Making Your Own Deer Lures and Scent Blockers

First Rule:

Make your clothes and equipment scent free.

Second Rule:

Always use deer lures and masking or cover scents in the field. No matter how clean your clothes and equipment deer will smell you if conditions are not just right.

Food Lures

Caution: In some states food deer lures could be construed to be bait and if hunting over bait is illegal you could be thusly charged. By making a tea of the food products and putting it out by sprayer or droplet dispensing bottle the food smell will still be attractive to the deer but not the local game warden. Grind the food with water in a food processor let it stand in the refrigerator for a few days then filter through a coffee filter. You can pour the concentrated decanted liquid in a into an ice tray and cover with foil or plastic wrap. Before going hunting take a couple of cubes and put into a dispenser with some more water. You may not be able to smell the food trail but the deer can.

• If there are fruit trees in the area you can collect apples, persimmons, peaches or pears. If there is no worry about possible bait laws you can eat them take pieces and drop them along the trail or place them at your desired shooting target site.
• Squeeze black or blue berries and drop them on the trail or make a tea..
• Collect acorns – peel and crush them up if they are a local food source. Peel the acorns you collected on your scouting trip and put them in the food processor and use the paste or powder in the same way as above.
• After getting to the stand but place the food scents and in such a way as to lead the deer out to a comfortable shooting distance from the stand. Do not put deer lures close around the stand or blind unless you just want to pet the animals as they will follow you up the ladder steps.

Odor Masking Agents (Cover Scents)

• Take some rubbed sage from the wife’s stores. When you get to your hunting area rub a little of the sage on your shoes, soles and all, and your lower pant legs. When you get to the blind or stand sprinkle some all around the stand. Sage is a natural plant growing in most forests in the U.S.
• You can do the same with cloves but you will have to finely grind the hard dried cloves in a coffee grinder.
• Sassafras root tea is another widespread natural aromatic scent source.
• All of these natural smelling items can be pureed with water and stored as a liquid for a short time to dissolve the odor chemicals in the water. Later you can filter the liquid through a coffee filter and put it in a spray or dispensing bottle. Save the strained solids, dry them and save in a plastic bag to put out in the field.
• If you use trail cameras or the TrailEyes Game Pager™ for scouting purposes do not forget to treat them the same as clothing and neutralize odors after each use and apply natural masking scents before setting out.

Conclusions

The ideal situation will be to use natural scents known to be in the area as cover  and deer lure scent agents. To assure this when you go on pre-hunt scouting trips look for sassafras trees, mint, cedar, pine, wild onion and etc. to harvest to make your cover scent teas.

In addition to the above natural deer lures and attractants Sex Based Deer Lures should be in your deer lure tool box. Don't forget about abating human scant in and on your clothes and equipment before the season starts.