Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Two Stands For Hunting Locations?
It’s certainly not an original idea. Many hunters, besides me, have toyed with the idea of having two stands for each hunting area. One for the prevailing wind direction and the other for most other wind conditions.
I’ve thought about this at great length, and have pretty much decided that the most problematic wind is from the northeast, east and southeast.
Would a stand for a prevailing westerly-northwesterly wind, and one for an easterly wind work?
It probably would if the cover (meaning trees for tree stands) were available for those winds. The reason most of us never put up stands for an east wind is that we never used to get as much of that wind as we have over the last several years.
I have a few places where hunters can go when an east wind blows. One is a pit-blind at the base of a small hill, and an east wind blows right into the opening where bow shots are taken. Deer, as a general rule, do not approach from behind the pit blind, and it’s very difficult for a deer to wind the hunter.
A couple of our elevated coops are situated so an east wind isn’t too bothersome, but many of my stands are placed strategically for the prevailing westerly wind direction.
However, going back to the plausibility of two stands for each hunting area. It could work, if the terrain features and available trees are present, but there is the additional cost of doing so.
Say we’re hunting a big buck and we want to set up on him when the wind is out of the east, it can be done but it’s not something one jumps into when we already have some 50 stands on 1,024 acres. If we could do so, that would mean building or buying many more stands.
Most of our stands are permanent fixtures, especially elevated coops built into trees. If we were to do it at all 50 spots, the woods would lose its good looks and begin looking like a scattering of tenements in the trees. That would spoil the aesthetics of the hunting area.
What probably makes more sense than anything is to build four or five stands for use strictly on an east wind. That might mean two or three new stands along the western edge of our property where the likelihood of a deer catching the hunters scent would be minimal.
If two or three stands were positioned with the west fence line just a short distance away, the chance of a deer circling next to the fence and picking up human odor would be minimized.
The other alternative would be to build an air-tight coop with one shooting window strategically placed. If it was just large enough to shoot through, and could be opened without a sound, it would probably work.
Too many windows in a coop allow the hunter to be silhouetted against the light entering another window. And, the more windows there are, the more likely someone will try a shot at a circling buck or open the windows to look around. All this would do is distribute more human odor.
Fighting the east wind is something bow hunters must put up with, and in some cases, we can do something about it. In other cases, the wind may beat us.
We’re putting our collective heads together this winter, and trying to figure out how to beat the October east-wind problem. Will it be two blinds in one hunting spot or air-tight blinds with only one small shooting window?
Will it be one or two more pit blinds that back up to a hill? Will it be stands close to the fence to keep deer from circling behind the hunters?
It may well be a combination of all of these things although having two blinds covering one hunting spot is not one of my favorites. If one was an elevated coop and the other was a tree stand, it could work without cluttering up the skyline.
One thing is certain: whatever we do must be accomplished during the spring, or at the very latest, by June or early July. I like all changes to be made long in advance of the bow season.—The Whitetail Wizard