Deer scent?

[SCREWLOOSE]

I don’t know squat about deer attractants.

But deer repellents.... That I have decades of experience with. The best repellent for me is a deer tag....

 

[bearclaw]

Pour a few splashes of gasoline on the ground in a sandy or muddy area with open dirt and come back the next day, it will be crawling with deer tracks. They are inquisitive critters.

There are literally hundreds of examples where deer will paw and lick at human piss on the ground, and those are whitetails. I would personally rather piss in my own eye than sit somewhere trying to lure anything to me.

 

[mjb]

Back east we would piss in the scrapes or right off the deer stand....if the wind was right of course.

 

[Bigolwiggler]

I would consider myself a "fairly" consistent buck hunter . Yea , I used a scent or two that I got as a stocking stuffer from a person trying to buy me something nice.
Here is my opinion for what its worth . Maybe not worth nuthin.

Generally I don't use 'em . Scents. You can buy every gimmick in the book but unless you use good hunting tactics, I don't care what you do , you wont be consistent . Here is what I do though as far as scent stuff is concerned..... and its cheap .

On every buck I kill , I cut out the scent glands from the rear legs . Right at the inside of the rear leg elbow. You will see them and SMELL them . They look like a ruffled piece of fur and they are AROMATIC. Some say they stink but I really like the smell. They smell super "bucky" .They smell sweet to me. They get me kinda fired up .
I cut that 2 inch pad out and save em every time .
If I have another tag to fill , I put them on my boots immediately ( Pic attached ) If not , I put them in a zip lock and save them in the freezer for the following season to attach to my boot lacing right before opening day .
Deer noses are EXTREMELY sensitive . I have watched does and bucks follow my walking trail right to me with their noses on the ground. . Maybe they followed that scent trail ? I don't know for sure .
I hit those scent glands on my boots with water before each hike to re-hydrate them so they leave a juicy trail where-ever I walk.

I don't buy that bottled stuff . It costs money and the glands are free .... save em from every buck you kill. .

Number two . I get sweaty and I stink after a day of hunting . So do you .... sorry to say . I wash my clothes each day if I can and use scentless soap to clean my own stanky carcass. Wash and dry the clothes in plain creek water if possible each day . Dry them in the sun . If you cant , I take pine needles and mash them into my clothes. Pine needles are strong smelling and I think they do a good job of masking scent .

Never use scented detergent to wash hunting clothes and never use those stupid scented drier pad with your clothes in the drier. EVER.
Us dudes gets stinky when hunting . Wash and scrub in the creek . wash and scrub your clothes in the creek . Even with all of this you will never mask all of the smell. We just stink , we are carnevores , we smell like meat eater . We scare deer with that smell. We smell like meat eaters.

Wind direction detection is you main offence. Always know what the wind is doing . Tune your senses to that . Move when you need to . Descent binocs are your best weapon and wind direction , Then a rifle that is properly sighted in .... on a good steady rest . Works for me most seasons. Hey , I eat tag soup to sometimes.

I will try to attach my boot pic from last season and some racks from B zone . These racks don't include my indoor buck mounts and horns that I have cut up for decorative projects and such things.

I hope that someone can glean a few scraps of info from what I have learned over a lot of years. I don't buy many of what I consider gimmics. Just my opinion(s) here . May not work for you ........... but I hope it does.

BOW

 

[Bigolwiggler]

I could give a couple more hints if anyone cares to listen ... bout sneakin and things like that . .... basic stuff .....more came to mind after I posted may last stuff.... I have learned the hard way most of the time and sometimes I get too long winded. I have also learned good stuff from some good dudes. Way too often I have to re-learn old lessons . That is what happens when you get over 50 years old. Enjoy your youth and DONT try to think that you know it all ....you DONT !! I don't either ...... still !

BOW

 

[hatchet1]

I hate deer hunting.

 

[mjb]

Big, your on the money but I try to keep this type of stuff off the web. Some need to achieve hunting etiquette before they are given this knowledge.

If you like the smell of the tarsal....your welcome in my deer camp any day!

 

[Bigolwiggler]

I hate this site ! But I am glad that you guys have tolerated all of my bad grammar and mis-spellings ..... Sometimes I write too fast and just hit "send" without spell checks and stuff. I think that you get the gist of my conversations though . Im just an ol country boy .....aint had too much edumacation . I hate this site .....too much of that edumacation has ruin't some of you . ; )

Alls I know is I like the smell of them tarsals. I kinda chew on them when no one is a lookin'.

BOW

 

[TheGDog]

BOW... I'm curious... wouldn't you have problems like crazy with Flies and Yellow Jackets wanting to hound you all day with those cut-out glands attached to your boots? Not to mention ants wanting to crawl up your feet when on a set? Man... I'd have Yellow Jackets on me in a Hot minute where I go.

