Getting pics of mature deer?

Always wear latex gloves when checking the camera, and if possible check it on the way to or from your stand. Take every precaution to avoid stinking up the area.

Minerals in spring and summer, bait in late summer and early fall , and scrapes whenever they start .
Resist the temptation to check them to much , and hang them in areas ya can check them without much intrusion.

Unless my camera is on the way to a treestand I don't get off the fourwheeler or out of the truck typically to check or get it.

Minerals and water in summer.
Food is essential in early fall.
Scrapes and pinch points in November.
Food again when it gets cold

Not that I'm always getting good pics. Lol

I keep my cameras up/angled down out of deers line of sight. I stand on 4 wheeler rack to do so. A 4-step stool works as well. I rarely get a pic of a deer looking at the camera. Amount of trespasser pics also went up with cameras being up and out of the normal line of sight.....http://www.theohiooutdoors.com/showthread.php?16055-Camera-Mounts

You will get more pics of mature deer where there are more mature deer. Sounds stupid and I am not trying to be a smart ass, but it is very true. Almost all of my big buck pics are mid to late October and November in or near a scrape. I check them every 2 weeks or so and don't use any special scent precautions. Mineral can be good in spring also, never had much look with baiting. I also like to put cameras up high pointing down, mainly because we have lots of bears in WV and they love to eat cameras, if they are up high they don't seem to see them, but deer and people don't see them either.

brancher147 said:

You will get more pics of mature deer where there are more mature deer. Sounds stupid and I am not trying to be a smart ass, but it is very true. Almost all of my big buck pics are mid to late October and November in or near a scrape. I check them every 2 weeks or so and don't use any special scent precautions. Mineral can be good in spring also, never had much look with baiting. I also like to put cameras up high pointing down, mainly because we have lots of bears in WV and they love to eat cameras, if they are up high they don't seem to see them, but deer and people don't see them either.

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This brings up another point. Not targeting you, jusy the concept. Your post just made me think of it. What's the purpose of running trail cams if your not going to check them for two weeks? especially during the rut. Any deer you get pictures of in that time frame.might be there for 3 or 4 days max.... and by the time you check your camera, that deer is more than likely long gone and you missed your window of oportunity. Trail cams are a tool to know when and where to hunt, to me atleast. If done corectly, a camera can be checked every 3-5 days without disturtbing deer. All of my cameras are positioned to be checked with little disturbance. The ones that are not, I will hunt that stand once a week or so, just to be able to pull a card on the camera.

Never really used them intentionally to pattern deer. We have 3 areas we let the deer pattern us. 2 are Mineral sites and one is in our plot. We run 11 cams, 3 of which never leave the woods. I think we screw up more than do it right but it doesn't matter. We always get great pictures, one deer in particular loves the cameras and he is a 7 year old buck we call Big 6.

My phone is jacked up. Will finish post later.

I'm still messing with cameras and trying to decide if I even like using them after a couple years. I get mature deer, just not at a time of day when I can kill them usually. Sometimes I get 1000 pics of a branch blowing in front of the lens lol. It's been fun checking the card and seeing what has been stopping by but I don't think it's done anything to help me kill deer so far. I've had a few trails and whatever that looked like a deer highway. Hang a cam, check it a week later and I get 2 pics. One of me walking away when the camera is set up and one of me coming back to check it.

So far the best success I've had getting lots of pictures is putting a camera over corn in the winter or salt in the summer like the others have said. Again, it hasn't helped me kill anything. You just see a monster and focus on him, lose sleep over him and then never see him during daylight lol. Or, last year I got a pic of one I'd shoot and he was there at 4:30pm. I hunted that spot a bunch of times and he never came back. The buck I killed last year was not doing anything on a regular basis that I could see, he just happened to show up while I was hunting.

I have two cameras out right now. One I think I forgot to put a card in because when I got home I had a card in my pocket. The other one is telling me deer only show up there after 1am but for some reason I keep hunting there anyway thinking they'll show up early one day. I will most likely just use them for fun looking through them with the wife and kids now that I've messed around with them a little. Could be a great tool I'm sure but it hasn't done much for me.

We have 3 cameras set up in areas that are easy to get to and the deer are used to the commotion now. Some of our biggest bucks we got on cam are within an hour of checking cards or throwing apples out. So the deer hear us come in and do our thing then they do theirs.

The rut is my favorite time to run cams, with the new HD video and audio cams we hang a couple cams on hot scrapes and field edges. Using the field scan feature is pretty awesome too.

In the end it's all in what you want out of it. I personally enjoy the "when I'm not there" aspect. I learn a lot from the cameras and enjoy seeing what goes on in the woods.

I'm sure Billy will have some input on this too Giles. He gets some pretty good bucks on his cams but I always tease him about those "city deer".

