[shortwave]

Another deer attractant that might be of interest depending on your hunting area is cover.

Around here, it's hard to compete with the corn,beans and alfalfa fields the farmers grow every year. But I did a select cut in a mature woods a few years back where there was very little undergrowth due to the thick canopy.The undergrowth came back with a vengeance.

There is more scrapes/rubs around that area then any other place on the property. Problem is, every deer I've shot runs dead into those briars that are so thick it's not possible to walk into. Gotta use a machete to chop your way in and out.

I've sit on the adjacent hillside and glassed some nice bucks going into the thickets to bed down.

Knowing I can't compete with all the farmland, having made the select cut and let the thickets hold the deer, I've changed my food plot to sugar beets that have paid off well during the winter months. The more it frosts the sweeter the tops get to the deer. After they eat the tops, they'll dig the beets out of the frozen ground all winter long.