It can shave years off your learning curve. Well worth it if you invested in land for deer hunting.

Goal could be all of the above and then some.

I think the mock scrapes is all about location. It will help define a movement, but you need the movement first. They learn early to participate.

Deer have what I call community scrapes. They’re thee year after year and almost all year long. I’ve seen everything from fawns to big bucks hit them and that includes does more so than bucks. Same with rub trees. They’ll hit the same tree year after year until they finally kill it.
Bucks will run the same pattens year after year providing hunting pressure doesn’t push them out. But remember, what you have now may be 3-5 miles away come October. But what someone else has 3-5 miles away will be on your property. Some travel and some stick around. Even early season when they get rid velvet they will become antsy. We’ll have bucks in velvet disappear for 3-4 weeks then come October show back up for a month then gone again and you won’t see them until January.
Had a very nice buck show up a few years ago the last week of November. We had never seen this buck but he became our main focus. When I was there he wasn’t, when I wasn’t, he was, lol. December 18th was the last pic we got of him. I happened to be at the processors on December 20th to pick up something and saw this rack that looked familiar. I showed the processor my pics of that buck and asked if he’d pass my info to the hunter that killed that deer.
That deer was killed on the morning of the 19th 4.2 miles away as the crow flys. That guy said that deer was on camera all Summer and disappeared right before gun season started (mid October). He said he thought it was dead until it showed up that morning he killed it. From mid October until the last week of November we had no clue where it was, but between the 18th and the morning of the 19th it crossed several roads, fields, a 4 lane highway, and possibly even some back yards, lol.

For years I never put out the first trail cam until they made scraps An active scrap with a cam in front of it will show you every buck on the property Mature bucks will work it while smaller ones will pass by and get their pic taken
Mock scrapes are crap shoot that a deer will work it. Most deer around here start making scrapes late September early October

Here the most predictable scrape and camera location is under a box elder tree. Maybe not every buck but a large percentage of them will scrape under that kind of tree on the property I manage\hunt. White failed deer will hit that thing and rub their faces all over the overhanging branches most of which are 7 ft off the ground. Most days during the pre rut and rut will show an average of 8 shooters working it. Often at noon.

I'm anxious to get out hunting. Don't rule out having a consultant walk your property with you. It might surprise you the ideas that can be garnered from such an experience.

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I think it’s a great idea! putting those best management practices in place for land management, understanding stand placement, travel corridors and bedding areas will pay nice future dividends.

After owning and developing our land for 37 years I think it would be interesting just to see what they would say compared to what we know as per all mentioned above.

Never did see a cost associated with that…

Based on that picture, you need to remove a bunch of the junk mid-story stems. Get more sunlight on the ground. Anything above 48" is useless to a deer.

It's pretty thick in a lot of spots. This parcel is 90 acres with much diversity.

I was planting acorns the other night & noticed deer really seem to like bedding in our 3 year old oak clear cut.

I went hunting last night & noticed my licking stick was knee height instead of belly button height. Something bent this tree over that's holding it up. I wonder if deer sometimes get aggressive and grab a hold of a licking tick & pull

Ohiowoodchuck - PM sent.

It's more than that. It's making improvements to the land . That in turn will keep and hold deer to the property. Strategically cutting things out and adding things to certain areas of the property. They help transform the property, then show where to put stands and why and when to hunt them. Not not many people have the time or the know how to do it on their own.

Do licking sticks work for late season?

They can work all year round depending where they are not disturbed with human pressure.

Ok, thanks. Interesting.

The improvements to habitat is as fun as hunting sometimes

And as time consuming too

It's that time of year where people will be evaluating their season and planning ahead for the future. Of course most of us seem to think about it year round