Need advice from the experienced SL hunters...

[Caveman]

I have two extra stands to hang on state land now that my private land fell through this fall. The problem is I haven't scouted the state land I now have to hunt aside from what I've seen while squirrel hunting. I found a place where some thick pines and near perfect bedding area are separated from a corn field by about fifty yards of hardwoods. Also another place where the backside of that bedding area is within reach of an overgrown orchard.

On paper this set-up sounds pretty good except these two areas are some of the most accessible areas in the forest and I'm sure I'm not the only one who's found it.

So my question is should I set up here and hope for the best or sacrifice the first few days of bow season to expedited scouting and try to find somewhere a little more off the grid?

[Doc]

Something that you might want to try to take care of first would be to check with the landowner that has the adjoining corn field and try to get permission to track a wounded deer onto his property. It sounds like you are close enough so that you might need that. Also, you never know you might just obtain permission to hunt his property too.

As far as how to get educated on some new land (public or otherwise), how about a little of both? Try a morning stand for a few hours and then start wandering around learning a bit more about the rest of the state land. There's a good chance that you may locate a few another spots that may even be better.