I usually put my cams out in late June and mostly on minerals. And 1 or 2 on our plots. I like to see the growth cycle of a bucks antlers.
I also like to inventory the bucks in our area. This is important because some of the guys I hunt with don't get into deer like I do and really don't know what a shooter is if it don't have massive headgear. Its nice to be able to point out mature deer to them so they know to shoot them. And its also nice to be able to show them witch deer to let walk. Sometimes you can just tell that a buck will blow up with one more year. I also like to have pictures from year to year of the same buck to see his progression.
Imo. If you have mineral licks in the spring and a corn pile in late season and you don't get any pictures of nice bucks then there proly isn't any in the area.
As with everyone else, When the end of October nears, I always get pictures of bucks that are just making there way into the area. And more often then not, I have pictures of the same bucks from the year before.
Another advantage to running cameras is when you get a picture of a boarder line shooter, Without having that picture to know if you want to shoot or not, You loose an advantage if you see the buck while hunting. As we all know sometimes you don't have much time to figure out if you want to shoot or pass. Having a picture and already knowing is a big advantage to me because I already know if he's a shooter or not witch gives me more time to make a good shot.
Has a trail camera ever helped me kill a buck? Yes

Kaiser878 said:

This brings up another point. Not targeting you, jusy the concept. Your post just made me think of it. What's the purpose of running trail cams if your not going to check them for two weeks? especially during the rut. Any deer you get pictures of in that time frame.might be there for 3 or 4 days max.... and by the time you check your camera, that deer is more than likely long gone and you missed your window of oportunity. Trail cams are a tool to know when and where to hunt, to me atleast. If done corectly, a camera can be checked every 3-5 days without disturtbing deer. All of my cameras are positioned to be checked with little disturbance. The ones that are not, I will hunt that stand once a week or so, just to be able to pull a card on the camera.

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I don't check any cams during the rut. I am shooting with something other than a camera at that point. Bucks are wandering and completely unpredictable then, no point trying to use a camera to pattern them. I just like to know what is in the woods before the rut hits. I say check every 2 weeks because some of mine are a long hike into places where deer are not used to people. If the deer are used to people and cameras are near your stands then check them whenever you want.

brancher147 said:

I don't check any cams during the rut. I am shooting with something other than a camera at that point. Bucks are wandering and completely unpredictable then, no point trying to use a camera to pattern them. I just like to know what is in the woods before the rut hits. I say check every 2 weeks because some of mine are a long hike into places where deer are not used to people. If the deer are used to people and cameras are near your stands then check them whenever you want.

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Can't say I agree with all that. I've killed some of my biggest deer based off camera Intel in the middle of the rut. Deer come and go... and if you have a steady supply of does, and especially the rt doe at the rt time, it would benefit you to know what buck is courting that doe.... which is exactly the case in the deer I killed in 2010..... he followed her into a food plot for a 1.5 days prior to me killing him. I went in, and killed him the evening I checked the cam.

Also.... I can't be on 6 properties at the same time.... so checking cams let's me know what farms I need to be hunting.

I don't understand the point in running a camera during the rut, if your not going to check it. Personally, I could give two shits about getting a picture of a nice buck if I'm not gonna kill him. So have a picture of a deer 13 days ago that I never saw because I didn't check my camera for two weeks is useless.

But...... that's just my opinion.

Kaiser878 said:

Can't say I agree with all that. I've killed some of my biggest deer based off camera Intel in the middle of the rut. Deer come and go... and if you have a steady supply of does, and especially the rt doe at the rt time, it would benefit you to know what buck is courting that doe.... which is exactly the case in the deer I killed in 2010..... he followed her into a food plot for a 1.5 days prior to me killing him. I went in, and killed him the evening I checked the cam.

Also.... I can't be on 6 properties at the same time.... so checking cams let's me know what farms I need to be hunting.

I don't understand the point in running a camera during the rut, if your not going to check it. Personally, I could give two shits about getting a picture of a nice buck if I'm not gonna kill him. So have a picture of a deer 13 days ago that I never saw because I didn't check my camera for two weeks is useless.

But...... that's just my opinion.

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I agree. I check my cameras almost every other day during the rut and almost always hunt where I have the most recent picture of a shooter. I don't mean that spot, but that farm. I just wish I had wireless cams.

How awesome would that be to have a bunch of wireless cams and have real time knowledge when a big deer moves into a property.
I agree with tryin to have the latest Intel and concentrating your efforts in the areas you've had recently gotten pictures of a shooter .

Carpn said:

How awesome would that be to have a bunch of wireless cams and have real time knowledge when a big deer moves into a property.
I agree with tryin to have the latest Intel and concentrating your efforts in the areas you've had recently gotten pictures of a shooter .

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For me, it greatly added to my level of frustration. I could never be in the right spot at the right time. Chasing my own tail sort of thing. I had a buddy watching my cams from Italy. He sent me a text and told me I was in the wrong spot. A camera 300 yards east of me had a dandy stroll by. When a dude in Italy texts you to tell you to pay attention to your cams...it's just gone too far!