Not at all. I use my mocks to conditions bucks year after year as they age.. Once a buck hits that 2.5 year old mark out here int he bigwoods, he settles into a pretty consistent core area which he moves around in throughout the varying season's with the native feeds, but still stays in the area.. I try to target areas that hold doe family groups year around and are overlapping with big buck core areas. These seem to provide the most and consistent activity. Feed is always crucial though, feed needs to be in the general area or many of my scrapes end up being only productive during the scraping phase of the rut..which is fine but I like a scrape that will produce results 4 and 5 months out of the year.. especially from Sept-Dec when I can hunt them. You are never to late to start a mock scrape imo.. Prep that licking branching for visual asthetics as much as scent. You are both attracting by scent and visual here. Whitetails notice a licking branch that looks well used. Good luck, I will jump over and check out your thread ...just really busy here ... haven't been caught up much online..
This is the first year that I made up some mock scrapes. First I just scraped away leaves and snaped some licking branchs. no juice one visit. I peed In one satilite scrape many visits made scrapes with day time dripper lots of little guys last night started noticing bigger bucks140 plus stepped out but was at40 plus yards. for the first time using mock scrapes I think I'm getting a little succus. I hope I'm doing this right.
This will be my first year hunting with a bow...I have alot to learn about hunting the scrape which I'm addicted to...LOL I've been in the process of walking 60 acres down I have access to hunt. I'm getting started a little late but this is going to become an all year event on into hunting season next year. To start off with the 60 acres has big clear cut and wooded areas also. I have found some really nice cover areas (with no traffic that I can see) is it possible to start feeding that area to bring in the deer? Well thay come to the sweet feed? And how far away should I put my mock scrapes away from the feeding area. This sight will not be hunted this year but would like to hunt it next year if I can get the deer to show up.
This was shot about a week after this pic. He went north of the 200# mark. This guy will be good in a few years. I like his go getum attitude. I will make another scrape in a few weeks after finals to see what survivors show up.
Over scrape question...Cyote poo???? I placed a dripper over an active scrape about a week ago. Today I went out to see if it had been visited recently and found poo right on the scrape. Not deer poo though!!! At first I thought it was dog dukie, but on closer examination there was a ton of hair in it. So, I am thinking maybe it was a cyote or some other predator. Has anyone experienced such an event? Would a predator deficate in a scrape? If so I would imagine this would completely turn the buck off.....right? Thanks, Joe
I think when it's all said and done... if you scout, find the sign, and "HUNT"... you 'll do just fine. All this bull**** mock scrape and stinking up the woods is just do do as far as I'm concerned. You're stinking up a woods of natural smells with artificial things that are not natural. If you hunt the sign... you'll find the deer. IF a deer can smell me from a half mile away... he damn sure knows the difference between cow pee and fresh girl in heat. People put mock scrapes all over the woods and when a deer wanders through on his daily routine.... they declare the MOCK SCRAPE GOT HIM. Folks.... 95 percent of the time he'd have been passing buy anyway if you did your scouting. How many do you think we scare away with artificial stuff. I know from watching all the videos that more are scared away giving a Maaaaaaaaahhhhh to stop a deer. Better off to just take the shot at a slow walking deer. I DO NOT believe in mock scrapes. Big deer are killed where big deer live... period. Big deer don't die because I sprayed some perfume on the ground or a tree. Give me a stinky free atmosphere over a fake scrape any day. I don't want the deer to know I've been there.
For anyone interested in mock scrapes, I just recently shot a special segment for our latest Nextbuk Outdoors video, "Farm Country Bucks" ... on my approach to Mock Scrapes and using Buck Fever Synthetics. You can like us on FB get week to week details of what we are doing in the deer woods @ https://www.facebook.com/nextbuck not to mention order our instructional whitetail bowhunting videos.
That was a nice read, I will definitely be trying that out this season. Hopefully that will up my odds of getting mr. big
THIS WAS AMAZING, answered all my questions on mock scrapes except one, do you put your test scrape by a scrape you saw last year or on a scrape line or in a spot where you think there is a buck
killed this buck Aug 30th, 4 years of trail cams at a BF scrape.. When I shot him the other day, he ducked under my dripper and ran through the scrape.. pretty neat conditioning him to this spot all these years as he grew up.. I included a couple trail cams of him from years past.. he was 6 yr old this year
Shed , I'm going to do some hunting with scrapes this year I just purcased a few bottle of Buck fever synthetics. Thanks
Definitely glad I found this thread!! What an amazing read! Thanks a ton for such an informative and helpful write up shed. Truly an awesome thread!!!
