Anyone who has ventured into the woods with gun or bow in hand has considered a strategy of hunting deer based around feeding preferences: natural, planted or dumped out on the ground. But have you ever considered a hunting strategy based on the scent of food?
Kyle Clark of Doc’s Deer Scents suggested that using food attractants definitely has its place.
“We have a series of food attractants. One is persimmon, one is acorn, one is vanilla-based; we call it a curiosity attractant,” he said. “Vanilla is good for deer but is also a proven bear attractant as well.”
Clark said the placement and use of food attractants has a lot of bearing on the hunter’s success, steering deer as opposed to caling them in like a flock of mallards out of a clear, blue sky.
“You’re not going to have all kinds of results using a persimmon attractant if you don’t have a persimmon tree within 50 miles of your stand,” he said. “When the acorns are falling, that’s an ideal time to use an acorn attractant. It’s best to use it as an enhancer to get the deer to come in and investigate your location.”
“I’ve seen guys who will fertilize oak trees all spring and summer because they swear those acorns are bigger and sweeter, and (that) the scent of them will actually draw deer away from other oak trees and bring them to the fertilized one,” Clark said. “It’s the same thing with food attractants. Use the food-attractant products to bring deer in to range.”
As for the application of food attractants, Clark said the general misconception is that hanging scent wicks are only for sexual attractants.
“I’ll use food attractants and curiosity attractants the same way that a lot of hunters use urine,” said Clark. “I’ll hang it from wicks. I’ll put three or four out in front of the stand as an effort to get them to smell something that’s a little sweeter or a little more pungent than the food they are seeking and (then) come over to investigate.”
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