Is a Map basically useless in really thick, flat land? I know a lot of woods in the Northeast are so thick that you can't really get a long distance bearing. Do any experienced navigators use a Map in really thick woods?
If a map is of evenly thick and virtually flat terrain with no lakes, streams, trails, roads or any other feature shown on the map that can be identified on the ground, then a map would be of little or no use to me. I've never used a map that did not have something of interest to me that l could ID when standing on it.
So yes, a map and compass can be useful in totally thick flat country and may be even more critical than in places where you can see some distance, depending on what you are doing. I usually do my map work at home, jot down heading(s) and unless I change plans while out there, seldom pull out the map while walking or hunting. When you need it you need it, however! So take it with you! I fold it to show the part of the map I'm on and put it in a Ziploc.
The single most critical factor is to know where you are on the map at your starting point. That is true whether thick and flat or on a mountain peak. I would assume that there is some kind of road/trail/stream/building/pond etc. at your starting point. I'd look at the map, pick out a place that you can identify when standing on it, and use that as a starting point. Done that many times. Showing exactly where I am may be the single most valuable info a GPS gives us.
Then you can travel a compass heading from that point, even if you can't see ten feet in front of you. The thicker it is the more carefully you need to navigate, and it can get tedious.
I have found it easier to walk a compass heading in super thick brush and timber with two people. The man with the compass sends the other man out ahead as far as he can go and still see some tiny bit of him, and has him move right or left till he is lined up on the direction you want to walk. Then he stays there till the compass man gets to him and they repeat.
Long before GPS my main hunting partner and I navigated to remote moose swamps found on a map, on a vast plateau of thick brushy timber, with only one trace of an old road or trail out on the edge somewhere. There is no sign of the swamps anywhere near the road. Again, it is absolutely critical to know your starting point precisely, and the thicker it is the more important to never wander off of a heading etc. Never lose track of exactly where you are or at least the heading to get back, until you are standing on another positively identified landmark.
My best moose spot is 67 degrees magnetic from a spot on a road that is a brushy tunnel miles long with no view nor breaks of any kind. The starting point is .6 miles from an ancient crossroads of now abandoned roads. 75 yards into the thick timber my cut trail starts. I never leave the road at exactly the same place and avoid making any tracks or sign of where I left the road. I never park at the same place nor close, except a few times when loading chunks of dissected moose a moose as quickly as possible.
Since getting my GPS I have lifted Google Earth coordinates of places I want to hunt that are way off trail, entered them in my GPS and used a compass to walk to them. The GPS is easier overall, but it can be done with map and compass, and I find it easier to actually walk a heading by compass rather than by GPS.
