Just curious what kind of terrain and layout people look for in an ideal blind/feeder combo. Are you looking for something in the open or something secluded in its own glen?

Gun or bow will be real different answer from me.

Rifles for sure sorry

Rifles

I know the old adage "deer need to be 50' to cover to feel secure" is a bunch of crap. The best sets I have are WAY out in the open. The occasional axis like them best too. When we bought the place, all the crappy old blinds (that they left of course) and feeders were in tight little openings in the cedars. Who wants to stare at the same cedars, up close, for hours? Kids will get bored in 5 minutes.

"You're not seeing the big boys back in the brush." Well, get out and spot and stalk!

I put the stands on travel routes between food and bedding, it may be in a small clearing or in the thickest stuff known to man but the deer want to be where they want to be so don’t try and reinvent the wheel. Feeders generally go some where in between but a little closer to the bedding area so you can get them to come by for a snack and the bucks tend to hit the feeders set up this way as well. Up here the bucks won’t come within a quarter mile of a feeder if we simply put one up in a location that’s convenient for us out in the open but some places that works. If your set ups are on known travel routes you can’t really go wrong in my opinion. Do your homework on patterning the deer and it will pay off in the long run.

I try to have the feeders and blinds on deer travel routes, but routes do change over time, so I have to adapt. My stand placement years ago actually caused a change (positive, for me) in deer movement. They went from feeder 1 to 2 and then to 3. A year or two I moved feeder 1, which changed their route and messed up my pattern. But, the new placement of feeder 1 is bringing in the does, and a few nice bucks. Took the one doe, and the bucks walk.

There is one thing of interest though. I’m having bucks eating corn at the feeders, which they have rarely done in the past.

leases i was on. Twas different kinda hunting than we're raised.
Legal tis legal. It was wooded & people had corn feeders, food plots.
Baiting - used ta lure game in. Biggest lease twas 1,200acers. Had hogs on it.
Roughly a dozen hunters, keep prices down.
Used a .45 Kentucky, climbed in a tree, with string ta pull rifle up. In an area natural funnel.
Hunted that way for years gun/archery. Whin did make my own stand. Used a tiller
ta put oats/food plot, kept it simple. Trimmed area as little as possible. Used pvc corn feeders.
As pappy once said : game animals learn ta pattern hunters.
Try keep as natural as possible. Think outside the box.
my apologies in advance.
Best wish's.

I likes to have a pen set up on an incline going away from me. Gate goes on the side.

Spend some time on the property, it will reveal where to set up pretty quick.

Teach a little more Hud. Does that allow you to shoot over the pen easier?

Where I'm at most stand/feeder combinations are level to each other in pretty open country so I account for that in the pen design.

I like to use two/three hog panels on the backside of the feeder. (opposite stand location)

And loosely string up three strands of barbed wire on the side facing the stand. (t-posts all around)

Although the cattle will sometimes push into the barbed wire a bit if I spill too much corn while filling the feeders it is enough that they've never tried to cross it.