• The SH Membership has gone live. Only SH Members have access to post in the classifieds. All members can view the classifieds. Starting in 2020 only SH Members will be admitted to the annual hunting contest. Current members will need to follow these steps to upgrade: 1. Click on your username 2. Click on Account upgrades 3. Choose SH Member and purchase.
  • We've been working hard the past few weeks to come up with some big changes to our vendor policies to meet the changing needs of our community. Please see the new vendor rules here: Vendor Access Area Rules

Scent control regiment

Davis21

Davis21

Well-Known Member
Joined
Sep 27, 2018
Messages
362
Don’t want to debate the scent control vs play the wind issue, but have a question to see how y’all do it..may be dumb question..but let’s say you wash clothes scent free, dry outside and store in scent free tote..wear street clothes to woods and change..scent limited going in. But when you get done with hunt what do you do with clothes you wore hunting? put Back in bin with clean clothes? Separate and rewash when you get home, washing in between every hunt?
 
I quit worrying about scent control products this past year, I would hang them up in my spare bedroom or wash them depending on how bad they smelled to me. I should be ashamed to say this but they are on the floor in my closet right now needing to be washed and hung up.
 
I have a worn bag i throw them in. I ozone dry wash and wear again.
So i have a clean bag, a worn bag, and a ozoned bag. They are those large scent free zipper bags. Hunter specialties i think.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Do y’all have different sets of clothes you cycle through or just dry wash single set every time? I’m a sweater so I feel like I’m contaminating all my other clothes if I just use single tote. But I don’t want to wash every time either. Does a dry wash bag get a good wash of clothes are wadded up in there?
 
I have always just washed two sets of street cloths and two towels and washed ever other hunt. Then wash any camo that may have gotten sweety or stinky and let it air dry and all back in the tote.
 
I absolutely believe carbon reduces scent. However, where I hunt, I work up a sweat going in and setting up so its NOT a real option for me. I pay a lot of attention to my rubber boots and keep them away from odors. I wash my clothes in Arm and Hammmer All clear with baking soda and leave them hanging outside on my back porch during season. I shower daily and wear fresh clothes every day. I also soak my saddle and backpack in baking soda water weekly. ...... and I hunt the wind. I get busted from time to time, part of hunting. But it works for me. Carbon suits are just to hot down south IMO and the lightweight soak through to easily. Pay attention to entry and exit strategies, keep the wind and THERMALS in your favor and move if needed. I have moved 30 mins before dusk and had bucks walk by 10 minutes later.
 
I have a few of sets of camo for the season. I hand wash everything in scent free and line dry. Then I pack in mashed up hemlock boughs for 4-5 days. Then I remove the hemlock, if you don't remove the hemlock the cloths take on the moisture. After a hunt I hang em on the line outside. No camo that's been worn ever goes back in the clean box. I'll wear them for 3 or 4 hunts then wash them again. I wash everything outside by hand. 3 rinses and hand wring, and hang dry. My camo never comes in the house and never has to go in a car. I've done it this way for almost 30 yrs. and I kill deer every year. I set up with the wind in mind, and last year using the saddle I hunted a little higher than my standard 20 feet in the tree when conditions allowed.
 
I feel like with scent control you have to go totally balls to the wall or pretty much do nothing. John Eberhardt has some videos and books about his scent control procedures. It's hard core. If he buys a new set of boots he won't wear them in the field for 2 years. He just leaves them outside for 2 years. He talks about how you can't have beards. If your face isn't covered its a waste. Your pack has be scent controlled, etc. etc. He also hunts 25 feet up on average. He says he never gets busted and I believe him.

I'm way too lazy to do that stuff. I play the wind and let the deer win sometimes. Their nose is their main defense. When I hear a snort behind me I just laugh it off and try again somewhere else.
 
