One of the best things we can do as stewards to the outdoors is to introduce young people to our sport and get them interested in what we love to do.  That feeling is contagious and when kids see how much we enjoy the labor of love that is hunting they are bound to want to take part.  I’ve been involving my son in what I do since he was three years old.  He has been out with me setting and checking trail cameras, scouting, glassing, taking care of our farm deer, shooting, and of course hunting.  Now he is seven and wants to be behind the weapon with a deer in front of him.  I’m not sure if he is ready for that yet, but we will see.  This weekend we went shooting and for the first time he got to shoot his bow at a 3d course and kill some foam.  Most of our shots were rather close, but I had an extreme moment of pride when we were shooting at some targets from one of the treestand towers.  The closest target was 19 yards away.  This is quite a challenge for Matthew since most of his shooting is done from 10 yards and in and his little Diamond Nuclear Ice bow does not pack much of a punch.  To both of our surprises however Matthew was able to put a shot not only on the bear target, but a perfect heart shot.  Now I realize that it was a lucky shot but that does not diminish the pride I have in my little man for continuing to develop into a future TCW prostaffer.

Here are some pictures of our shooting day.

Good hunting!

Tom Lester of Monster Raxx had reached out to his fellow bowhunters on Bowhunting.com to get some help testing out their new line of attractants, Whitetail Magnet and Apple Harvest.  After an overwhelming response by volunteers Tom selected a small group and fortunately Bryan Roth of TCW was one of the lucky few.

Upon receiving the package it was clear that this attractant was potent.  Just opening the bottle consumed the air with a sweet, sticky, fragrance that lasted long after the bottle was closed.  Shortly after receiving the new products Bryan and Damien devised a plan on how best to test this with deer.

Having used corn for years to put deer in front of our trail cameras we decided that a taste test set up would be the best option.  What that means is we would set up two piles of corn in front of trail cameras.  One pile would be mixed with the Monster Raxx attractants and the other would be plain corn.  Then we let the pictures tell the story of which the deer prefer.

Check out the video below of our initial set up and be sure to check back to see the results.

UPDATE-We have gotten the initial results from checking our cameras and we were quite surprised by what we found.  The deer clearly favored the plain corn initially for the first couple of days.  After getting used to the Monster Raxx product they did begin using it and then moved over to the Monster Raxx heavily and eventually exclusively as the plain corn ran out.  With the sweet smell of the Monster Raxx Whitetail Magnet I thought for sure that they would be attracted to it, but in retrospect I guess I can’t be completely surprised.  The locations we used for this test have had corn used in the past to get trail camera pictures so the deer are used to plain shelled corn.  I’ve seen similar results when we’ve put corn cobs out in place of the shelled corn wear the deer are wary for a few days.  So the fact that they went to what they are used to makes sense.  So without further delay here are the supporting pictures.

The deer in the first four pictures are clearly favoring the plain corn.

In the second four pictures they are getting used to the Monster Raxx and using both piles.  In fact you can see in two of the pics one deer is going back and forth between the piles.

In the last group of pictures the deer are clearly enjoying the Monster Raxx corn and by the end are using that pile exclusively until both piles are gone.

Conclusion: The Monster Raxx product definitely has its merits and the deer certainly like it.  However keep in mind that any change to what the deer are used to will have an affect on them.

Good hunting!