YES!!!!! What works is developing a good stand before season, getting in the woods really bleeping early, and staying bleeping put all bleeping day. A real nutcase I know owns a long oak ridge in the middle of a HUGE swohmp in Pine county, Minn., which in general is the most miserable god forsaken buck brush imaginable, beat only by Aitkin county, which is beyond horrible. At any rate-he spashes through the swamp two full days before opener, sets up camp, and unwinds for two days. Gets up at maybe 0400 opening day, creeps through the woods about a half mile to the other end of his oak ridge, and sits down overlooking the swamp. And drops a deer every year, period.
And then there is this other friend of mine who has eight or so acres that backs to a local Rapid Oil Change and K-Mart, and he hunts so close to both stores he can hear the conversation on the loading docks. And yes, it's legal. He is also within about fifty yards of 35-just out of Forest Lake. All the deer scent nonsense is nonsense. I have always thought that deer pick up an off scent just as easily as we detect an off smell in our kitchen, no matter how light. And the stuff reeks. De-scent all your clothes, ever your boots-I wear different boots in the woods than I drive to the woods in.