Pennsylvania Game News - October 2008 - 5

outing was uneventful, aside from a fawn that nearly ran me over on the path to my house. After my daughter’s late afternoon soccer game I decided to try an evening hunt in this highly pressured area. With a tarsal gland from my 2004 10-point on a drag rope, I walked a trail into and around the stand, made a mock scrape and hung the tarsal on a limb above it in a clear shooting lane. A 12-point had been hanging around this area and my hopes were for a repeat of the prior year’s success. On stand by 5:50 p.m., it wasn’t long after until the action began. A scraggly horned buck started chasing does around, but chased them out of bow range. At 6 o’clock I heard a deer walking behind my stand. As I turned to look, there stood a doe at 15 yards, looking past my tree toward the chase on the opposite hillside. Finally, she relaxed and began to quarter away, but not before investigating the smell emanating from my mock scrape and affording me a chance to make my move. When I drew my bow she was still whiffing in the deer scent. I planted my sight pin behind her third rib and released. She ran into the thickest tangle of briars imaginable. The blood trail I followed petered out and it took me a few hours on hands and knees to pick it up again. Finally, at 8:30 I found my doe only 100 yards from my stand. The drag from this dense part of the valley was brutal, but if you want deer you sometimes have to go to extremes. As for the 12-point, we had a few encounters that season: one bump on the way to the stand, again during the rut when all the tarsal glands, decoys and calls in the world weren’t going to pry him away from the hot and ready doe he was pursuing, and once more on Christmas Eve, as I hung a stand for the late season where I froze every other morning without ever seeing him again. Every experienced hunter knows that taking wary mature whitetails requires skill and patience, but sometimes just a little luck can be priceless. OCTOBER 2008 Using the tarsal gland as a deer attractant isn’t a new idea; actually tarsal use goes back as far as early American trappers and Native Americans. However, the recent proliferation of the deer lure industry has made it as easy as going to the store to entice deer within range. So why bother to cut off, wrap and freeze deer tarsal glands? Because the 2006 archery season once again had me coining the phrase, “Ain’t nothing like the real thing.” Two years from the date when I shot my last buck found me 100 yards from that spot in my treestand, and 15 yards away from another dangling tarsal gland taken from my 2005 doe. The early morning was pretty calm as far as deer activity in the valley, but around 9 o’clock, just as I started thinking how unusual this calm was for November, I spotted a lone deer cross the hill 100 yards above me. A few burps on my grunt call caught its attention and it stopped, but then began to trot toward the sound. As it made its way through the briars and saplings it would stop momentarily to scent check. When he hit the 30-yard mark in the open woods it stopped to look for the intruder, and I decided its 8-point rack met my criteria. He stalled 30 yards away, though, and checked the wind. Almost certain he was going to bolt, I prepared to take the 30-yard uphill shot. Suddenly, his head cocked to attention as he looked past my tree toward the mock scrape with the tarsal gland, then he dropped his guard and came in fast. When the buck stopped 10 feet from the base of my tree to scent check again, I drew, planted my sight pin on his shoulder blade and released. The broadhead smashed through the spine, angled through the heart, dropping him dead in his tracks. Fifty yards into the drag I remembered the tarsal gland and ran back to the stand site to grab it. Tarsal 5

Pennsylvania Game News - October 2008

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