How do you search a large area: acres in size?

[pgoupell]

I got permission to hunt an old school playground. It is about 5 acres in size.

While hunting takes place over days / weeks, how do you keep track of what pieces / grids you have already hunted?

I am thinking about getting a small gps unit and take a reading when I start and finish, searching in a rectangular grid area. By taking opposite corners (top left / bottom right) I can keep track of each grid and should be able to start where I left off on the next hunting day.

What do you think?

 

[Idaho PRB]

That is a very reasonable way to go about it. I have thought about doing the same thing. Another way to do it would be to bring a 100' tape and some small flags like are used when they spray your lawn or install a sprinkler system. You could measure off (or pace off) a grid, say 50' X 50' and sketch the grounds off on a piece of paper, or print a Google Earth map, subdivide the map and just keep track of which grids have been searced and which ones haven't.
Mind you, I haven't done this yet myself, only thought about it. I usually try to read the place and hunt the most likely spots. Sometimes walkways, trees or sunny/shady sides of buildings are good. Just think of where people would have concentrated on a regular basis and why. That approach always leaves me wondering what I have missed though.
It would be cool to hear how the GPS works out for you.
Good Luck.

 

[amc rulz]

Personally, I've never gridded anything, I prefer to haphazzardly hunt an area in a manner that makes little sense, randomnly plundering the goods at first, then coming back time and time again until the finds are slim.......or so I believe

 

[tony (Orlando FL)]

What I do is wander till I hit on something and then from that point I start doing circles gradually getting wider and wider till I hit another target, at that point the circles begin again.

This is how I have been doing my sites and the beach. It seems to get me in tune with where the action once was.

It can be mind boggling cant it? That is the beauty of a small space isnt it?

 

[Yeasty]

Using GPS, this is how I've been searching this large site.

 

[cdsmith46]

I think that you have a great idea. I'm glad that you posted, because I am also working an old school area that is large. Grid it is the way to go, and the GPS should work with reasonable accuracy. Have gps been able to get any more accurate than 5-10 feet?

 

[RLOH]

Good hunting spots are hard to find. If you have unlimited time and access to this spot, take your time. I always sort of cruise the area until I start finding good stuff. At that point, I will grid an area of 50 foot by 50 foot and hunt it hard. At the end of the day I make notes in on a small pad of the boundaries of the area you hunted. The next time, I will grid another similare sized area that borders the finished area and start the process all over. It has taken my an entire summer to hunt spots like you have and when I am finished with covering it all, I will go back to the most productive areas and hunt them again, but this time I hunt it from a different angle. You will be amazed what you find the second and third time around. Most people do not have the patience to do this, but with good spots getting harder to find or get permission to hunt, you must take advantage of these rare oppotunities. R.L.

 

[pgoupell]

I have decided that I will start at one corner of the playground and work my way around it. I have all summer and the school / playground is closed so I will not have any interference with bystanders.

I will use some flags to mark a search grid and keep track of each grid. At the end of the day's hunt I will stick a golf tee with a washer around it to mark where I stopped. That should make finding where to start the next hunt easier to find.

 

[JAN1]

I have a Garmin Legend that I use for locating rock pools on the beaches and good spots on land but I have found that it is completely useless when quartering a field as even on a high spot in the middle of a field which is square it is sometimes 30 ft out and the line on the screen is no where near what you have walked.
So now I use visual sightings or my rucksack but flags are a good idea.

 

[drkp88]

When hunting a larger area I tend to section it off and hit each section in sequence (I haven't gone high tech - I just use landmarks). I go over each section first with a slightly faster "spot scan" pattern. I then go over each section at slower speed and more concentrated overlaps (with a smaller coil in trashier areas). If my first pass produces a larger number of targets I'll repeat right away with my 2nd pass. Don't disregard sections that don't produce many targets - they could hold that one BEST target.
Bruce in Ct

 

[stasys]

RLOH said 100% perfect, cant add anything more

 

[BerntOut]

Section it off in your mind, grid it and start swinging that coil! I have 7 acres I have been hunting with my 10X12 SEF off and on for a year and a half. I have a lot more to do!