Trad Gang
Main Boards => PowWow => Topic started by: highlow on October 17, 2015, 11:20:00 AM
-
.....no stinkin' scent control. Just want to pass along an encounter this morning that just reinforces my skepticism about scent control. Had a fork horn come into my shooting range, 20 yards, directly down wind of my ladder stand. Not only that, he browsed for a couple of minutes exactly where I walked on my way to the stand. Had his nose right to the ground but never once indicated he knew anything was awry. Now I know some of you are going to say a year and a half old buck ain't the brightest bulb in the herd but I would have to think that even that young, human scent would have to be a red flag. He showed about two hours after I had passed that spot so there is the possibility my scent was gone. It was very windy to boot. Obviously I'll never know but still have to think this scent control/elimination crap is all a bunch of hooey. Just my opinion so I don't want you scent control advocates to jump all over me. :nono:
-
HMM interesting.. I have been wondering how much there is too it as well. Would love to hear more on the subj.
-
Should also have mentioned that all my hunting clothes, except for my safety harness and pack, were in the house all night, subject to all odors present in my house for that period of time. Boots were also in the house.
-
I've bowhunted deer for about 45 years and have used just about every scent control available today (with the exception of ozonics and hex suits). I have had very, varying results.
There are times that deer have seemed to wind me from UPWIND! I've also had some success washing my clothes in scent free detergent that have no UV brighteners, and spraying down my clothes with "scent killer". Have also had some success using vanilla extract.
My conclusion has been to take some precautions, but not to really depend on any. They killed lots of deer with archery equipment before all those products.
Good luck!
-
It's likely the wind currents were in your favour. There is nothing you can do to stop a deer from smelling you if the wind is in his favour. The scent you left on your trail was old and like a dog, they can tell. Last year I "blew" a shot on a nice buck from the ground, 15 yrds downwind of me. The air currents were going up though and that is the only reason I got that opportunity. Outside of a rutting buck or a fawn, I've never had a deer that could smell me stick around very long. With all that said.....I still wash my hunting clothes in baking soda and try to keep my "stink" to a minimum.
-
I believe the deer will do whatever it does and the next one may react differently. If that deer is used to smelling humans cutting thru the area, maybe it is not so caring about a two hours old scent.
Also, as alluded to above, sometimes our scent does not go exactly as we think. Breeze blowing that way, scent goes that way ? Maybe not, depending upon thermals and other things.
I used to take pieces of egg fly yarn ( fly tying buffs know that stuff) which floats almost any time, releasing them into the air at my stand and watch them float around... all over the place sometimes.
ChuckC
-
wind will scrub scent off the ground if its very windy, plus if thermals are rising deer can be downwind and not smell you as long as you haven't put your hands all over the low lying bushes etc.. have had many deer downwind when the sun is high and thermals are going up..toss some milkweed fluff out on a sunny day sometime and watch it ride the thermals up.
-
I think another factor is HOW MUCH DO YOU REALLY SMELL!? And I don't mean you're smelling abilities. I'm meaning your ability to stink. Are you a clean person are you well bathed. Does your house stink. Etc. I have friends that I can smell outside of a building and I'm on the inside. :biglaugh: and I know people with zero scent. (To a human of course) I don't whitetail deer hunt. And there are people out there with many hours of experience that will tell you different.
But years ago when I did deer hunt a lot. There would be deer literally all around me at times and we did hardy anything for scent control. Maybe cleaned our clothes in baking soda. And Jung them outside when it was nice. But hunting was just about going to the spot they were likely to be at. Sometimes they came from upwind. Sometimes downwind....
-
I have shot several deer that came in on my downwind side, while smoking either a pipe or cigar. One I was sitting on a nice soft badger dig on a steep hill side, catching some rays and enjoying a nice cup of hot Earl Grey and rather spendy cigar. A doe came down the hill straight into the wind sniffing. I carefully set my cigar down to avoid a possible grass fire, grabbed my very heavy longbow laid back and shot her at about 20 feet with the bow, arrow shelf down. Another time, the month that I hunted with a metal handled compound. Sneaking on an edge of sumac I saw the area dominant, he was heading towards me, so I skirted the ridge to get around him. I assumed that I spooked him. By that time my hand was freezing on the metal grip. so I hung the heavy machine on a branch sat down and packed my pipe with custom blend of latakia, virginia, baked burley and deer tongue tobacco. It was a damn cold morning and the smoke ran along the hill no higher than it left the pipe. I saw a better place to sit that was in full sun, I was cold. I heard a sniff and through the cedars came a nice 8 pointer sniffing as he approached, until he was only twenty-five feet away. I could not reach the hand freezing machine, when he went behind some cedars shrubs I moved to my bow and behind and upwind me stood the dominant. He saw me and moved back into the sumac sticks, the 8 that was straight downwind stepped fully around the cedars and not looking at me. That machine took a minimum of 3 seconds for me to get off a shot, the 8 pointer gave me 2 seconds at 15 feet. I could have killed either deer with any wood gripped trad bow that morning, the smell of my pipe or me had no effect on the deer, but my bare hand on that freezing metal gripped thing made a huge difference on my success possibilities.
