By: Heath Wood
The Transition to Shed Hunting
As deer hunting winds down across the country, the focus turns to what bucks made it through the season. Many hunters begin looking ahead to next season shortly after the current season ends. Often they use game cameras to capture bucks that didn’t get harvested and take inventory of potential bucks for next year. Another excellent tool for scouting the upcoming season’s bucks is to shed hunt after the season.
Shed hunting is the pursuit of finding antlers that have fallen from a whitetail bucks head due to annual shedding. In recent years the popularity of shed hunting has increased dramatically. Many hunters search their hunting properties each year, beginning as soon as December. Yet, most whitetail bucks shed their antlers during late January, February, and into March on most occasions. Depending on the country you are hunting, weather and the specific bucks themselves will determine when antlers will shed.
Always Be On The Lookout
On multiple occasions, while predator hunting during January and February, I have stumbled across the sheds of bucks. However, I have done the same while spring turkey hunting in April. On a special note, I can recall while on the move to a gobbling tom, I looked down on the forest floor to see one side of a mature buck’s antlers lying next to a log. I put the distant gobbling tom on pause for a few seconds and quickly scanned the surrounding area for the matching side. To my surprise, I found the match a few yards up the hill.
The uncertainty of where and when to find these natural treasures is part of the excitement of shed hunting. There is a bit of urgency that goes along with shed hunting. Hunters want to find antlers before their buddies do or critters claim them as their own. Small rodents such as mice, squirrels, and even porcupines love to chew on the antlers as a source of calcium, phosphorus, and protein. Small critters will also chew on the antlers to wear down their fast-growing teeth.
The Advantages of Cellular Cameras
To gain an advantage when shed hunting, I use my Stealth Cam Fusion X cellular cameras. By placing the Fusion X cameras in strategic locations, I can constantly observe the bucks in my area. When pictures begin showing up of bucks with no antlers, one-sided, or two bloody red circles on their head, I know it is time to look for their sheds before the competition finds them. Most often, bucks lose their antlers in the same areas each year. Antlers are primarily found in food sources, such as food plots, pasture areas, or crop fields. Another common area is along natural travel paths and water sources. When searching for shed antlers each year, I often scan all my fields and food plots by foot to see if I can find antlers. After noting pictures from my Fusion X cellular camera, I searched these common areas multiple days.
Another excellent location to find shed antlers is along fence lines. By walking fence lines, hunters can find shed antlers where deer have jumped the fence. As the time nears for a buck’s antlers to shed during the winter months, the antlers will become loose. When a buck jumps a fence, his body is jolted when he lands on the other side. The jolt is often enough to finish knocking the antler completely loose, resulting in the antlers nearby the fence lines. I have found complete sets of antlers along fence lines on multiple occasions, meaning both sides.
Why Should You Shed Hunt?
One who has never been shed hunting might wonder what the fuss is all about; the antlers from a whitetail buck can be used for many things. Often antlers are used to make home decorations such as lamps or chandeliers. I have also come across kitchen cabinets that use shed antlers as knobs. The possibilities of using shed antlers are endless.
Yet, the main reason for the excitement of finding antlers from a hunter’s perspective is scouting. As mentioned earlier, finding shed antlers is an excellent way to confirm which bucks made it through the season. On many occasions, hunters have found specific buck sheds for three to four years in a row. By having each year’s sheds, hunters can measure how many inches of antler a buck grows from year to year. Hunters often have had a particular buck on game cameras for multiple years in a row. However, if you don’t have the bucks’ shed antlers, it is still a guessing game as to how big the buck is. Having an average number of growth each year, a hunter should have a close estimate of what the buck will score the following year. When the buck reaches the maturity, age, and best set of antlers, that buck gets placed on a hunter’s hit list for the upcoming hunting season.
The Power Of Game Cameras
It is no secret that game cameras have become the number one scouting tool for deer hunters in recent years. By using the technology of cellular cameras such as the Stealth Cam Fusion X, hunters can now use game cameras to find more shed antlers each year. By finding more shed antlers and an array of data gathered using game cameras throughout the year, hunters are more prepared and have a more significant advantage of finding and harvesting a mature buck year after year.