Not eating meat before a hunt?

[justin davis]

I have never bought into the scent elimination products that are out there.

When I sweat I don't stink (to myself or people around). I don't get the bad BO smell that some guys get.

But if an animal is down wind you bet your ass they will smell me. Human scent is that "human scent". You can't hide it.


It is interating that guys like randy ulmer do it?
I wonder why no meat? What does meat do that adds to the scent?

 

[littlebuf]

I would highly doubt ulmer actually practices that. Espeacaly with the mount he hunts, any one really believe he's not eating meat like all year? I'm sure he read about what ever BFE Indian tribe was mentioned earlier and in the spirit of being super archer just touted it as something he does or did or whatever. Of course this is all speculation but even guys like ulmer I do not believe everything they say, there still a personality in a business and like ALL of them always have an agenda. Not that's it a a bad thing it's just a thing to under stand. On another note has this thread about eating meat shifted to vaginas? And if so how far are we willing to take that one ?

 

[Bonedalien]

guys like Justin are stoked, this bodys not like that. while im not super elimination guy,i wear scent-a-way deoderant ,and i still wear a couple dirt scent discs pinned to me. as EVERYONE has said, i make sure to never neglect my windicator...wind..wind!
as to littlebufs question... im totaly enjoying both threads!

 

[Rucker61]

Originally Posted by tttoadman I hold an old elk vagina over my mouth when I exhale throughout the day.


Fixed it for you

Don't you scare the elk away since every time you exhale you blow a raspberry?

 

[Joshua Barney]

I think I'm just Gonna spritz myself with Deer scent morning, noon and night that way I dont smell like human. Oh wait I know deer estrus that will get the bucks running to me. The estrus smell will get the bucks so horny they can't smell, see or hear strait. Don't blame me If a buck mounts you unexpectedly. If you use estrus you'll be able to eat anything you want...

 

[William Hanson (live2hunt)]

Don't you scare the elk away since every time you exhale you blow a raspberry?

Lmfao too much just too much

 

[tttoadman]

This is spiraling down as bad as the manscaping thread.

 

[Hootsma]

I've tried this 2 seasons ago! I came up with this notion after reading a couple of Dan Brown Jr. books. I did the "Full Monty" too. 2 weeks before the season opener I went full vegetarian and starting eating chlorophyll pills. Every couple of days I would sit in the sauna as long as I could stand it pounding water. I scrubbed all of my gear including my pack and bow. The night before the opener I sat in the sauna, then showered. Went to bed, got up for the hunt and showered again. Wore scent free street clothes on the drive and changed at the parking area into my Scent-Lok suit. I did everything I could short of using an ozone system. All this trouble and effort had NO discernible effect. I was blown at by deer downwind within the first hour of hunting. It was disappointing to say the least. I went one more week to the 2nd weekend of the season just to make sure. Same results.

Last year I got an old 4-wheeler to use for hunting. That pretty much put an end to my scent control notions. That thing stinks to high heaven of gas and burnt fuel fumes. No way I could deal with that and keep my sanity. However, I still use the scent free laundry soap and deodorant. I gotta wash my clothes and put on deodorant anyways, so no extra effort there. I store all of my gear in the same totes I was using to try to keep them from accumulating scent in the garage. My stuff has to go somewhere so no extra effort there as well. I usually hang a clothes line at camp and hang my gear on it to air out after a hunt, particularly if it's hot and I sweated a bit. No real additional effort there too.

Hunting has become more enjoyable now without all the hassle and I'm just as successful. I'm glad I finally got that out of my system.

 

[Poser]

I'd suppose that garlic, onions and spices have way more of an impact on the amount of scent that you put off than eating meat. If you're going go so far as to stop eating meat, you would also need to consider cutting garlic, onions and most spices from your diet as well. Legumes tend to make most people have excessive gas as well. Looks like you are left eating plates of greens and veggies using only salt and mild herbs for seasoning. -no hot sauce, no ethnic spices. If it has a strong flavor, it will probably increase the amount of odor your body puts off.

