Ep. 554: Foundations - The Buck Bed Mystery

and hunting buckbeds, or at least I have been. And you know, I remember reading about Dan Infult and some of these other guys a long time ago, and they were always preaching the virtues of hunting buck beeds, and I thought, well, that doesn't make sense. Now. That was because I didn't really understand the value of buck beds. But you can't ignore it forever, no matter how stufforn

you are. And I'm pretty stubborn. So lately, especially in the last couple of years, I've been paying a lot of attention to specific buckbeds and trying to factor them into my scouting and my hunting strategies, which is what I'm going to talk about right now. If you follow Mark on social media, you probably saw that he posted

about a friendly fishing contest we had Back in June. He, along with fellow Metator Guy Corey Caulkins, challenged myself and other meat eat guy Garrett Long to a fishing contest. It was a dumb move on his part for so many reasons. First off, even though they enlisted the help of an ore man in Foundations podcast engineer Hayden Samack, they were fly fishing for trout. There's there's nothing wrong with that, mind you. I love fly fishing, but you're not likely to stack up a bunch of big trout

while fishing from a driftboat. You're just not, especially in about four hours, which is the time we gave ourselves. Now, if they were competing against other fly fishermen, of course they would have had a chance. But Garrett and I weren't fly fishing. We were bass fishing out of a bass boat with real fishing tackle, real gear. I'm not saying fly fishing isn't real gear. I'm just saying we had lots of advantages in our spinning and bait casting rods.

We also happened to be on a lake that I fished an awful lot all summer long and have fished for years, And we also happen to have an amazing scenario where the water temperature had busted through the sixty degree mark and it stayed there, meaning the Smalley's were headed shallow to make new Smalley's. And when they do this, they're pretty easy to catch and they're pretty easy to find. So, in other words, Mark and Corey didn't stand a chance. Although they talked a lot of ship that they were

going to stomp us, they didn't. Garrett and I had too many advantages, not the least of which is being a hell of a lot better at fishing. But we also had betted Smalley's to work with in a lake that I have fished for twenty years. And do you know where those Smalley's were bedded? Mostly, or a better question would be, do you know what I'm talking about fishing and not betted bucks? Because those male Smalley's they sought out boulders and stumps to build their beds against.

And do you know why? Because they are easier to defend if you don't have to worry about an approach from every direction. Let's say you're a smallmouth, you're a male smallmouth, and your bed is against a boulder, you you've already kind of reduced the area in which you have to watch for crayfish or perch or sunfish or any critter that might be looking for a little caviare now Bronze backs aren't building beds to lay down in obviously, Well, I mean, I guess they kind of are, but not really.

They use their tails and fins to create a spot that's just right for a big female to layer eggs in. Then the males do their thing on the eggs and they wait for the fry to hatch. But the design is meant to make survival of their offspring easier, to ensure simple stuff with deer beds serve a different function, but there are parallels. When you start paying attention to

deer beds, you really start to see some patterns emerge. Rarely, maybe almost never, do you see a mature buck bed in a place that doesn't offer at least a few real advantages to him. I don't know. A simple example of this that relates to Smalley's is how often bucks bet up next to a dead fall or some other piece of structure. They seem to know that coyotes or wolves or Elmer Fudd types aren't going to crash their way through a dead fall to get to them in

that situation. They're taking out the possible approach, or at least one possible approach of a editor, which narrows down the area they need to monitor with their senses. It's pretty simple and it's pretty effective. You often see beds on benches or knobs or other terrain that offers a clear advantage, usually with elevation, because elevation is important, and

bucks know this and they use it well. Just think about how hard it is to climb up a hill and surprise a deer that is halfway up at looking down. Then think about how hard it would be to approach from above if the wind was blowing downhill. Say you're like in a thermal situation. In those specific cases, good luck, you're not going to get the jump on that buck, and he knows it. That's why they bed where they do.

It's why when you're taking a shortcut through the big woods and you cross a swampy meadow, you often find a random big oval on a high hummock that is tucked into a vast landscape that doesn't seem all that special, or why when you go peasant hunting you decide to let the dogs run through the overgrown homestead for a rooster, you often jump a big buck who waits until the labs are dang near sniffing his butt before he breaks free. Those bucks, they understand their world, each and every part

of it. And you know what we really don't, well, not really, but finding beds, which you can do right now. It's a pretty good start. Now. The beds you find in the middle of the summer, they won't necessarily be the ones that the bucks will use in October, but that doesn't make them valueless, and it doesn't mean that some of those beds don't transcend seasons. Understanding what dear choose to do in all facets of their life is

