Deer urine attractants can be some of the best tools for improving your hunting experience, but if you don’t know how to use them properly or how urine attractants work, you’re just pouring stink everywhere. The key to creating the perfect attraction for deer is to tell a story with them. Find out what deer urine you should be using during each hunting season and how to fool curious deer with attractants. Plus, a few hunting and deer urine usage tips from the experts!
Why Deer Urine Attractants Work
Before you lay down your first “deer story,” you need to understand how deer read different signs and signals. For now, we will cover the basics. We will have an entire post dedicated to the senses of deer in two weeks, so keep a lookout!
A deer’s sense of smell is the most powerful sense they have. Deer use their noses for breeding, finding food, and looking out for predators. Plus, deer are curious creatures when it comes to new smells. Using different musks, attractants, and odd odors will pull in a few curious critters.
However, deer are smarter than you think. Setting up a decoy and dripping some deer urine is not going to cause deer to flock to your location no matter what. No, you are going to have to make sure your story is believable to the deer you are trying to attract.
Make sure the area you are setting up is a place where deer are likely to travel. If you see tracks, previous scrapes, have a nearby water source or have seen deer using a trail cam, you know that is a believable place to put your deer urine and other attractants.
Types of Deer Urine Attractants
Different urine attractants tell different stories to deer in the area. Below are some basic categories of deer urine and when it’s best to use them:
- Doe Urine – Can be used throughout the year, but works best during early pre-rut and before the rut. This scent will reassure deer that the area is safe, which puts their mind more at ease.
- Buck Urine – Leading up to the rut, buck urine is good to start challenging bucks in the area to come closer to get rid of any intruders in their territory. Combining this deer urine with some calls and mock scrapes will make your story more believable. For tips on deer calls, check out our Mastering the Deer Call post.
- Doe in Estrus/ Doe in Heat Urine – By far the most popular deer urine attractant. Use this during late pre-rut and throughout the rut. Once you detect that the rut is beginning to end, continue for a few more days. Does will go in and out of estrus at different times, so if you are one of the last ones, a desperate buck might be more curious to check you out.
- Scrape Scent – This is more of a combination of scents than one type of urine. Scrapes are a way for deer to communicate their status to each other (if they are ready to breed, dominance, etc.). Scrapes are great to use year round if you have a good mixture of proper urine attractants and other smells to peak the interests of the deer in that season.
What to Look for in Urine Attractants
If you are trying deer urine attractants for the first time or aren’t having luck with your current selection, there are a few things you should be looking for when testing deer urine attractants.
On the label of each urine attractant, you will find what ingredients were added. Make sure that the deer urine included is appropriate for the season.
Also, look up information on the company that produces the brand. You want to choose a company that has years of experience and research, such as Wildlife Research Center. Looking through reviews on products is a good idea as well. Choose a name you can trust!
How to Tell an Enticing Story With Urine Attractants
Now that you know why deer urine works and what types you might use, here are some tips on how you can tell a story using the equipment you have. Below are the top tips for creating a story to attract those curious deer.
- Think like a deer. It seems basic but if you get into the mindset of a deer and set up accordingly, you will have much better luck in your blind or treestand. Where are deer traveling in my area? What are deer doing during this season? Would a deer feel comfortable walking through this area? All are great questions to ask yourself when creating an attracting setup.
- Add other products to tell your story. If a buck can smell a doe but can’t see or hear it, your story is already sounding a bit fishy. Combining deer urine with other products like deer calls or decoys will make your story more believable.
- Take down scent wicks at night. Unless you are hunting in the dark, you need to take your scent wicks down at night. Deer that are attracted at night will remember that smell and they won’t be curious to check it out again once they find out they’ve been tricked. One way to make this easy on yourself is to get a dripper that is temperature controlled, like the Magnum Scrape Dripper. These products stop dripping urine at night when the temperature drops and starts again in the morning. Another reason this works so well ties into my next point, you don’t want YOUR scent all over the place so handling wicks less often gives the best results.
- Use scent blockers. Deer recognize our scent as the smell of a predator, so if they smell YOU they don’t care about the attractant. They will high tail it out of there and change patterns to avoid your area completely. Everything you wear, use, and even touch should be covered up by some kind of scent blocker. Scent-blocking sprays, laundry detergents, clothing, soaps, and more can be used to get rid of your human smell. Scent-blocking kits contain a variety of deodorizing items for you to get started. We will be creating a post dedicated to scent blockers soon, so keep a lookout for it in our hunting category.
- Place Your Attractants at Maximum Shooting Range. The further away you are from your attractant, the less chance a deer has to smell or spot you. Of course, you still want to be close enough to hit your mark, but keep in mind that deer are smart and can sense you long before you can see or hear them.
- If it’s not working, switch it up. If your urine attractant isn’t working for you, don’t drop them all together. Maybe the deer in your area have gotten used to that particular smell. Keep an open mind and test different smells to see what works for you. Deer love some strange smells and hate others that we wouldn’t expect.
Hunting Season Success
Hopefully, everyone is having a great hunting season so far. Have you shot your first deer yet? Eaten any great venison dishes? Let us know about your hunting victories in the comment section. We always love to hear from you here and on our social media pages, like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!
Also, a big thank you to Wildlife Research Center, INC for providing a ton of information for this post. Their years of experience are sure to help new and experienced hunters. Take a look through some of their tested products HERE.