Salt for deer

Which salt product is best for deer? Loose, small blocks, or standard blocks.

Do you mix it with soil or just pour or place on the ground or stump?

I put a yellow bag of water softener salt on a stump and deer go crazy over it. They will eat the dirt around the stump. White salt blocks work well, but people steal those here. I never could get deer to come to the reddish brown salt blocks much.

Mix some loose regular salt with a bucket of Lucky Buck (TSC). on a stump or in the dirt.

That's funny, I've had better attendance at the mineral (red) blocks than the standard white. I don't think it matters, you could mix sand with stock salt and they would eat it. They crave the minerals, so they consume them, imo.

I've dumped a 50 lb sack of white salt in the same several spots every few years. I've got holes in the ground 2 ft plus deep and 10 to 15 foot round. Never saw a deer lick a block f salt. They always seem to nibble at the dirt underneath the block getting the salt that dissolves into the soil.

I buy 80 pound bags of mixing salt at the feedmill for $9.00

Deer can't eat salt directly, it has to leach into the soil first.

I'm thinkin I need to change things up a bit, thanks guys!

My old boss's cabin in Northern Minn. Has a 75 year old hole on a hill where they drop a white block in every year .
Seriously in 1984 it was 8' deep and 15' across.

I've always used the white live stock salt blocks I think there 50lbs.
I have had trail camera pictures of deer licking the salt block but most of the time there licking the dirt.

I saw a deer chewing the remains of a white salt block ...one time while bow hunting.

As long as they dont have a choice they will consume whichever you put down. I find the 50lb blocks to be the hardiest. Once deer start digging around the salt and create a hole, I move the block away from the hole a bit. Otherwise, when it rains the block will sit in the water and dissolve much quicker.

A friend took me to an old shed where salt blocks for livestock were once stored. Deer had eaten the wood threshold under the door.

I've seen cattle eat the paint right off a barn, I'm assuming for the same reason.

For deer, I typically use freshly ground sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Trophy rock, is what gets hit hardest here. Rural King and Tractor Supply both carry them

Same here in Ga. Trophy Rocks get licked until they're gone. The heaviest use time is about to start....

i use yellow sulfur blocks they help with tick and insect control in sheep and goats a few years back when it was real dry a lot of dead deer was found i never found any in my area i keep them out in different spots year round have for 20 years or more

Doe deer benefit the most from mineral supplements before and after dropping fawns.

I looked out the bathroom window this morning and the deer were opening up my salt block stump.
It must be the time they need it.
Will have to freshen my other ones up.

Depending on who you get ur fox urine from there can be alot of salt in it. During the fur boom years the ranchers would add salt to the foxes diet to make them drink more water and produce more urine, I quit using fox urine for quite some time as the deer would come into my sets and i would have issue.

Some bow hunters use to use fox urine a scent cover and they would see the deer respond to it.

While eating lunch once a small salt packet was left on a stump, the bow hunter watched a deer travel in a straight line from quite a distance directly to that little white packet.

It does not take much salt to draw a deer or cow.

https://www.realtree.com/brow-tines-and-backstrap/how-to-make-your-own-deer-mineral

Years ago I started mixing my own after breaking down the ingredient listing and % on a bag of Antler King Mineral. Local Fleet Farm carried what I needed to mix my own at a fraction of price.

Mix 1 bag of each with some loose salt and dry molasis flakes produced great results from a consumption stand point and summer trail cams. No longer do this due to baiting / feeding restrictions. Dave

most every time I put out a salt block for anything I had more skunks than I could shake a stick at. Not a bad thing per say.

I use Himalayan salt animal lick for deers and I think it works well

Where are you from

Where are you from nosipho_truter

My guess is somewhere in Africa. Seeing a lot of spam post on other sites. Most linking to a fake site. Not saying that the post above is that but folks need to be careful. Especially with a first time poster.

Bulk Trace mineral salt, mixed with di calcium phosphate. Lactating does benefit from the phosphate, and both bucks and does benefit from the calcium. Deer need the minerals and deer will not consume the di cal without mixing it with the trace mineral salt. Salt alone does little benefit to deer, it is just an attractant. Another thing it is good to place your mineral lick close to a water supply.

Loose blue or white stock salt

They’ll eat holes of earth large enough to hide a 4 wheeler in over time.

