Find you way with a GPS!!!
I know there are lots of people out there that would love to hunt in different spots on the globe. The problem is that most of us don't have a lot of time off to scout and hunt. What we will do is spend a lot of money to pay a guide to hunt in different places. Hiring a guide may provide you with the hunt of a lifetime. If you can't spend the time scouting and hunting this may be the best way go. However, if you are only a couple of hours away you would be able to hunt on the weekend and still not miss any work. After using the map service that we talked about in the last article, you may choose some spots where you want to hunt. This is where a GPS can be helpful.
A Global Positioning Satellite system (GPS) is a hand held device that is used to find where you are on the planet. The hand held device receives transmissions from an overhead satellite and uses trigonometry to find the exact spot where you are. With this information the GPS can show you where you are and how far you are away from where you want to be. A GPS can get you to five feet away from a target.
GPS has been available to the public for about 14 years but in that time it has become a tool that over half of all hunters use. Like most devices that are available to hunters there are many different kinds on the market. All of them have many different options but there are some basic option that they all share. First, they all need a clear view of the sky in order to get the signal from the satellites. For a GPS to be able to tell you where you are it needs to see at least five satellites. The more satellites that the GPS receives a signal from, the more accurate the unit will be.
A GPS has some limitations. The biggest is that the antenna doesn't receive good signals within a building. Using a GPS in the woods, the leaves and branches can interfere and degrade the signals that the unit is receiving. Other limitations are that the GPS runs on batteries that will go dead so you must always carry spare batteries. Having a map and compass as a backup in case the GPS gets lost or broken is a no brainier. Whenever using a device like this you should know how your specific unit works. GPS manufacturers suggest that you practice with the device before you go into woods so you will know how to use it and not get lost.
The way that the GPS works is that each channel will receive a signal from one satellite. Standing at any one spot on the globe a GPS receiver can receive a signal from as many as 8 satellites. There is a total of 23 satellites that are orbiting our planet. Twenty of them are working satellites and three are spares. The satellites are owned by the Untied States Department of Defense (DOD). This service was made available to everyone on the globe for free. The DOD does not allow non-military employees to have the same accuracy that they use to defend the USA. In most cases the GPS will only get you within five to twenty feet away from your target.
Now that we know how the GPS works we need to
know how to
use it. There are two ways to find your way to a spot in the
woods.
The first way to get to a spot is to use a "Way Point". A Way Point is a
spot that you have already entered into the GPS unit by marking the spot where
you were standing.
To get to that spot you would tell the GPS unit to "go to" the Way Point.
The other way is to enter the longitude and latitude address in
the unit which will point to it and tell you how far you are away from the spot.
I have been talking to hunters that have said that a GPS is more trouble than it is worth. I feel the reason for this is that these hunters don't understand how to use the unit. A GPS is not like a compass. When you turn around the GPS will not react to this movement. When you have a compass in your hand you just have to turn and the arrow will point to north. With a GPS you have to move a few feet to get the arrow to change the direction it is pointing to. The reason is that the GPS has to take into consideration not only where you are going but where you are now.
Now that we know the basics we have to talk about the use of the GPS. You can't just turn on the unit and off you go. The GPS has to find the satellites which can take five or ten minutes with an open sky. What I do is turn on the unit and put it on the dashboard of my truck ten minutes before I get to the hunting spot.
After you get the unit so it knows where you are, now you have to tell it where you want to go. The only thing you have to do is enter the "Way Point" or the coordinates into the unit. It will tell you how far you are away from the spot. The unit will also tell you how fast you are going. One thing you have to remember is that the unit doesn't take into consideration altitude. If you have a mountain between you and the spot you are going to, be aware of this because the unit walk you over the mountain instead of around it.
A GPS unit will give you the chance to hunt new spots and make your scouting more effective. The key is to know how to use the GPS with the maps on the internet. I have always felt that this unit can help any hunter out there.
Good Luck
