Rut Trail Cam Placement
By Mark Melotik
With summer in high gear, the whitetail rut might seem a long way off, but it’ll be here before you know it. Will you be ready? If you’ve followed our little mini-series of tips on trail camera placement, you know we’ve already covered early summer and late summer strategies. The goal of the next major camera movement on your selected tract should be to capture rut activity, and there are some dependably deadly strategies.
The signal that shows when it’s time to transition from late-summer camera locations to rut locations is relatively straightforward, according to Justin Langlos of trail cam specialist Spypoint.
“At some point you’ll see that bucks are going to go nocturnal, and when you start losing those daylight photos, it’s time to focus on main travel corridors and main concentrations of does,” he said. “Typically I’m going to start hunting the does right after the first part of the season.”
Langlos said in-woods travel corridors are great in-season camera locations, good examples being ditches and dry creekbeds that funnel deer movement. To find them in his hunting areas, Langlos depends on the detailed contour maps found in his Spartan Forge hunting app, but HuntStand and OnX apps are popular as well.
More travel corridors to target with your cameras during the rut include well-known trails, the edges of different habitat types, fire lanes, and even field edges where bucks can feel safe while observing a wide area as they search for does.
And don’t forget locations around or with proximity to food or water, Langlos advises.
“In a time of drought, water is going to be more attractive than food. An artificial water hole can be huge all season long.”
You might not need to be told that some of the most consistent rut-time camera locations are scrapes (both natural and manmade) and rublines.
“Scrapes are really great for the camera, but if I were to pick something to hunt over, it would be the rublines, because they tend to get a little more daytime action,” Langlos advises.
More solid advice is ensuring your camera settings are a good match for rut activity, especially if your cameras have multiple options.
“With my Spypoint cellular cameras, during early and late summer, I only have mine transmit photos once per day,” Langlos said. “And then when the rut starts, I have it send me a photo every time it takes one.”
Langlos says knowing that real-time info, sent right to your smartphone, can tell you instantly when it’s time to be on stand for a successful rut ambush.
Another smart rut tip from Langlos is to ensure your cameras are switched from photo to video mode.
“If you have them on photo during the rut, you don’t get the full experience,” he said. “Put them on video mode, and you’ll not only see a doe running by, but also what’s chasing her. You’ll hear those grunts and snorts and capture lots of good action. One of our users sent us a video of a big rutty buck dragging around a dead buck after their antlers were locked during a fight. You’re really getting your bang for the buck using video during the rut, especially when your cameras are hung over scrapes.”