a huge check in the wind calumn. This is something the industry, and by that I mean the hunting industry, hasn't done a very good job of talking about. But it is absolutely true. The path, or at least I should say, a good path to big dead deer on a consistent basis, isn't point a to be stuff. It involves a lot of side tangents and a lot of time just looking around. Think about this when you're scouting now, and when you do find a buck bed or any bed,

actually ask why why there? And then ask in what conditions would that be most beneficial? Ask yourself if you feel like maybe you're in a little micro climate where it stays cooler. That's good to know now, because it's good to know in September when the temperatures are high. Ask yourself what wind the buck or deer would probably prefer there, And when you get the answer, ask yourself

how you'd use that knowledge to your advantage. If a west wind would give him a real edge in a specific bed that you found, how does that work for you? Can you set up on the down wind side to watch him leave? Can you maybe guess his approach trout from nearby food sources with that specific wind direction? What is it that he has working for him? And how can you use that against him? Ask yourself if I bumped him out of that bed, where would he go

and how would he get back? I honestly think one of the biggest mysteries in the white tailed world is buck betting. We see some of the evidence left behind, but have to fill in so many of the blanks. I mean, I don't know how often do you actually see a buck lay down in a bed. I scout and hunt quite a bit, and it does not happen to me very often. It really doesn't happen very often with big bucks, and when it does, I pay attention. How they behave in relation to betting tells you a

lot about how secure they are in a spot. And finding places where big bucks are confident you won't kill them or even just come in and bother them is the secret to actually killing them with some frequency. I absolutely believe that now I should expand on something here, because I think a lot of the messaging around buck beds and hunting them is kind of incomplete, or at the very least we're exposed to sort of a highlight

reel from the better buck bed hunters out there. The message is usually that you should find a specific buck's bed and then figure out the conditions in which he'll use it. Then you slip in as close as possible and you shoot him. Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy. Right. I don't think so. I think that's wrong. I think it's

so wrong, so very very very very wrong. Sneaking up on a bedded buck can absolutely be done with the right conditions, But then you've got to have the right conditions and the knowledge that he's actually in the bed when you want to stalk him, aside from running a cell camera over the bed, which would be at best in ethical gray area, in the legal gray area, I don't I don't know how you would guarantee something like that. Now, you could, in some situations glass up a bed you

suspect has a sleeping buck in it to confirm your suspicion. Now, that would give you a hell of an advantage, but wouldn't make the final approach much easier unless you have some rain or wind or both to cover up your approach. And we all know that there's probably not that many situations where you're gonna easily be able to glass up a bed at buck. Maybe out west, maybe in a few more open areas, but in most places good luck.

So maybe a better strategy is to scout your ass off and find some beds without thinking about hunting right over them. Scout them up now this time of year and throughout the season, mark the beds, you assume our buckbeds, drop away point, whatever you gotta do, and then factor that into a bigger strategy. Let's just say, like, for example, if you find a bed in a marsh on public land where you could slip in and saddle up close by,

give that a shot. You'll learn a lot about your skills in that move, and a lot about whether the buck is actually killable that way or not. If you find a big oval next to a dead fall, you know, halfway up a bluff, side on a little bench, oh, maybe you won't be able to get his close. Fine, what next? Then? Is he killable on top of the ridge or in the valley below? Is there a reason for him to side hill into or out of that bed that will give you some kind of ambush option,

some kind of advantage. The benefit of focusing on beds, specific individual buck beds is that you might know exactly where a buck is going or exactly where he is, or exactly where he might be coming from. And that's not nothing, my friends. That's a big deal, and it is doable. And it's also important to note that trying new hunting styles and techniques and forcing yourself to think about deer in a new way is a true tremendous opportunity to actually grow as a hunter and get way better.

Remember at the beginning of this podcast when I talk about how I kicked Mark's ass at a fishing contest, Well, I used to fish a lot of bass tournaments. I still fish a few, but I used to fish a lot that was in a past life, and I was as obsessed with it as I am with bow hunting white tails. Now. There are plenty of downsides to that life on the road chasing a little green and brown fish,

especially if you're a young, drunken idiot. But one of the upsides that I didn't see coming when I registered for my first tournament was that it would force me to get better, way better. And it did this on two fronts. The first was that I started out on the amateur or co angler side. That man, I was paired up with a professional, and in some tournaments you'd work as a team, and in some tournaments you'd fish

against each other out of the same boat. No matter the format, getting to fish with someone who was really good it was always a humbling experience. I learned a ton from some of those pros and It forced me to think about how much better I could be. The Other thing was that fishing new lakes and new river systems and new reservoirs meant that there were a lot of techniques that could work better than what I was

comfortable doing. No, the problem would be like, say, I don't know, the large mouth were schooled up on a sunken rock pile in July, or they were twenty ft deep on weed lines lounging out around the thermocline eating crayfish or whatever. Now, if you primarily love to throw spinner baits or some other chunk and wine lure, you might fish I don't know, eighteen feet above those large ease.