Illegal to put salt out for deer in Mi. so they get theirs off the roads in spring those little divots that are cut on the centerlines every foot make perfect containers

We can't bait anymore here. Some are switching to h2o holes &/or licking sticks

I put out some acorn and apple mineral blocks last year with almost no interest

This is what I do. I'll hatch out the center of the stump.

Check out "licking ropes"

Spot on... A lot of minerals needed for whitetails exists in natural forage and natural licks, certain regions lack the much-needed trace minerals in plants and soil - supplementing minerals in these situations make sense. If you're mixing salt to attract the deer to minerals that's a sound strategy, sodium will attract deer but offers little nutritional benefit for the herd on its own. Di Cal promotes feed digestion, weight gain and milk production for lactating does, fetus development is an important part of herd health and antler development. Hardened antlers contain 40-50% organic matter, proteins mainly derived from calcium and phosphorous- the mineral intake of these two compounds helps with that development in bucks and replaces the drain on lactating does. I utilize Redmond Mineral Salt (I think a Trophy Rock is a chunk of Remond), Trace Mineral and Di Cal - Trace Mineral has a much higher ppm level of magnesium which is important because it promotes health and doesn't naturally exist in high quantities in certain regions. If you're in an area where it's legal to put out mineral stations- think longer term... a 5-year plan should produce noticeable results.

At least in my part of Wi, last year we were only allowed to bait during the archery season, making it impossible to feed deer during their growing season, other than utilizing food plots. I think it's like that statewide, except for the more than half the counties in which baiting is disallowed year round. I don't know if other states are like that.

Is there something to mix in to kill ticks?

There's not a lot of counties left in Wisconsin- if you put minerals out during the prescribed times- the deer will still be mining those sites in the spring.

Timing: No person may:
• place, use, or hunt over bait or feed during the closed season for hunting deer, but may start to place bait for deer hunting
24 hours prior to the first deer hunting season, which is the archery season. Note: The 24-hour period is the period from
12:00 A.M. to 11:59 P.M. on the day immediately before the archery deer season.

Next time your in TSC look at the analysis on that 20 dollar trophy rock . Then look at the analysis on the 7 dollar brown mineral block
Your welcome

I always thought that Trophy Rock is a chunk of Redmond Salt that dropped off the conveyor belt during processing- I'm skeptical on buying seed, minerals or anything that has a big buck on the label.

In Saltwater tide zones.Deer here pay no mind to salt blocks.

HeavyDieselSparks on youtube went into the salt mine that they get trophy rock from, good information and fun video to watch.

I remember when they first OK'd baiting, think it was in the late '90's.

Was hunting up in the Glidden area on a shirt tail relatives place.

about a dozen large bait piles all over a 40 acre tract. Deer tracks all over the place around the bait piles.
Several of us sat on those bait piles for many days straight. It was rare to see a deer. Next morning fresh tracks all over and the bait was all gone.
Seemed to me it allowed the deer to fill up big time at night and lay in the swamps all day and sleep the full belly off.

But if its legal and you feel you need the help go ahead and use bait.

I also think bait makes them nocturnal

Down here most people use feeders that are on timers. Only scatters a bit of corn at certain times of the day.

Kelly Harris recipe off bowsite. Been used by many successfully, cheap and easy. Meets needs as well.

"I always buy 50 lbs bag of dicalcium phosphate, 50 lbs bag of trace mineral salt, bag of powdered molasses. I dig a 3 ft hole wide and about 18 inches deep. I chop up the dirt really good, shovel in the ingredients with dirt 1 shovel full at a time. I mix it up really good and keep doing it until the hole is filled back up.

It is simply amazing to me how people can make a simple thing complicated. Just go to the feed store and buy you a cheap block of white salt. No mixing, no recipes, no digging holes, just set it out where animals are known to roam and if they have a need or craving for salt, they will come.

Yep Trophy rock works great on the farm we hunt in Ky. Also the mineral salt for livestock,.

Couldn't find Kelly on Bowsite?

Back when I hunted deer, you could legally use a Trophy Rock, but not a mineral block in Alabama.

We supplement in areas not hunted, they love the trace mineral blocks and have starting hitting a loose granular spot we have out too.

Kelly passed a few years ago from cancer. He was a great person and his recipe lives on. If you do a google search several different links come up.

Thanks Bear Tracker.

What state or city was Kelly from.