Hrmm... come to think about it, might be a little *interesting* what may come visit you in the night too with that scent around, Eek!

 

[Bigolwiggler]

Well G-dog. I have never noticed any vermin crawling onto my boots at all. Its probably a natural repelent to bugs ?? I generally don't worry about bugs . Occasionally when I set up for turkey I will lean up against a tree that comes alive with piss ants as soon as the sun comes up . That's no fun but I am not wearing scent glands on my boots then .
I do have yellow jackets here that show up when I start skinning a buck almost always. . But me killing a buck is so rare that I just kind of work through it when I have to . Between me and the wife we might only have to deal with that 2-3 times a year . ; )

But back to the scent glands on our boots . Never seen bugs attracted to them.

I do have a little story about them . Two seasons ago my beautiful wife and I hiked up into the Trinity Alps . A friend of mine followed up later in the morning with his wife and some mules packing our camp stuff AND their dog . The dog is a Jack Russell named Grizz . I love that little dude. Well, when they all arrived at the deer camp we were setting up for our tent and kitchen. 'ol Grizz comes running up to say hi to me like he always does. . Immediately he latches onto one of those scent glands that are attached to my boots. I didn't pay it much mind for a while , but after about five minutes of dragging him around and tripping over him I decided that was about enough. He wasn't going to let go ! I tried to open its jaws but Grizz wouldn't let go . Then I started thinking about a time when a Jack Russell jumped up and snapped my pecker when I was taking an outside camp shower ! That is a TRUE story ! That really smarted !!! I decided I better be a little more careful. I didn't want any kind of ending like that again so I asked my mule buddy Lyle how to get him off of my boot. Between the both of us we opened his jaws and got him off of my boot . I kept dancing a jig in camp to keep Grizz away until they walked their mules and horses out of camp .
I still love Grizz ..... mostly for his tenacity. Don't let a Jack Russell near your junk though !

Don't be scared to put the glands on your boots. They may "not" work ....but they just "might" work in certain situations. I don't know. They can't hurt right ? Its what deer smell out in the woods. I just know that they smell good me so I will keep doing it . And .... they are pretty cheap. I leave all that other stuff on the shelf at the store. Hunting is expensive enough without all of the gadgets and snake oil.

BOW

 

[mjb]

Grizz on your pecker....

You can't just leave that without the story

I use the gland for training Slick my Jagd to run bucks only

 

[TonyS]

Whitetails (where they get the scent from) and Mulies I believe are completely different species.

Kinda like putting out turkeys scent for quail. Something wrong in this picture.

 

[Bigolwiggler]

I have to say , Whitetail and western bucks are very different . Scents might be much more effective on WT ??
I hunted whitetail this year and they act very different than Mulies and Black tail . That was a whole different game for me. So.... again .... I cant speak for scents on WT at all .

As far as Jack Russels nipping at your stuff ? I won't elaborate too much .....its just not a pleasant thing . Use your imagination. All that I will say is that he didn't have to jump very high on me ; )

BOW

 

[mjb]

So, you were peeing on him?

Or, did you get caught with your hand in the cookie jar.....so to speak

WT are very spooky and they do pattern well. During the rut you can bring them in when things are right but most of it is sit in a stand & wait......I did that far way too many times...no more
Just pee in a scrap you made off a hot trail if their are rutting bucks worked for me in GA

 

[Bigolwiggler]

Well mjb , if I must tell. .....

I used to have great fun with this Jack Russell and a garden hose. As soon as the hose was turned on , this dog went manic ! He would VICIUSLY snap at the water stream coming out of the hose . You could hear his teeth snapping together like a steel trap . If he was able to capture the end of the hose , he would jerk violently , like a shark trying to tear off a hunk of meat. He would play like this for hours if I let him. It was kind of fun.

Well, here I was in the outside shower and I figured no harm if the dog was catching a little shower at my feet . I went to rinse the shampoo out of my hair . I guess the water was running down the front of me just right and there apparently was a stream of water running off of my junk . So what does the dog do ? Just what he always did, jump up and clamp onto the end of the "hose" .

That is about as descriptive as Im going to get . I think you get the idea. It was an eye opening situation and I got plenty of shampoo in my eyes right then ! It was a bad situation on many levels.

Don't ask for pictures. There will be none . I could have probably retired from a video gone "viral" though.

There were no hands in the cookie jar ..... lol.

BOW

 

[TheGDog]

You have to look... but they do have Mule Deer specific Estrus.

And even more fun? They sell Skunk cover scent! Man that isht is powerful!!! Person could do some devious stuff with that. For that reason alone always good to keep around.

"Wasn't me. Skunk must like your car though! did you leave food in it or somethin'?"