead of him and just kept walking.

If you’re like me and hunt several hours from home, you simply can’t keep up with deer patterns as well as if you lived there. The best thing to do is hunt as many days as possible and slowly zero in on the deer. If you see deer moving through an area, chances are the pattern will stay the same throughout your hunt. Don’t be lazy! Move the stand. I have several successful stories about times when I had moved my stand but the things we learn from most are our mistakes.

How high should we put our stand? Generally speaking, the higher the better. Early in the fall there are still lots of leaves on the trees and quite a lot of ground forage. You can probably get away with being pretty low, say ten feet or so. But as the leaves fall, you’re better off up at least fifteen feet. Many hunters don’t feel comfortable high above the ground. Comfort is a huge factor in bow hunting. If you’re not comfortable at a certain height, it will be difficult for you to hold the bow steady while shooting. Only go as high as you’re comfortable with. And always use a safety harness.

Finally I had the bear hitting my bait the day before I was to leave Canada. This time the stand placement was perfect, and all I needed to do was get a shot at the bruin. Here he came, a half hour before dark. As he made his way to the bait I admired his jet black coat and powerful 200 pound plus frame. He hesitated ten feet before he got to the bait. No wait, he didn’t hesitate, he stopped. And stood, and stood and didn’t move. I thought to myself, "What is he waiting for". Then I figured it out. He was waiting for dark. Oh no, my last day to hunt and he is just standing there. He had stopped right behind some thick brush. Two days ago I thought about cutting a shooting lane through it with my tree saw but would have had to walk back to the boat (some fifty yards away). I thought, naw that’s ok, he’ll come right into the bait. He didn’t, and five minutes before shooting light I tried to squeeze an arrow through the brush. He took off running unscathed and stopped twenty yards to my left. Still within range but behind even more thick brush. "Boy" I thought, "what a nice spot for a shooting lane to have been cut". By, by, end of hunt.

For bow hunters, cutting shooting lanes is a must. For turkey hunting you will probably be cutting lots of brush. The lower you are, as in a turkey hunting situation, the more brush you’ll need to cut. I like to sit in my stand and have a helper walk around and tie orange surveyors tape to the trees or brush I need to cut. I like to cut six lanes. One to my right, one to my left and two in front and behind me on angles.

It doesn’t matter how many deer you see, if your arrow can’t make it to the deer. An occasional twig might jump out at you’re arrow on occasion, but if you take your time and cut those shooting lanes you will have one less excuse and put more meat in the freezer. Place your stands properly, move them according to the deer’s pattern and cut yourself enough shooting lanes. DON’T BE LAZY.

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