TWO-ON-ONE WHITETAILS

Double Rattling

EDITOR'S NOTE: Two hunters can take twice as many whitetails as one hunter can, and two hunters often bag bigger whitetails than one hunter will. Many of the trophy whitetails bagged in America today are taken when hunters double-up on bucks, because trophy whitetails know more about the hunters who hunt them than the sportsmen understand about the deer that sport high racks and heavy body weights. Find out this week how doubling-up on deer greatly can increase your chances for bagging that trophy buck.

During the rut, rattling and grunting are effective techniques for taking trophy whitetail. However, most hunters rarely see the trophy bucks they rattle and grunt up. One of the buck's key defenses is to come in downwind of what he sees, smells or hears that he can't identify and use his nose to try and check out what his ears and eyes tell him. In many rattling situations, unless a buck is being rattled and grunted from a piece of thick cover with clear ground all around it, the deer usually will circle downwind before he comes to the sound of the horns and the grunt tube. But if you put a second hunter 100 yards downwind in a tree stand from the hunter doing the rattling and grunting, generally this second hunter will see and be able to bag the trophy buck the first hunter calls. Often the big deer will move in below the second hunter, or come in between the first and second hunters.

Always utilize odor neutralizers like No-Odor, Tink's Non-Stink, Scent Shield and Scent Blaster to eliminate as much human odor as possible before you go into the woods. Then once you're in your tree stand, try and spray as much of your clothing as possible, especially your hat, your waistband, your crotch, behind your knees and your feet. Use some type of cover-up scent or deer lure to cause the buck to smell the odor of the deer he thinks he hears upwind when the horns clash. Then the buck will assume no danger lurks in the region because you've touched two of his senses -- smelling and hearing.

The downwind hunter who's not rattling and calling usually will see two to three times as many bucks as the sportsman doing the rattling and grunting. This technique is most effective when employed along scrape lines and where you find buck rubs.

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TOMORROW: HUNTING HILLS AND HOLLOWS