Favorite scents

[Pupster]

I've have been snake bitten when it comes to using scent. I basically don't use it any more. But if I do I usually use tinks 69. But my typical experience ends up with a doe sounding the alarm with the annoying WWHHHEEW! about 50 times in a row. So what are some of your favorite set ups with scent? Pre-rut, rut, post rut? What brand?

P.S. What happened to the debate about students getting resident lisences? There were some good points being brought up in that topic. I'm guessing it must have gotten out of hand.

Pupster

 

[Rackaddict]

Pupster, If you can, get the real thing. I always take a clean plastic jar on hunts with me just in case I, or one of my hunting party, harvests a deer. You have to be careful when you take the bladder out not to get any blood in it and there are those times when there is not much to get but it is certainly worth the extra effort. Label the jars according to sex and age if it's a buck and the time of year you harvested. Freeze it and you will have fresh scent when you need it. Rubber gloves are worth the effort when you put out your scent cannister if that's what you use. Try it out, at least you will know that what you are using is "real" deer urine and not some contaminated blend of everything on four legs. The best part is it won't cost anything but a little time. * This year I am going to try to extract the urine using a very large syringe. Just a thought!

 

[M350]

GOOD QUESTION. FIRST OFF DONT TAKE THIS AS A SMART --- REPLY PLEASE, BUT FOR A TRUE BIG BUCK HUNTER NO SCENT IS THE BEST ADVISE I CAN GIVE TO ANYONE-- I MAKE A GOOD PART OF MY LIVING SELLING DEER SCENTS---BUT I ALSO SELL A TON OF SCENT KILL, A TON. THINK ABOUT IT FOR A WHILE, A MATURE KNOWS EVERY ELEMENT OF HIS HOME, AS DO YOU. WHEN YOU WALK INTO YOUR HOME AND SOMEONE IS WEARING PERFUME, YOUR FIRST ACTION IS TO LOOK AROUND AND BECOME AWARE OF SOME FORIEGN PRESENCE..NOW HAVE THAT SAME PERFUME THROWN AROUND FOR SEVERAL DAYS, WELL YOU SEE MY POINT. HEY, MATURE BUCKS ARE HARD ENOUGH TI FOOL WITHOUT PUTTING THEM ON FULL ALERT. JUST MY TWO " S C E N T ' S " WORTH OF INFO M350 OUT

 

[Pupster]

M350,
That is exactly what I do! For years I've mostly been an advocate of scent free, and just dabbled into the doe in estrous or buck in rut scents with little to no success. Although my friends have the scent lock suits and so forth, I use the old fashion baking soda bath for my clothes and leave them in a plastic bag full of oak leaves and dirt, followed by a liberal dose of scent away spray and to top it off, the fresh earth disc by H.S. on my cap. Every night I come home my wife thinks I smell like the garden. I just smile to myself and think it must be working. We all kind of dream about dragging the scent rag and having that big buck follow it right under the stand, and while he makes a scrape you stick him. I think it's mostly timing, the right buck at the right time. A while back I remember a few hunters claiming their own urine in a scrape seemed to work pretty good! Good idea Rackaddict as I'm in on about 10+- harvest recoveries a year, I could collect it from my friends harvests.
Pupster

 

[wisco kid]

I have to agree that less is more. Best bet is to "figure out the deer" and hunt him on his terms. To me, that is much easier to do than to "fool" him with some scent or lure. Sure, some guys get lucky, but to consistently do well on mature whitetails, I believe its best to disturb the woods as little as possible.

My one fear about using scents is that other, sloppy hunters in the area are using them without paying attention to the details - being scent free (including the use of rubber gloves), not paying attention to wind or other conditions, as well as presentation and therefore "educating" the mature bucks in the area to associate those scents with humans.

That's not to say scents won't work, but to me, I'd rather scout my buck and figure out where he's likely to be and when, then just be there when he gets there. That way, he's not "expecting" anything and is less likely to be looking around and on alert for another deer or hunter.