Does anyone who likes to make a couple Moc scrapes have a favorite, or go to scent for in the drippers? Been sticking with the active scrape that comes with. I usually put out 2 a year and have mixed results. On camera, some deer will seem interested, some small bucks might re-work a scrape, but some deer will run from them. Just wondering if anyone has great results with something else.
I just use a straight deer scent to get them curious and then let them work them and keep them active. Not every mock scrape will work. Some get hit hard and another won’t get touched. But evercalm is my go to scent to get it started.
I use the drippers with Active scrape… all the years I have been doing it I have only shot 1 buck with my bow that was coming to work the mock scrape.
That being said.. I have had thousands of trail camera pics over the years of the bucks using it at night. Which is why I keep using them.
When you have 2-3 drippers.. 5oz. of active scrape every 2 weeks at $15 a pop…. adds up if you do it during OCT and NOV… thus I am going away from it. because I rarely see any positive impact on my hunting situations.. just great photos at night.
Wind Pro is a great Minnesota based product. Works great and its 100% synthetic (which is completely legal). I prefer not to douse my land with deer farm urine…
Only legal outside of the cwd zone 603, if hunting in that zone its still illegal, synthetic or not. That’s the way I read the regs anyway, I maybe wrong.
Man, this topic takes me back in time. lol
I once shot a buck that was on a huge scrape, complete with a licking branch and everything else they like. When the arrow hit him he was all hunched up taking a leak and running the urine down his back legs and over the tarsal glands where it then ran onto the scrape. I’d seen this buck do this on three previous occasions but his posture prevented a decent shot on those. On those occasions he’d work the mud up and just rip in that scrape. On more than one occasion I saw other, lesser, bucks come into that same scrape and do the same thing. That got me wondering as I did the field dress on my buck.
I cut those tarsal glands off the back legs and wrapped them in a plastic bag and stuck them in the pack. About three days later I made slits in them and hung them at about face level on that licking branch and told a buddy to sit there at the stand for a couple days. An hour into his first sit a nice buck came along and was sniffing the scrape, then he focused on the branch and apparently found those tarsals. My buddy said that the buck went ape over the glands and started to attack the tree. A short was made and that buck was freezer bound too.
I know that in at least one case, this one, scenting might play a big part in getting deer on scrapes. This was 100% natural scenting. I have no experience with artificial scents or other “natural” scents as I seldom used them for archery hunting and still won’t use them in my muzzy hunting during the regular season. I’ve just never wanted to draw the attention of the deer to something they didn’t put there themselves. Still, this case may have merit to those who are scent users and want to try something different.
BF RUT
I’m heading out tomorrow to freshen my drippers. Gonna put some evercalm rutting buck on the licking branch also. I have 3 out in spots that get a natural scrape every year for as long as I can remember. We’ll see what the cameras say.
Not much happening under the drippers. A few does each, and one four pointer that was at 2 of the 3. Did find 4 fresh scrapes 50 yards apart down a mowed path along a tree line.
I’m sure most of you are making sure you have as little scent of your own left at these dripper sights but I always preferred to leave scrapes and scrape lines alone. If I was curious about traffic on a line I’d always stay well off the line to take a peek. Buck deer have an amazing ability to “sense” if people have been there and probably even more so than if other deer have been along the line. Bear are the same way.
Anything put there that is not absolutely natural can move deer off a line….and by natural I mean fresh from the critter within a day or two or three. How many bottled products can assure that? The glands located between the two sides of the hooves tell a deer which other deer have been there. This component is not in the bottled stuff.
Jeff Schomaker alludes to using the straight bottled scent to get their curiosity going and more than anything I feel that that’s about all one can expect from bottled products and generally will be a doe thing. Bring the does, the bucks will come along in time if you let the does do their natural thing and stay off the scrapes yourself so a buck doesn’t sense your being there.
Sktrwx2100 mentions bucks going nocturnal on scrapes where scents are being actively manipulated with bottled products. I can absolutely see that in areas where deer density numbers are high along with hunter numbers. The same thing can happen if one puts out an attractant compound…. the salt/mineral/sugar stuff that’s supposed to drive deer batty. 95% of the time this stuff is put out where the hunter can observe it. Deer can sense that vulnerability.
Advertising is developed to lure potential buyers and in the case of deer scents and deer hunters it apparently works real well, only iffy with deer.
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