Also, people from the same country or culture often have a similar or signature scent because of their diet. Diets heavy in Curry is a great example. Europeans often comment that Americans smell like sour milk and cheap cheese (we eat a lot of dairy), so, it would follow that you should also cut dairy products from your diet. If a Frenchmen can smell you, I'm quite sure an Elk can. This is one of those "open one door and 20 more doors open" types of debates. Cutting meat out of your diet to not smell like a carnivore might sound good in theory, there might even be some truth in it, but only if you go all the way and cut all strong odor causing food outs of your diet. How far are you willing to go? Would you consider fasting for a few days before a hunt? And then, pretty much as soon as you break a sweat, game is over and you'll begin to have a detectable odor. Is this even a practical approach for backcountry hunting? I could see it maybe having some application if you were walking 200 yards to a treestand, but not up and down mountains.

Also note that many predators eat nothing but meat, guts, and the digested browse of their prey, never take a bath and seem to do alright hunting and they do it at a much more close range and personal level then even the most hardcore primitive human hunter

 

[Joshua Barney]

I dont own a stitch of como. Or scent eliminating products.

I think I'll try rolling around in an elk wallow to mask my humanity.

 

[ethan]

"Breathing through elk vagina's"!!!!.....you guys are on to something! Instead of that "cough muffler" thing they sell, you can make a ....."Muff-Muffler"!!!

 

[unm1136]

I have spent a lot of time training with scenting dogs. Tracking dogs, when properly trained, are not just smelling skin rafts and whatnot cast off by the quarry, but they are smelling crushed vegetation, soil moisture escaping from the quarry's footfalls, etc. Trailing dogs can tell which nostril gets more molecules of airborne scent and is able to work a scent cone to find the source by following the increasing concentration. They also process scents individually, which is why the old coffee bean trick over the cocaine doesn't work. When I learned how complex a scent picture is for a dog I realized that trying to fool them was pointless. I breathe, I sweat, I eat. Sent control clothing has openings for sleeves, torsos, heads, and feet. After several benders in college I distinctly remember smelling boozy as alcohol worked its way out of my pores. Scent control products MAY reduce odor, but I really don't think that they will reduce it to the point where their effectiveness justifies their cost. One of our dogs had a big pile of shredded cash, courtesy of the US Treasury, to show that he is hitting on drugs, and not money. That cash was kept sterile, and trainers had to use extravagant means to keep it that way. The first time he hit on the cash it would cause reliability issues in court, reducing his usefulness. As long as every time he hit cash on the street there were drugs with it, and he did not hit on the sterile cash he was fine. Even vacuum sealing leaves detectable residue on the packaging.

I decided a few years ago that if a deer/elk is half as sensitive to scent as a dog is, trying to fool them is a lost cause as well. This was reinforced two years ago after a five day hunt without so much as a baby wipe whore's bath. I was ripe, I could smell myself. I was sitting in a blind on a watering hole waiting to ambush the only legal deer I had seen that week. I could visualize my scent cone. I watched four does walk up to the watering hole. One appeared a little skittish after seeing something that disturbed her in my blind, and hung up staring right at me. The lead doe walked over, grunted at her, smacked her, and got her moving towards the water. The three leading does all wandered into my scent cone and began to drink. The lead doe pushed them forward, and then took her time. She was more alert than the other three. I called it within one foot when she would scent me based on my visualized scent cone. Her head popped up, she looked at me, grunted, and all of them bolted. I had already moved enough to photograph her and with the same hand use my laser range finder to determine she was 12 yards away. My blind was a bunch of juniper branches pulled together and tied strategically with a huge shooting window right in the middle.