Not sure if you have seen this?
I don't want to debate either as I use a combination of both methods....
IMO this is the ultimate in scent control....
I hunt in a public area that gets heavy hunting pressure and the deer population is not great to begin with. Local hunters drive it out and unfortunately shoot anything that they see. That being said, chances are slim of finding mature bucks within a few miles of my truck. The few mature bucks I have found close to easy access set up in areas where I've watched the milkweed do some incredible things..."thermal mess" I call it.
I'll try to keep it short.....my most memorable scent failure.

I was hunting early bow season and the local hunters usually don't start pressuring this particular swamp until rifle season some 6 weeks later....I was hunting this huge 5-6 year old 10 point I had been getting some night time trail cam photos of at a nearby primary scrape. It wasn't just luck that I found this bed, I had done circles from this doe area he was scraping in the previous year scouting. After some time I located one of his hiding places within the half mile I figured he was travelling to get to the scrape. The weather said wind 5mph NNW. I was set up well before first light on a route I know he sometimes uses to get to and from the swamp. Milkweed was leaving my hand.... heading pretty good....with a slight off wind to the bed I thought, "he won't wind me until it's too late....." Looked like it was going to be a great hunt... I had managed to get in quiet only 50 yards from a bed I was pretty sure he would be in or maybe returning to. At three hours in the sun's up and the milkweed is starting to show a problem.... it seems the water surrounding my big friends bed is not heating up as fast as the surrounding trees and shrubs. My off wind is still perfect but the milkweed seed is now heading toward the bed in a circular motion of "Oh Crap". I guess that's why he loves that bed on that wind there is no off wind.... at that time of day he can see out in the swamp and has the entire edge behind him covered with his nose. Don't get me wrong I love getting this close to a mature buck (in these woods is doesn't happen often). So my friend must have caught just the slightest scent of me and decided it was time to go.... at first I thought maybe he just wanted to get up and I still had a chance. But as I go for the bow he must have heard something....now he's running through the deep water and way out of bow range. I'm not saying he can't be killed with milkweed alone but he smelled me and never even saw me, he just knew it was time to go.....

That's why now I dress at the truck with clothes from a tote, I'm doing my best leaving my truck to hunt. But when I have a house out there it will have a hunting washer and dryer and my own scent control room....why waste the time to get so close and get beat in this way?
 
Last edited:
Idk that seems like it would take some of the fun of hunting away being that ocd about it. I don’t have the time either, I may go straight to woods after work. Like DaveT said, here in Arkansas it doesn’t take much to work up a sweat. I would rather try to minimize it as much as possible, but hunt the wind and thermals.

So when y’all come in from hunt, clothes go in “worn” tub. And then y’all wear those a couple times and rewash. Hate to say it but that ozonics closet looks pretty handy to hang in backseat of truck and dry wash overnight. Anybody ever thought I’d DIY’ing one of those things?
 
Davis21 said:
Idk that seems like it would take some of the fun of hunting away being that ocd about it. I don’t have the time either, I may go straight to woods after work. Like DaveT said, here in Arkansas it doesn’t take much to work up a sweat. I would rather try to minimize it as much as possible, but hunt the wind and thermals.

So when y’all come in from hunt, clothes go in “worn” tub. And then y’all wear those a couple times and rewash. Hate to say it but that ozonics closet looks pretty handy to hang in backseat of truck and dry wash overnight. Anybody ever thought I’d DIY’ing one of those things?
Click to expand...
I guess it depends on what your hunting...I've killed enough young deer and does, I'm only hunting mature bucks at this point of my life.....and if you hunt some place deer rarely see humans.... I guess it wouldn't matter!
 
I’ve had enough positive experience with scentlok that I will continue to use it when temps allow. I also think it’s mostly all or nothing with mature deer. You can however do minimal scent control and get away with young deer getting downwind. I haven’t tried smoking clothes yet but plan to. Check out this guys scent regiment. He makes John look sloppy.
 
Ive seen Jim Brauker's stuff too forgot how thorough he is.....love his channel and I have his book on shaping your hunting property ... like to see him and John hunt together.....these guys are scent pioneers...LOL
 
Last edited:
Where you hunt is important. I used to manage a property that was on the perimeter of an apple orchard, I could get away with just leaving my clothes in a sealed bag with apples in it and I could literally sit with the deer undetected surrounded by drops...those were the days!
 