On the other side of this, my buddy farmer was telling me how his from boots that smelled like hog poop was the perfect masking scent and no deer could tell where walked. An hour later a nice buck cutting across the disked field where he crossed with his rubber boots, stopped sniffed his foot print and bolted clear across open country until it was over the hill a half mile away. My buddy said,"Did you see that? Man I had that one wrong."
-
Individual deer are different from one another as are people. Some will tolerate a lot more than others. Chances are that very same deer might turn inside out the next time he crosses your path.
-
I would bet that if he would have been a 150" 10pt that he would not have stuck around 30 seconds! There is a huge difference between a mature buck and a dumb young buck.
Bisch
-
Good thing it wasn't an old wise doe, everything in the woods would have known you where there.
-
Everything you eat and drink give off scents that any animal can smell. You have to breath and that smells, you ride in your car/truck and that has smells, there is no getting away from it or stoping it from getting out.
The wind is your only friend, so use it and good luck.
-
young deer tend to put up with alot more scent most times
-
I you want and try to argue scent control is not needed that's your prerogative. You may not think it is needed but exactly how does it hurt you or your chances? It's not like scent control has to cost huge $$$. It's called scent control not "total scent elimination".
Your not arguing, I hope, that a deers nose is not hundreds times more sensitive than a humans. You have no idea how many deer winded you farther out or beyond your field of view that turned tail and left and you never even saw them. Also, yes that big old buck would not have stayed even 5 seconds.
Don't care or worry about scent control, You one crazy hunter! :jumper: Good Luck!
PS. There is several Natural ways of scent control also.
-
as izzy said every deer is different, i try not to stink when i go out but even with the best scent control i think a deer will still smell you if the conditions are right, the question is do you smell like a threat.
i would imagine a deer would have to way its options as far as what it smells. if its something it has had a negative encounter with it would probably turn and run but it cant expend energy running off every time it encounters a new or questionable smell.
i don't use a lot of scent control. scent free shower and deodorant that's about it. i have used a product called nose jammer recently and had some interesting results though.
-
"the question is do you smell like a threat?"
I think that is it in a nut shell.... Animals that have been hunted hard and either been shot at, or next to a deer that was shot is going to act differently than one that doesn't associate human scent with danger....
I've seen farmers go out and feed their live stock daily with deer & elk both not even spooked at all, and then watch a hunter approach the same group of animals and they go on high alert.....
I've also seen the same spooky deer i've hunted for weeks, relax and bed down in my yard a week after hunting season.... Tell me these critters aren't smart....
-
Originally posted by Kirkll:
Tell me these critters aren't smart....
OK...hey, Kirk... These critters aren't smart!
:knothead:
Hey...you said to tell you!!! :eek: :rolleyes: :jumper:
-
Originally posted by Bisch:
I would bet that if he would have been a 150" 10pt that he would not have stuck around 30 seconds! There is a huge difference between a mature buck and a dumb young buck.
Bisch
Just what I was thinking :thumbsup:
-
And they don't give a rip what your car or truck smells like, what you had for lunch or what soap you use. Deer smell YOU. You guys never had a fawn and doe come by and that dumb fawn just does it's thing and the doe comes unglued? Happens to me all the time. The 1 1/2 year old doe I killed a few weeks back didn't catch on I was trouble but the older doe she was with did. The young one died, the older one lived.
-
Every time I am in the woods...I always ponder how many deer have smelled me and skirted the other way outside of eyeshot.
Here's a link to a similar thread (http://tradgang.com/noncgi/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=146768#000000) ....about a recent article in Field & Stream that RE-tested a bunch of these products...that shows (again) no difference to the inferior dog nose when compared to doing nothing for scent control.
My Golden has found several bow hunters while we've been out bird/squirrel hunting...she'll get on a trail no different than game...away she goes, with me trying to keep up, until she is waggin' her tail next to some poor fellow or barking because she "tree'd" them. :wavey:
I keep a bell on her for this reason, to alert anyone of her presence long before they think about shooting.
