deer baiting help

[dougster]

i found a spot that i want to hunt, i was scouting today and the area was covered with deer and moose crap, but i want to make sure that the odds are in my favour. I am thinking about placing a salt lick and dumping a bunch of oats around, would this be the best way to bait, laying the oats once a week? or does anyone else have any good suggestions

[muledeercrazy]

is it legal to bait deer? sorry dont take offense i just cant remember. I have never really been into baiting.

[Joel]

Bait them in all the way up untill the actual hunt. Than when your trying to get one, dont bait it. That way it's legal.

[dougster]

deer yes, predators no

[killman]

predators yes, bears no

[RJ]

legal to bait everything except bears :wink:

[NaStY]

Baiting, luring, calling and what ever else you can do. Is legal for all ungulates.

[Ron.C]

dougster's question wasn't one of legality, he is looking for tips on baiting! Yes it legal to bait deer, so why not anwer his question?


From what I understand, alot of baiting /salt licks work somewhat ok in the summer early fall, but don't seem to work as well as the rut approaches.

But if you watch some of the late fall deer videos out of Sask, you see them using bait and having lots of deer respond. Maybe this is becuase of the heavy snow and ease of effort for deer to feed at bait stations.

In all honesty, I think you need to constantly be putting out large quantities of bait all year, or be hunting over a large food plot for it to be consistently effective. There are lots of magic lures/baits on the market. In my opinion, if any of them as well as advertised, you'd be beating the monster bucks off you with a stick. And that's just not the case

[hardnocks]

I have put out some salt . Spring and summer i get lots of activity not so much in the fall . I hunt one place that the deer are digging holes on switch backs of hard packed logging roads. Looking for salt.

[daywalker]

The deer will look for the minerals in the early late summer so on for antler growth that is why it works a little better. Then of course we all know what happens after that, there is one thing they are thinking about.

[bridger]

put a bag of barley (50lbs) out once a week that works as well as anything. just dump it on the ground where they can find it easily. if you have several deer coming to the site then you may want to use more. it is a little trial and error for the first few times but you will soon get a routine. in my experience the deer don't hang around and eat until they are full rather a few mouthfuls then go unless it is really cold, but they do return. barley works better than oats in my experience.

[.300WSMImpact!]

baiting in the rut is to get the does to come, and hope that the big buck is not far behind, what I find works good is water softener salts, they dissolve into the ground so only you no where they are, and cheap too

[NaStY]

Your absolutely right Ron C.

Brother inlaw has been planting wheat, alfalfa and many others through the spring for many years in certain areas. Results have been good.

Brother inlaw has dumped truck loads of apples in fields. Has dumped grape left overs as well. Use your imagination.

[hunter1947]

I have baited for deer using oats and found that a black bear if he finds your baiting station will never leave it once he has found your station.

Deer like the oats but the bear does as well I had over 200 pic on my trail cam with a black bear and not just one black bear but three where eating the oats.

One of the bears the bigger of the three just camped there he slept there as well till all the oats where gone.

My suggestion is the put a bag of rock salt out and you will have less of a chance of having bears come in to your baiting station.

Hear is a pic of a mule deer I got on my trail cam last week I put rock salt out ,the trail cam was out there for 7 days and not one bear to be seen on this trail cam..
http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/data/500/medium/Picture_0174.jpg (http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/showphoto.php?photo=19958&size=big&cat=500)

[dougster]

so it would be a bad idea to use oats right now??? ok sounds good i can go out tomorrow after work and lay out a salt pile, and i can keep doing it once a week until its time to smoke bambi

[.300WSMImpact!]

I have a bunch of deer on my oat pile, one bear but it has not stuck around that I can tell, I also have some elk around the oats, but I think the elk are there because I found them first

[Buckmeister]

Apples and some various grains. If you have the room, go to your local farmer and see about purchasing some square bails or one large round one.

I put out a salt lick two years ago during huntin season and they pretty much ignored it. Came back the next spring and found the salt lick gone and large hole in the ground where it used to sit. Just visited the site last weekend and found the hole to be almost twice as big now, they just keep hitting it.

[leadpillproductions]

what do you guys do to keep the oats dry , or dont worry about

[ratherbefishin]

Baiting is an interesting subject and generally brings a lot of comments about the ethics or sportsmanship of it-but when you really think about it-its not all than much diferant than calling or rattling,which few people would consider unethical or unsporting.

