(Photo from Author: Mock scrapes not only have the potential to draw deer to specific spots but also position them for the shot, while focusing their attention away from the stand) Author: Steve Bartylla The outfitter I was consulting for thought I was nuts. As part of my compensation, I was allowed to hunt a remote, hard-to-access area he controlled. Truly a nice area, just really hard to access and harder to hunt safely and effectively. I’d been playing cat and mouse with a solid 4-year-old eight and I was asking him if he’d mind if I cut and “planted” a small tree in an open food source I was hunting. I explained that I believed it would allow me to tag out that night. (Photos from Author: The author planting his first scrape tree in 2009 and the buck he shot working it hours later.) Fast forward about five hours later and I was about to shoot the 8, as he’d made a beeline for the group of does surrounding the new scrape tree. I shot him moments later, as he worked the scrape a youngster had already created a half hour earlier. The new scrape tree had both drawn him to within range, something that had been alluding me, and positioned him for the shot, at a known yardage, while focusing his attention away from me. Can you really ask for more?! Here is EXACTLY how you can do the same. Putting it Together Whether it’s using a treated pole and adding branches, cutting and “planting” a small tree about 3’ deep, attaching lick branches to trees, hanging branches from a wire where needed or simply using an existing branch, I create one or more mock scrapes around most every stand I set up. The stands covering open areas and food plots, where a lot of deer will be out of range, one of those mock scrapes will be armed with a Magnum Scrape Dripper and filled with scent, as that does increase the drawing power, in my experience. That said, I rarely use scent at more than one mock scrape per stand site, and have found an increased scraping rate when an undoctored licking branch just happens to be handy, as well. Most bucks are happy to work other bucks’ scrapes, but some seem hellbent on at least opening their own. While the majority tend to focus on the doctored scrape, I’ll get an extra 10-20% of bucks that exclusively work the undoctored licking branch. In every case possible (one can’t when hanging a branch from a wire, for example), the tips of the lick branch are pointed directly at the stand, at a known and easily makable shooting distance. With the tips pointing towards the stand, most bucks will work in a broadside or quartering away positioning, while looking away from the stand. Add it all up and these lick branches and full-blown mock scrapes can help draw, position at a known distance and focus buck’s attentions away from the stand. That typically results in giving us plenty of time and opportunity to draw on a great target. When “planting” trees and using post variations in larger open areas, remember, within reason, the bushier the better. Again, within reason, we want our “scrape trees” to stick out like turds in punchbowls! Standing out more increases their drawing power, as that scrape serves much the same advertising purposes for bucks as highway billboards do for us. Conclusion No, if you put a doctored mock scrape and an undoctored lick branch around your stand you will not draw every buck to within range, regardless of if they were heading somewhere else all along. Most of the bucks that work them would have been within range or close to it, anyway, and most of the bucks that never would have still won’t. However, it will still help position a bunch of those that would have and tends to draw around 10% of those that never would have been within bow range, otherwise. For the little bit of efforts, I consider that a huge return. They sincerely can make the difference between a filled tag and watching a buck out of range! Finally, that doesn’t even touch on the management advantages that getting those bucks to waist an extra even 2 minutes working a scrape on our side of the fence can make between that buck making it another year or being shot by the neighbor. We’ll be covering that one in our next posting. Categories: Education