At times I think that these animals are so tuned into their environment, that they may not even smell "human", but notice a smell they recognize as out of place, and thus, possibly dangerous. They have learned to trust their sense of smell, and while they can identify some predators by smell, so can we, really, if we are close enough. How many yearlings and young animals have had much exposure to human scent? I would wager that the majority of them can't recognize human scent specifically, and that the vast majority of those that do have no negative run-ins with people trying to kill them. There are far more hikers, walkers, drivers, campers, and fishermen than hunters in the forest. A small percentage of the humans that they detect by scent, sight, and sound are no threat to them, and would rather shoot a picture than an bullet or arrow, but they can't know that. How many just notice something strong smelling that doesn't belong here and their prey instincts say "you don't know what that smell is...RUN in case it is something that wants to eat you".

pat

 

[Poser]

I have spent a lot of time training with scenting dogs. Tracking dogs, when properly trained, are not just smelling skin rafts and whatnot cast off by the quarry, but they are smelling crushed vegetation, soil moisture escaping from the quarry's footfalls, etc. Trailing dogs can tell which nostril gets more molecules of airborne scent and is able to work a scent cone to find the source by following the increasing concentration. They also process scents individually, which is why the old coffee bean trick over the cocaine doesn't work. When I learned how complex a scent picture is for a dog I realized that trying to fool them was pointless. I breathe, I sweat, I eat. Sent control clothing has openings for sleeves, torsos, heads, and feet. After several benders in college I distinctly remember smelling boozy as alcohol worked its way out of my pores. Scent control products MAY reduce odor, but I really don't think that they will reduce it to the point where their effectiveness justifies their cost. One of our dogs had a big pile of shredded cash, courtesy of the US Treasury, to show that he is hitting on drugs, and not money. That cash was kept sterile, and trainers had to use extravagant means to keep it that way. The first time he hit on the cash it would cause reliability issues in court, reducing his usefulness. As long as every time he hit cash on the street there were drugs with it, and he did not hit on the sterile cash he was fine. Even vacuum sealing leaves detectable residue on the packaging.

I decided a few years ago that if a deer/elk is half as sensitive to scent as a dog is, trying to fool them is a lost cause as well. This was reinforced two years ago after a five day hunt without so much as a baby wipe whore's bath. I was ripe, I could smell myself. I was sitting in a blind on a watering hole waiting to ambush the only legal deer I had seen that week. I could visualize my scent cone. I watched four does walk up to the watering hole. One appeared a little skittish after seeing something that disturbed her in my blind, and hung up staring right at me. The lead doe walked over, grunted at her, smacked her, and got her moving towards the water. The three leading does all wandered into my scent cone and began to drink. The lead doe pushed them forward, and then took her time. She was more alert than the other three. I called it within one foot when she would scent me based on my visualized scent cone. Her head popped up, she looked at me, grunted, and all of them bolted. I had already moved enough to photograph her and with the same hand use my laser range finder to determine she was 12 yards away. My blind was a bunch of juniper branches pulled together and tied strategically with a huge shooting window right in the middle.

At times I think that these animals are so tuned into their environment, that they may not even smell "human", but notice a smell they recognize as out of place, and thus, possibly dangerous. They have learned to trust their sense of smell, and while they can identify some predators by smell, so can we, really, if we are close enough. How many yearlings and young animals have had much exposure to human scent? I would wager that the majority of them can't recognize human scent specifically, and that the vast majority of those that do have no negative run-ins with people trying to kill them. There are far more hikers, walkers, drivers, campers, and fishermen than hunters in the forest. A small percentage of the humans that they detect by scent, sight, and sound are no threat to them, and would rather shoot a picture than an bullet or arrow, but they can't know that. How many just notice something strong smelling that doesn't belong here and their prey instincts say "you don't know what that smell is...RUN in case it is something that wants to eat you".

pat

You might find this interesting.

http://www.fieldandstream.com/artic...-control-products-and-practices-vs-a-drug-dog

It is some testing with K9s and scent control products including ozonics. Using ozonics on clothing products seems to actually be effective as it delayed the dog for up to 50 seconds. I don't think that is very significant for backcountry hunting, but for stand hunting, it could be advantageous.
Also, ozone has significant impact on your gear as it breaks it down far faster than UV. I'd think that ozonics probably damages your DWR treatment significantly.