I like watching deer year round and pick up a sack of COB[corn,oats and barley run through a roller mill]-its like candy to them,and as far as I know, doesn't harm their digestive system.Even a cupfull on a regular basis brings them in,you don't need to put out the whole sack,and in fact, its probably better,if you leave out quantities, they might only come at night.I can bring them running by banging the scoop on the rock after I put out the COB,you can hear them coming a 100 yards away!

[Rodd]

I have been baiting deer behind my house on my property for years now, have had significant results. I built a small lean-to and a wooden box and place my oats/barley/corn in there and it is protected from the weather, have many bears going by too, but they are only interested in the neighbors garbage, and leave my grains alone for the most part. I find the deer don't like the wet feed as much but will still eat some. If the local Elk herd finds it, then you will need a tonne of bait as they can clean up 50lbs overnight like nothing... So I try to avoid the Elk(bugle them in). Another method that works is to buy some 4inch PVC pipe with a cap on it cut a hole in the bottom just big enough for the grain to trickle out very slowly. This makes the deer stay longer at your site, and maybe into daylight hours to get enough. The majority of deer I get on camera are at night(nocturnal Ghosts). I've heard of guys who have timers setup and only open hours are during the daylight, it takes some time for the Deer to figure this out, but they do, and then only come to feed there during the day(for this to work it has to be in a dense area where the deer feel comfortable approaching during the day, near bedding areas). I think if you have does around regular then your bait will be successful, as they feed and urinate in the area, and it leaves a concentration of scent that the bucks going into rut have to investigate. The same principle applies in Sask. too. I found the bears like salt too. My 2 cents worth. I personally don't hunt my bait in my yard, more for the pictures, but I would like to set one up in my whitetail area soon as it works very well, and just may make that big ole Buck make a mistake he might not normally make.

[silvicon]

I did try a timed feeder for mule deer behind my house. Used rolled oats.
Mulies did not take oats. Cut up a few old apples and trow them along the fence in the evening.
Next morning all apples gone.

[knockturnal]

Has anyone ever tried some of that Deercane or monster mix or any of those type of products?

[Lone Ranger]

...interesting to see a member who argues about the ethics of semi-auto's ask about baiting. Its all legal so its allowed. Leave the ethics for the illegal stuff. LR

[Gateholio]

...interesting to see a member who argues about the ethics of semi-auto's ask about baiting. Its all legal so its allowed. Leave the ethics for the illegal stuff. LR

ha ha

Interesting observation!

:mrgreen::mrgreen:

[hunter1947]

Headed to the WK tomorrow to scout out for ELK will be taking a few pounds of this stuff to see if the deer elk like it :roll: 50 pounds $11.00 dollars..
http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/data/500/medium/P8120062.JPG (http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/showphoto.php?photo=20016&size=big&cat=500)

[Roughneck Country]

Has anyone ever tried some of that Deercane or monster mix or any of those type of products?

Poured some on a rotting tree stump once, it was absolutely destroyed beyond belief! They loved that stuff but would bait with salt and mineral blocks myself.

[steelheadSABO]

salt lick works fine and it is for sure legal to bait deer so set it out and wait for bambi to come

[WoodOx]

ive tried oats, salt, etc and found that only apples work for mulies.
dont know what kind of deer your baiting?
early in the season I get both bucks and does coming in
late season mature bucks stop, but as mentioned by another member, the does will keep coming and theyre the trick in the rut anyways.

I typically go through about 350lbs of apples every couple weeks.

[dave_fras]

ive got my camera set up right now... i bring 50 pounds of apples and a 40 pound sack of cobb every 3 days!.... i got some salt from buckerfields out there too.... but the pvc pipe idea works great!!!... i wasnt using the apples at first... but once i started i was gettin action all day and all night!... even when its 35 outside those deer are still coming in!.. i figured now that they came to the apples... they will stick around cuz of the salt and cobb

[Buckmeister]

I'm going to set up a camera in a good mulie area and bait it with salt and mineral licks in the next few days. My plan is to take some apples, cut them up into wedges and place them on the licks. My hope is that they will get a liking for licks when they pick the apples up off of them.

There are a few natural mineral licks in my area located up on the banks of old skid trails. I've witnessed the deer literally biting off chunks of dirt. A few years back, a mineral lick was put out and in just a few days instead of licking it they bit and ate half of the block instead.

[Brian011]

doug, you should invest in a trail cam and then put it where you put the oats to see all that is coming in to the bait. i found that when i put out the oats i had a couple nice bucks come in right away and then after that all i had pictures of were bears.