This year was my first hunting deer. I am a long time shotgunner and since there are fewer and fewer pheasant and quail around these days I dedided to try something new. I did get a small buck by the way.

My problem is that while sitting on stand and waiting for deer I would occasionally catch a wif of Hoppe's benchrest and Rem-oil. I go to the trouble to minimise my own smell and here is my rifle stinking up the area. If I can smell the rifle I know the deer can, and from a lot longer distance.

Are there cleaning supplies that minimize the smell or am I doing something wrong in my cleaning regimine? I follow the procedures outlined on the bottle of Hoppe's Benchrest.

Chuck Graber

Why do you minimize your smell? I never do anything special regarding odor treatments. I just put on my clean clothes and hunt. I have had deer walk within a 5 feet of me while was was sitting on the ground next to a tree. This has even happened with deer coming from up wind. To me the scent blockers are just another gimmick to sell to the unwise and inexperienced plain and simple.

Besides how do you know that deer cannot smell you even with all you special precautions?

Kent

They can smell you, period. Unless you are downwind. However, no use in making it any worse than it is. I would suggest some light machine oil for the exterior and a fouled bore, which I prefer to hunt with anyway.

Kent,
I don't spend any more money on scent blockers, but I do use an unscented laundry detergent and no fabric softener. I use unscented deodorant, shampoo, and bar soap. All of these products are just what I buy at my local grocery store.

I shower every day and brush my teeth.

If the scenting conditions are right the deer will smell you when down wind.

Gatogordo,
I do shoot a fouled bore and still I smell the oil and the Hoppe's.

Chuck Graber

You won't eliminate your rifles scents but you can minimize by shooting a few more fouler shots a week or two weeks before you hunt. Toss the Hoppes, I use Butches, or CR10 followed up with Butches Gun Oil or CLP. Shoot a few foulers and you are ready. sure-shot

I never use scent blockers or anything similiar, I too just put on my clothes and hunt. Wether they could smell me or not, deer have walked up to me, as have coyotes, possums, racoons, and other various critters.

I have never thought about the oil or solvent on the gun. Don't anybody tell Realtree or they will be selling a new gun-scent blocker.
Good luck and good shooting

I dont think it matter if your gun stinks.
The only thing that realy matters are the human (or predator) smell.

It all boils down to if you have the wind in your favor. They don't smell you.

Most human scent comes from your mouth. Deer will smell you if they're down wind no matter what kind of cover up you use.

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JD

I would imagine that few deer in the lower 48 are not familiar with, and ignore the smell of oily machinery. tractors, cars, chain saws, 4 wheelers, etc. How often have you parked your truck on a two track and come back to find deer tracks going right by it? And their prints on top of the prints you made when you got out.

Wow! Just Amazing! It's been many years since I hunted big game in the lower 48, and when I read the first few threads, I thought, man o' man hunting has really gotten tough down there! Clothes washed in non-sent soap, keeping your rifle barrel dirty, gargling every morning with Listerine, changing your shorts before there was even a good set of skid marks in them! Geeze, a guy like me who likes a big bowl of beans for dinner, could go out the next day and inadvertenly distroy all chances of anyone within a 100 miles of even seeing a deer! Guess I better stay up here for the betterment of all.

Juneau,
Thanks for the laugh! Around Kansas, hunting on public land the deer get more than a little spooky a few days into the firearms season. I don't know that I have ever been busted by a deer who smelled me but I am trying to minimize my scent cone without spending a lot of money.

I generally have bought unscented products for myself because I don't particularly like perfumes and if I am going to use a cologne I don't want it fighting other scents. So unscented products are not something that I use especially for hunting.

Sure-shot,
I will look into Butches and CR-10. I already use CLP on my shotguns and love the stuff.

Thanks to all, and if there are any more comments I would be happy to have them.

Chuck Graber

I saw a product the other day that might solve your problem. Called camouf-oil (sp) it's an oil that smell like cedar.
Myself, I don't bother, just don't soak your gun in oil and solvents, a thin fim, means THIN film.

Chuck,

I think the others are right about the necessity of all those precautions, but here are some ideas, which perhaps could be of you interest.