 

[Joshua Barney]

You might find this interesting.

http://www.fieldandstream.com/artic...-control-products-and-practices-vs-a-drug-dog

It is some testing with K9s and scent control products including ozonics. Using ozonics on clothing products seems to actually be effective as it delayed the dog for up to 50 seconds. I don't think that is very significant for backcountry hunting, but for stand hunting, it could be advantageous.
Also, ozone has significant impact on your gear as it breaks it down far faster than UV. I'd think that ozonics probably damages your DWR treatment significantly.

Exactly! So we are back to the deer or elk muff muffler, and estrus sprays......

 

[Brendan]

I think it depends on how and where you hunt. I live out east, and hunt whitetail from an easily accessible tree stand right near back yards. Deer are more accustomed to humans and human smell, so minimizing scent in this case I think can make a difference - lowering it down to a background level they're used to. I am a scent control fanatic for this type of hunting and I have rarely had a deer spook around me in this scenario.

Active hunting, backcountry hunting - when I head to Montana this year, not going to even think about it.

With that said: Giving up meat, coffee and beer is heresy. Not a chance.

 

[unm1136]

You might find this interesting.

http://www.fieldandstream.com/artic...-control-products-and-practices-vs-a-drug-dog

It is some testing with K9s and scent control products including ozonics. Using ozonics on clothing products seems to actually be effective as it delayed the dog for up to 50 seconds. I don't think that is very significant for backcountry hunting, but for stand hunting, it could be advantageous.
Also, ozone has significant impact on your gear as it breaks it down far faster than UV. I'd think that ozonics probably damages your DWR treatment significantly.

Very interesting. My favorite cover scent for years before working with dogs was simple campfire smoke. It was suggested by Field and Stream 30 or so years ago in a stalking article. Animals smell smoke a lot more than they see smoke or fire, and it is a natural smell in the woods. Scent Management may be a better term then scent control. I would like to see more animals tested, keeping in mind that a dog on a search has a very different mindset than a hoofed critter that will be a meal for anything that is able to catch it. Also, in the first test the dog's indication was over 250 yards away. That would be an interesting variable to control. Reading the comments underneath also had some discussion that was very conducive to the article.

Maybe I can spare a few oz in my pack for some piney smelling stuff. Everything else is too heavy to backpack with, and if a few oz will give a decent edge...I could probably just brew up some tea from local plants and rinse clothes in it and leave them hanging out doors over night.

pat

 

[husky390]

I purposely stop at Taco Bell on my way to elk camp for my own amusement around the camp fire with my hunting buddies.

 

[flyfisher11]

Has anyone tried this? If so have you noticed a difference?

I've heard of guys (including Randy Ulmer) that stop eating meat about a month before their deer/elk hunt to help reduce certain smells produced by body odor.

This is what I've heard and I'm new to hunting (will be hunting my first fall this fall 2020) so I don't know if its true but I'm going to try it. It is natures way of allowing wolves and other predators to get close to prey like deer and elk. When predators have empty stomachs and are starving they release less sent. Back in the day Natives here in North America noticed this and mimicked the practice by purposely not eating meat before a hunt. I do know that the more lactic acid you have running through your body (a human's main source is from eating meat) the more odor you have that attracts mosquitos.

 

[Poser]

Gist of this thread: “we must overthink every detail until we no longer are willing to consume the very thing that we are out hunting to consume.”

For every Native American ore hunt ritual involving smoke tents and fasting, the same people killed 1,000 animals opportunistically. It’s not as if every haunt required a ritual: if you saw a turkey, you killed a turkey. If you stumbled across a buffalo, you killed it. I once set down a BBQ sandwich to kill a deer.

 

[Milestone522]

The Lewis and Clark expedition were eating up to 9lbs of meat a day per man, while smelling rank and still killing game....everyday. Weird.