OK
I have always hunted on others land and thus never spent much time in the woods other than invites, or during our hunts in der season.

I have noticed this yr....
On my own place ----------
I have kept cams up on my feeders since feb.
Buddies and I make about 1 trip a month.
We take ATVs , fill feeders, drink beer, haul balls around on ATVS, fish, hoot holler , you name it.
On a pice of land that is less than 70 acres.

now i always set up my cameras on SUN morning before we head out to go home.
when I return the next month - I always look to see how long it takes for the deer to come back to the feeders.
THEY ARE ALWAYS at the feeders between 7:00 an 7:20 literally waiting for the feeders to throw the nextg morning (MONDAY)

no matter how much ruckus we make or how many times we flush the deer or yrlings when we first get there.

So - I am not for sure how much this would truley help.....

Input ?

Well I guess it depends, you hunting for meat or a big mature buck?

last year, I had my camo clothes on, bathed with no scent soap, sprayed on scent killer, got to my stand 2 hrs before daylite, didnt shoot anything

my brother got to his stand about daylite wearing ralph lauren clothes and shot 3 deer in 2 days

now , go figure

i have shot nearly all my deer roughing it!!! 6 by 8 stand with heater going, coffee in hand with a cigarette. biggest 148

i think its a large difference for bowhunters or rifle hunters....

getsum, u are proving something i completely agree with. when we go hog hunting, we might come up on a koon or something real close to some deer. well next thing u know its like the fourth of july with guns goin off shootin at the coon. then we turn the spotlight to the deer, and they just kinda look at us.... most of em could care less whats goin on.....

If anyone here believes that disturbing the woods and the deer, and leaving scent everywhere is not somehow affecting the deer then you are kidding yourselfs!

You should always keep activity to a minimum!

X2

Deer on our lease are not bothered by vehicles.they are used to it.with the rancher is always out checking on cows.The onlythig i'll use is tinks 69 during prerut.
Now when it comes to turkey hunting,of course stealth and concealment is the key.

I totaly believe this to be true , at least for the real mature bucks .

try bowhunting! even being covered in scent killer and scent killer soap. Those deer will almost always smell you if they get down wind.

Okay, here's my two cents.

You can't compare deer behavior inside and outside hunting season. There's a very good reason why 90% of the harvest occurs during the first two weekends of the season. Hunters are catching deer in their non-pressured patterns. The same deer that might look at you for 30 minutes while feeding at a feeder in July, will all but disappear three weeks into the season. I'm always amused when I hear hunters in East Texas say the deer have "disappeared" three or four weeks into the season. They're still there no doubt. They have just caught on that you're after them. IMO, that's when it's time to get off the ATV and walk more, while also taking time off to hunt in the middle of the week. I believe the most mature bucks can tell when the woods are more quiet and will move more as a result.

Of course, deer behavior during the rut is another period in itself. ANYTHING is possible during the rut when sex-crazed bucks have just one thing on their minds. The same buck that snorts at you before running off, might come right back chasing a doe ten minutes later, jumping over your ATV in the process.

All that being said, we have two things working in our favor in most parts of Texas. Gun season opens around the same time as the rut, and the deer are still in their un-pressured patterns. Little wonder it often sounds like the beginning of WWIII on Opening Day. And how much more likely will it be that way this coming season, when does will be legal on Opening Day in many East Texas counties.

keep activity to a minimum is true it really gets to me when some of the A.D.D. having client take it apon them selves to go out and drive around to "SEE SOME DEER" rather than sit in a stand.

How ever i think the sent lock,carbon sprays and other stuff is just marketing gimicks aimed at bow hunters.

yeah i do think a lot of the scent lock and carbon sprays are a big gimick but i do know that Scent Killer does work!

As long as you stay out of the campfire, make sure ur clothes dont stink, and put ur boots on in the field: you should be fine.

I have seen big bucks walk up to the trail that i walk in on, and run off as soon as they smell my boots

and for those ADD hunters! if you want to get out and see some deer, go get a bike! ive ridden my bike around our lease a lot and it doesnt seem to affect the deer as much as a truck would

X2

Also, deer are smart enough to know when you are there and when you are not! If you were riding around and having a 'blast' the night before, your scent sure as heck is not still hanging around the next morning anyway.........unless you are allergic to the shower or bath that is!

This largely depends on how and where you hunt. The hunting practices used here require a large amount of time on the hunting site. Plus, with ability to feed where you shoot, makes a large difference, if it smells man and also gets food..well it doesn't make the connection of danger like it would else where.

When you hunt in a place where you can't get a shot further than fifty yards, but maybe once in a lifetime you have to make sure that your scent is handled. Also, in other places, you have to be in their lands and can only be there during certain times. So, if you smell like Axe or OldSplice, you won't see a deer at all.

It's all bout where and how you hunt, if they are used to your smell and see food when they see it, they are less likely to skedaddle. Here I probably wouldn't worry about it as much as other places.

Maybe your not living right or your bother is just lucky playing the wind. Scent matters I asure you. Sometimes there just up wind and then it dont. But if you hunt long enough you will loose the opertunitiy on a nice animal because he winded you. I promise.The bigger bucks will seek out less humane active areas sure you might catch one chasing a hot doe in your yard but post rut you better play the wind right.

Yes I will agree that the scent neutralizers work and I have been using them for years as a way to cut down on odor; be it camp fire, diesel,bacon or what ever.

But the carbon stuff I believe is gimick MOSTLEY if you are one of the guys that totes it to the woods in a cooler and changes there (I was one for years) then more power to yah. But at the same time I have seen guys go to all that trouble then dip snuff in a tree stand and spit the ground.

The wind is your friend if you use it correctly. If you want to shoot 2.5 year old noodle horns stink it up, if you want to shoot deer smart enough to get big you might want to leave a smaller enviromental foot print. Having said this during rut all bets are off. If his nose is in a does rear you can ust about do anything and he won't care.

yeah but if he is cruising looking for does, all of his senses are elevated. Some days he might smell you and blow out of the area others he may not care. I'm not gonna gamble by not watching the wind and minimizing my scent when it is easy to do it.

well said, nothing sucks more than having a buck or doe wind you and then the whole forest knows somthing is up. man thats a bad feeling sitting in a blind. also thos darn squirrls and crows piss me off also when the see me and start to hollar to all the other animals

we continue to drive out and pour out corn for some of our critters.......and they always come out to greet us. I could take off running across the field with a bag of corn and it would look like I was about to get attacked by a mob of angry deer.

way to many variables to say deer don't get scared by these things. some do, some don't. but, if ur tryin to keep your chances as high as possible, or if your hunting one perticular buck, truth is he can and may be run off by these acts. if he dosent get run off, he may limit his daytime movement or movement in total. i've worked on ranches where i didn't hunt due to them being leased out. so, i'd be there all week seein deer around my house, in the pasture, etc. come friday when the hunters showed up and started making racket there was a noticable decline in deer activity. now, they didnt stop moving totally, but it was easy to see the difference. this was a 4800 acre ranch too, and it only happened during deer season. so yeah, i'd hold it down abit

I believe to a certain extent scent control can work. But it won't work magic. You can't ever ignore the wind.

Now I do spray down with scent killer when bow hunting (stand). I'm just too close to ignore it. But when rifle hunting, my stands are set up to take advantage of prevailing winds (as are my bow stands), but they're typically much more removed from the animals themselves. So a little more leniency is allowed here I think. I'm known to sit in a stand and enjoy a cup of coffee, and even a smoke or two. I just try not to go crazy with it.


Jay