For hunting clubs & leases
Members book the stand they want, scan the tag when they climb in, and the club knows where everyone is until they check out. The map works with no signal.
How it works
Back by Dark follows a member’s morning in four steps. Members use the iPhone app; club managers run the property from the web.
Step 01
Every stand shows the winds it hunts, how you get in to it, and whether anybody already holds it. Back by Dark checks today’s wind against the stand and says plainly when it is the wrong one.
Bookings are first come, first served and visible to the whole club — no group texts at 4 a.m.
Step 02
Each stand carries a printed QR tag. Scanning it checks you in and proves you are in the stand you booked, not the one eighty yards away.
If a tag is torn or iced over, type the code printed under it. Scanning works with no signal — the tag carries the stand’s id.
Step 03
While you are checked in, members of your club can see which stand you are in on Who’s Out. Check out and sharing stops in the same moment.
If you run late, Back by Dark asks whether you are all right, then flags you to the club managers, then shows them your emergency contact.
Step 04
Drop a sighting where it happened — a buck working the creek, turkeys on the power line, a tree down across the trail. The whole club sees it on the map.
Sightings fade on their own once they are stale. The next member past a hazard can mark it still there or cleared, and a broken ladder goes straight to the club’s upkeep list.
Features
Everything a club needs to share ground without guessing who is where — and nothing it does not.
Each stand records the winds it hunts. Back by Dark compares them with today’s wind and tells you which stands play it before you pick one.
Download the property before you go. The map, your stands and check-in work in a hollow with no bars, and everything syncs when you are back in range.
Scanning the tag confirms you are where you booked. Scan a different stand and the app says so — and offers to move you if that stand is free.
One list of who is checked in and where, visible to the members of your club and nobody else. It empties as people check out.
Thirty minutes late, the member is asked if they are all right. Forty-five, they are flagged to managers. An hour, the club sees their emergency contact.
Drop game, a blood trail, a blocked trail or a trespasser on the map where you saw it, with the direction it was moving and a photo if you have one.
Report a loose rung or a wasp nest and say how bad it is. It lands on the club’s upkeep list, and the app tells you what the report will do before you send it.
Switch between satellite imagery, USGS aerials and topographic contours to see the ground — ridges, creeks and field edges — the way you hunt it.
Club managers add and remove members from the web. Removal takes effect on the member’s next request, not whenever their session happens to expire.
Safety & privacy
A club needs to know where its members are while they are in the woods — and has no business knowing where they are the rest of the time.
Your position is shared with your club only once you have scanned in to a stand.
Checking out ends sharing in the same moment. Not a minute later, not on the drive home.
A position cannot be stored without an open check-in attached to it. The rule is in the database, not in a promise.
For club managers
The Back by Dark console is where a club is set up and kept running. Anything a manager changes there is on every member’s phone straight away.
Questions
Back by Dark is a stand booking and check-in app for hunting clubs. Members book a stand, check in by scanning a tag fixed to it, and share their position with their club only until they check out. Club managers set up the property, stands and members from a web console.
By scanning the QR tag on the stand with their phone. Scanning proves the member is in the stand they booked rather than one eighty yards away. If a tag is torn or iced over, the code printed under the QR can be typed instead.
Yes. Download the property before leaving the truck and the map, the stands and check-in all work with no bars. Anything done offline is saved on the phone and sends itself when the phone is back in range.
Only active members of your own club, and only between checking in and checking out. Not before, not after, and not when the app is closed. This is enforced by the server: it refuses to store a position from anyone who is not checked in, and checking out stops sharing in the same moment.
Back by Dark escalates on its own. Thirty minutes past their expected check-out, the member is asked if they are all right. At forty-five minutes they are flagged red for the club managers. At an hour, the emergency contact they gave is shown to the club — and not before.
Stands are booked first come, first served, and the booking is visible to everyone in the club. If a member scans a stand other than the one they booked, the app says so and offers to move them if the stand they are actually in is free.
No. Checking in needs the stand’s tag — scanned, or the long code printed under it. The stand’s short name code is never accepted, because that would let a member check in without walking to the stand.
A club manager signs in to the web console, draws the property, places each stand on the aerial map, prints a tag for every stand and adds the members. Members then sign in on their phones and see the same map.
The iPhone app is in App Store review now. The Android app is next. Club managers use the web console from any browser.
No. There is no advertising in Back by Dark, and member data — including location — is never sold or shared with advertisers.
Tell us your club’s name and roughly how many stands and members you have. We will help you draw the property, place your stands and print your tags.