Instead of gun grease you could use usual vaseline (the little yellow tin "Clover vaseline) and parafine oil for medical use from a chemistry (parafinum liquidum).

Getting rid of human odour is difficult, but you can reduce it by putting your freshly washed clothes into a plastic bag together with some fresh pine branches. Some old hunters here in Sweden had their hunting clothes hanging in the stable to change odour. But I�m not sure that you�re fond of smelling old cow and sow.

Fritz

I can't prove that minimizing your scent works, but it will boost your confidence which translates into more time on the stand. It seems to work for me. I use a silicon cloth to wipe off my rifle and powdered graphite on the bolt during hunting season. Everyone knows a deer's first line of defense is his nose. We have all had deer and other critters walk up and sit in our laps, but what keeps me up at nights is thinking about the ones I did not see because they were just too damn slick.

[This message has been edited by crowrifle (edited 02-05-2002).]

I don't personally do any of the non-scent stuff and I see plenty of bucks close up. I don't do anything to stink up the place either. Last year I took a nice 8 point with my rifle still smelling like tong oil from the last coat. What about the guys who sit in their stand chain smokeing cigarettes and still bag a buck?

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Endeavor to Persevere

Interesting topic. I did quite a bit of research on deer's olfactory senses and came up with some interesting stuff. Deer or any game animal will smell you at amazing distances, it's how they re-act that concerns us. It seems they can filter out the common, non alarming scents and zero in on the new, non recognized, and/or danger odors. They can either ignore,or go into "alert" or "alarm" modes and this dictates how they re-act. Also most of the alert and alarm scents are a learned process, being passed down thru teaching or trial and error. The predator scents are hard wired into their systems.
I think in many cases where a deer will walk up quite close while there is an obvious odor of say gun oil or boot treatment while ignoring human scent is because they do not recognize the gun oil etc. as being threatening, and quite possibly this overpowers the human scent or at least detracts from it.
They do not always bust out and run from every threatening scent either, otherwise they would spend all deer season at a dead gallop, nor do they always travel into the wind. Smoke does not seem to bother them, nor does farm equipment noises or deisel smells, this is a case of becoming accustomed and comfortable with them.

Strange and foreign scents or ones that are artificial or out of season or character with the local will alert and sometimes alarm deer, while common, non-threatening scents seem to almost relax them.

Everyone has conflicting stories and theories on deer re-acting to certain things at certain times, and that is what makes this such an intersting topic, deer are unpredictable in some cicumstances and seem to take great delight in confusing us.

Tom

Geez, some of us LIKE the smell of Hoppe's #9, Hoppe's Benchrest, Sweets 7.62, and Rem Oil...

My very personal and unscientific opinion of scent lokt clothes, hunter�s perfumes and other such snake oils is that they serve two purposes:

1. The get a lot of US hunters to part with their money

2. Provide a lot of entertainment to us cynics.

I�ll bet the deer just think �Hey, I can smell another hunter wearing a scent lokt suit covered in buck piss�
Keeping the wind in your face costs nothing.

Deerdog: You stated my opinion exactly.

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JD

LE270,
I also like the smell of Hoppe's solvents and Rem Oil, but on the deer stand I am looking for ways to NOT add scents to the area that I am hunting.

On the other hand if I can get close enough to the point where a pheasant or quail smells my double barrel smoothbore then I am just about ready to have a whole bunch of fun.

Deerdogs, and JD,
Like I said, I dont' spend money on scentlock or doe pee. Like you guys I am fairly cynical about their value. Still I know that If I can smell something that I am carrying then I know that the deer can smell it from quite a ways off. I try to stay downwind from where I expect the deer to be but you never can tell where they will show up.

Tom,
You are right that many scents will not automatically alarm a deer. In my case it is more a matter of confidence like Crowrifle said. A few precautions against smelling are to me the same as not making any more noise than necessary.

Human beings (even clean ones) do smell and in the woods will make some noise. I am just trying to minimise both, unless it is intentional.

Thanks again to all.

Chuck Graber

Congratulations on the buck. Very pungent oils are bad for your confidence so avoid them, apart from that forget about scent other than to keep downwind.