-
I've had on rare occasions had young deer walk downwind of me or accross my trail and not spook but I've also had them spook like any ol' mossy horn. You can occasionally get away with murder with young deer...not so with the long nosed doe or mature buck.
-
Originally posted by Michael Arnette:
You can occasionally get away with murder with young deer...not so with the long nosed doe or mature buck.
Nothing harder to trick than a wise old doe. Those mature bucks drop their guard during the rut. Those old does are on guard 24/7.
-
I'm a new hunter and still haven't made my first kill let alone with trad gear. The first time I went scouting the property with the owner we were talking and a deer came out not 10 yards from us, looked at us and then slowly walked away. Lesson learned always have your bow when scouting. He is a dairy farmer and you can imagine how he smelt and I was working and had no scent control. The closest chance I've had to shoot a dear to date was while going out after work, no scent control again and I got within 20 yards but it was too dark and too many branches in the way for a clean shot. Still when I go out unless its after work I use scent control on my clothes and on my body. Do I think it works...kind of. I think the idea of using regular soap on you and your clothes and such isn't going to help but I don't think its that much of a detriment but then again I still have yet to make a kill so my opinion shouldn't count nearly as much as others on this site who have decades of experience.
-
Deer are very curious creatures. I've seen them 20 yards from me, apparantly brought in by the sounds and smells of an old fat guy running a chain saw. Other times when working at a Wilderness camp I would find them staring at the outhouse just as I left it early in the morning.
I'm guessing some "scent control" stuff makes them curious because I know for a fact dogs can smell drugs, weapons, bombs when floating in a water tight container located down inside a full gas tank of a vehicle. Deer can smell you and not even a full tank of gas can cover your scent.
My fellow deer hunters and I that train bird dogs have hosed down quail with different cover scents and it doesn't slow the dogs down for a second.
-
I think scent control is very important. I've watched too many deer react negatively to smelling me. Just because you had a deer downwind that did not become alert does not mean that scent control is not important. I've sat in trees and watched deer walk by unalarmed to my scent which was blowing directly at them. Upon further investigation I realized that due to warming thermals, must scent was rising in the air and blowing over their heads.
-
Originally posted by JohnV:
I think scent control is very important. I've watched too many deer react negatively to smelling me.
Scent "control" in the way that every single company markets it as, simply does not work. Never has, never will. Period. Deer will be able to smell you no matter what you spray on, shower in, wear or hang above your head.
Being cognizant of your scent cone and how it is traveling at any given moment, due to very local conditions, is what is important, works and is free, to boot.
The way that I think of it is that Deer can differentiate scents to a higher degree than we humans can differentiate color with our eyes. They don't just smell our clothing as "human" anymore than we see clothing as "clothing"...we see colors, patterns, shape, buttons, collars, zippers...and when we stop and study it we see thread, stitching, pockets, etc...very fine detail. Well, deer do that with smell...they smell the cloth, thread, buttons, metal zippers, detergent, baking soda, etc...and when they stop and snort and sniff, that's like us stopping to look closely at something, to get a better picture of what it is. They are trying to put all the pieces together and hopefully whatever they smell moves, so they can confirm there is something there.
-
Someone said this is not about scent elimination but scent control. :scared: then it is worth the effort and the expense in my book.
There might be a deer upwind that is heading my way but hears the deer downwind freaking out and decides not to come any closer. If that downwind deer doesn't make too much fuss maybe that upwind deer comes in for a shot. :archer2:
-
The sprays may make a difference to your nose, but they make absolutely zero difference to a deer's nose or their ability to smell you. When I smell scent control sprays, I smell chemicals and plastic...definitely not "less" scent, just different than before. Deer smell both scents just the same.
Local conditions will have much more of a factor on a deer's ability to get a whiff of you on any given day...warm and humid with a light breeze...they got you from 1/2 mile away, and your trail stays around for a long time. Cooler and dry and howling wind and the VOCs are gone a lot quicker.
Scent control and commercial camo patterns are some of the most successful hoodwinks ever conceived by marketing firms to separate you from your money.
-
I think that perhaps camo is more important when calling in spring turkeys than it is in the fall. I have shot as many deer without it as I have with it. I have become self conscious of my whitening beard, I am going ask my wife if it would okay if I get some of that 'just for men' beard stuff. I am predicting that I will be chasing pheasants and turkeys when there is snow on the ground and I hate having a cold chin. Remember that apple/musk stuff from the 60s? Now that crap smelled like hunting to me, so did the old string wax that had that fishy smell, so does a good cigar and a cup of stick fire tea warming in my brass cantine. Yes, I have shot deer while I had a stick fire going or a cigar or pipe smoldering, a favorable breeze is always a good thing.