scouting report

[powderhogg01]

just got back in from a scouting trip. I covered a few key area which were hot last year, to find plenty of good sign this year. The forest service got in and clear cut some serious beetle kill zones, I am excited to see how things progress here in the next little while, as once this stuff is cleaned up this will be a really good meadow.
I came across 2 streams which all but die at mid mountain.. right at these spots the traffic is unreal. I placed a trail cam near one of these spots. I decided to follow the most used trail up and see where it went, it led right up and over the mountain showing me a hidden saddle I have never seen or known about. I will likely hunt here.
I found a small wallow with some solid fresh scrapes, one was 6 feet or higher in this pine. still oozing fresh sap, I altered course so as not to push any animals. I climbed the hill and looked over the other side, glassed for a while but did not turn anything up.
One peculiar thing I found was an old tree stand, it was built with lodgepoles and lashed together in rope.. not the safest looking thing, but got my mind to thinking. Who has ever seen or used something like this, and if you have did it work and would you do it again in the right situation?
there was a feeding meadow about 50 yards out from the water, looked to have been hit in the am before I got up the mountain, I would not mind putting a stand over the meadow there, as there is not much in the sense of good cover there.
aside from catching up to a small herd of cows and calf it was a pretty calm day in the woods just hiking around. I think I got my elk camp location figured out, as it allows me great deer and elk opportunities. getting close to opening here in co, im getting as ready as I can

[Rangerz]

I have seen those type of tree stands when I lived in VA. I even have a old deer hunting book that talks about how to build them. In the days before the strap on stands or climbers, there were all kinds of "homemade stands" out there.