Up Your Whitetail Glassing Game with Digiscoping

Western big game hunters depend immensely on glassing sessions in pursuit of the game they hunt. This strategy is paramount to locating and ultimately harvesting wild game such as elk, antelope, and mule deer. Whitetail hunters, not so much.

Surprisingly, many deer hunters rarely use optics other than their rifle scopes and bow sight pins. Sure, some depend on their binoculars and, to a lesser degree, spotting scopes. But mostly during hunts. Whether hunting whitetails with a rifle, bow, or muzzleloader, scouting using optics is less prevalent, largely due to this age of ever-improving trail camera technology in the whitetail world. While trail cameras are a fairly low-impact form of scouting, they are limited in what they capture. 

The bottom line is if you’re not putting your optics to use, you’re leaving intel on the table. 

The best part is you can soup up your optics-based deer scouting by capturing your sightings through the art of digiscoping. And there is no better way than with the leader in digiscoping technology, Phone Skope.

Put simply, Phone Skope digiscoping kits turn your smartphone and optics into a camera with long-range capabilities – which means many strategies can be put into place to capture clues in the form of coveted whitetail footage. 

It’s easy to build a digiscoping kit. Just go to Phone Skope’s easy Builder Page and choose your optics and smartphone make and model.

Magnification Required

You know the scenario. You’re sitting in your stand, and a buck approaches from a mere 50-yards away. You stealthily click off a picture with your phone. You go to view your new photo of said buck and it looks like a distant dot. It’s frustrating, to say the least. Your buddies back at camp will certainly be underwhelmed. What’s worse, you’ll be unable to glean much information from the shot.

Here are just a few of the benefits of enlarging game images through digiscoping in the whitetail woods.

Patterning Deer

By setting up at a distance, hunters can see deer movement. Capturing it with images or video only enhances this valuable information. Setting up with views of crop field edges, funnels, and food sources, great intel can be gathered, documented, and used to your advantage. As long as you’ve exercised scent control, this is a great way to determine the tendencies of a known hit-list buck (or discover a new one).

Don’t Fence Me In

Property lines are a huge component of hunting free-range deer. Shared deer populations can really keep you guessing especially for those on small to medium parcels. In these areas, it’s common for a buck’s core area to span two or more properties. We all know that hunting fence lines is a huge faux pas in the hunting world (as it should be). However, with a little etiquette, scouting them is okay. Phone Skope is a great tool for documenting how deer use your property as they relate to neighboring tracts. Set up (on your side of the fence of course) in the heavy brush with a good line of sight in both directions (if possible) and learn away. You’ll be glad you have pictorial evidence of common travel corridors across properties. More importantly, Phone Skope’s magnified images tell you a lot about how whitetail bucks use your property. 

While not ethical to hunt, areas along property boundaries can tell you a lot about how deer use your hunting grounds.

Locating Hit-List Bucks

Rarely does a season go by without at least one hit-list buck you’re trying to catch up with. You know the one. They show up at trail cameras, sometimes often, sometimes not – and when they do, it’s during nighttime hours. 

At times, the first sighting comes during the season from your blind or tree stand. Once hit-listers can be clearly recognized, it’s time to come up with a plan. Often, areas, where trail cameras have caught them, become inadequate for setting up. For example, during the early season, bucks start to depart from their summer patterns. And, of course, we all know the problem the rut creates relating to pinning down bucks.

Covering more ground with your intel efforts can pay huge dividends; and it you’re careful and tend to the basics, you can do so in a fairly low-impact manner.

Whether before or during the season, this is the time to put your Phone Skope digiscoping kit to work. Hopefully, some of your intel has narrowed down some information for you. Perhaps you think you have an idea of a buck’s bedding area and food sources. Set up accordingly with an observation point that provides a large field of view, conceal yourself, and seek to witness firsthand his patterns from a distance. The photo-magnification made possible by your Phone Skope kit helps you not only identify individual bucks, but it also helps you fine-tune a real harvest plan.

Determining Your Setup

What makes you decide where to sit for a particular hunt? Is it based on wind direction? A big rub? How about it’s simply a spot that has worked for decades. 

What about a hunting setup determined largely on real in-person knowledge?

With enlarged images of deer behavior, a good setup (or even multiple setups) can be determined for a given area. Even during the season, don’t be afraid to miss a hunt in the name of a good observation session – with visual documentation at that.

Put your digiscope setup to work by choosing areas with deer sign and vast views.

Conclusion

If you don’t already do so, it’s time to use your binoculars as more than a clunky necklace you wear in the deer stand. Use them in a more useful way through digiscoping. Take it a step further and invest in a spotting scope. There is so much information at your disposal if you magnify and learn from the areas holding the deer you hunt. Your first step is going to the Phone Skope Builder Page to seamlessly build your rock-solid kit. The woods are calling, what are you waiting for?

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