But someone several someone's probably in a tournament. They're going to figure out how to drag a Carolina rig passed them and light them up. Getting your ass handed to you by someone who is better at a technique like that it really kind of forces you to want to learn it, or it should. I missed that aspect of tournament fishing, because if you don't like losing, and who really does, you're gonna work on some new stuff and

you're gonna get better. White tail hunting is no different and a great example of that just might be bed hunting, or at least focusing on finding and reading buck beds. While I'm far from an expert on this topic, I'm trying to get better, and one thing I've learned is that beds become more important to me when I not only think about them, but give myself a good reminder.

If I find a bed while scouting that I think belongs to a big deer, I immediately drop a waypoint in that exact spot, and then I usually key in a few notes as well to remember things like wind direction and what would you know the conditions most likely be for a buck to use that specific bed, And if you start to find a few of those beds on a specific property, you can really kind of begin to piece together an idea of what bucks are really

doing throughout the daylight hours. Now it's worth saying that you might find three or four obvious buckbeds on property, and they might belong to three or four different bucks, or they might belong to one. The good news is it probably doesn't matter. If you know where a good buck likes to bed and what conditions he's likely to bed there, you have an advantage for the season, but also several seasons to come. This is one of the

things that fascinates me most about buckbeds. Honestly, while food sources often changed from year to year, and you know, travel routes might change depending on a litany of factors, a good betting site often doesn't. This is because they are so closely tied to the terrain, which means it's not likely that the knob on the ridge is going to wash away in a huge rainstorm or become altered

in some way from one season to the next. And sure, you know, logging activity could do it, and too much hunting pressure could convince bucks to look for better spots. But if nothing really big interferes with their betting spot, bus will keep using it. And why does that matter? Well, what if you scout your ass off this summer and you find, I don't know, six spots where the biggest

buck on your property likes to bed. You probably think you got him dialed right like, you might as well just call a taxidermist now and tell him to order

up a form because this is a done deal. But what if your neighbor goes out on opening night and kills the buck you've staked out for all you're scouting and hunting time, you've hung your you've hung your hat on that buck, and he's toast aside from sewing up a little voodoo doll to look like your neighbor and then spending your nights sticking hot needles into its delicates, and the hopes that you're no good buckshooting neighbor will

suddenly get super sharp pains in his undercarriage. You also know that that big buck chose those spots for a reason, and you know who else is going to figure that out? The next buck in line. And I talked about this a little bit ago, and I really mean it. That's right, And while it might not be the second biggest on your ground, you know that it's highly likely that when King Kong gets arrowed and opens up a power vacuum, someone is coming in to take advantage of his spot.

It's very likely that that someone is a buck who recognizes the same survival advantages that the previous buck did, and you know what, he's going to set up shop there. These generational findings are a gift to us white tail hunters. And while it's nice to figure out what apple tree is dropping during September, so you can set up there right now. By that, I mean in the season, not

don't do it right now. It's also nice to find certain things in the woods that should be used by bucks consistently from year to year to year to year. It doesn't take too many of those before you've always got a decent idea of what should be going on in the woods. And if you don't think that matters, hang out with someone who is a lot better hunter than you. If you can find one, they'll be thinking about that stuff all the time, and it'll factor into

their scouting decisions and their hunting decisions. It will drive where they walk, where they hang cameras, and eventually where they hang their happy ass off a side of a specific tree throughout the fall. So go find some beds, mark them, think about them, consider why Buck would use them and when he'd be there. Don't rely solely on their locations to end your scouting efforts, but use them to enhance the bigger picture. That's the best method for

becoming better at this stuff. And be sure to tune in next week because I'm gonna talk about why settling with your equipment throughout the summer shooting sessions is a sure fire way to screw up a shot on a deer come fall. That's it for this week, folks. I'm your host, Tony Peterson. That has been the Wired Hunt Foundations podcast which has brought to you by First Light. As I always, thank you so much for your support, all of us here at meat Eat really truly appreciate it.

And if you want more white tail goodness, on over to the wire Hunt YouTube channel and check out all of our videos that we dropped every week, or head on over to the metator dot com slash wire to read a bunch of deer hunting articles.