More power to ‘em. I’d say that he is probably either retired, hunts weekends only, or takes the two weeks straight rutcation, which is fine, but that
 
EricS said:
I’ve had enough positive experience with scentlok that I will continue to use it when temps allow. I also think it’s mostly all or nothing with mature deer. You can however do minimal scent control and get away with young deer getting downwind. I haven’t tried smoking clothes yet but plan to. Check out this guys scent regiment. He makes John look sloppy.
Click to expand...
I'd quit hunting if I had to do that stuff. Seriously. lol
 
I did the bee smoker thing - I got busted more that year then ever. May have been a combination of things but the only thing I tried differently that year was smoking my clothes. When I think about it, smoke would immediately put me on alert if i was a wild animal living out west.
 
Davis21 said:
Don’t want to debate the scent control vs play the wind issue, but have a question to see how y’all do it..may be dumb question..but let’s say you wash clothes scent free, dry outside and store in scent free tote..wear street clothes to woods and change..scent limited going in. But when you get done with hunt what do you do with clothes you wore hunting? put Back in bin with clean clothes? Separate and rewash when you get home, washing in between every hunt?
Click to expand...

This my thoughts and approach on the subject...
We can't really prove what level or intensity of our odor an individual deer may or may not accept on any given day, or under different wind and humidity conditions. I work hard at getting a single chance at truly mature bucks. Top-end bucks are few and far between and, where I hunt, it's years between even laying eyes on a B&C class buck, let alone get it within 20 yards. I have a 3 year history with a 200" buck that has forever effected me when it comes to being paranoid about odor and wind. After 20+ years since I had 5 encounters with that animal, I literally get goose bumps when I think about him. I will never know for sure if my current odor methods would have allowed me to put him on my wall, but on one particular occasion, the odor bust was so minimal. I really believe things would have turned out differently if I'd done then what I do now.

I never wear base and mid layers twice without laundering. Even days that I sit twice (as opposed to an all day hunt) I will change clothes (and shower a second time) when I can.
Carbon clothes are not laundered as often but they do get a regular ozone treatment and a dryer cycle "as needed".
I used to hang laundered clothes outside but I seldom do that these days. I got tired of putting on slightly damp clothes . Even when hung under the porch roof, the night time humidity permeates clothes. Cold, damp clothes are not pleasant to put on at O-dark thirty on a sub-freezing morning. I don't like being cold on stand.
And I have had chew damage from mouse/squirrels when clothes hang outside.

I figure that when my clothes come out of my perfume-free, odor-free washer, they are about as odor free as possible. When I need to hang them inside to dry, I will treat them with O3 before they go into a tub. On nice days, I will hang laundered clothes outside to dry, but I seldom leave them hang over night.

Clean clothes are stored in tubs, and sometimes transported in tubs, but more and more, I'm transporting in garbage bags.

Worn clothes and boots are never placed in the same tubs that clean clothes are ever kept. Especially boots. I have a tub for transporting clean and dry rubber boots, but after the hunt, those boots are not placed back in that tub and closed-up. After a day's hunt, rubber boots are usually damp inside from foot sweat. I don't want to put them back inside a closed, odor-free tub. I put them in a contamination bag and put them on the boot dryer and then follow with an inside-the-boot, O3 treatment before they go back into the clean tub.

And there's a dozen other things I do to reduce odor. I just can't shake the paranoia that I get with sloppy odor practices. I still do everything I can to hunt a favorable wind, but it's usually a challenge to have the wind not screw me at the moment of truth.
Odor reduction is something under my control. I can predict and play the wind, but wind is not something I can control.
Odor busts for me are vastly reduced and much less intense than they used to be. I absolutely hate an extreme odor bust. My system takes a little effort but the satisfaction I get from not being odor busted is well worth it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top