Salt Licks for Deer

[Perch74]

Why do Deer need salt this time of year and how long will they continue to visit the salt? l have found that regular road salt has brought in some nice bucks already but l'm still a newbie at this. Any info would be great, Thanks

[diesel]

We like to put the salt block on an old stump. Then when in rains the salt will go into the old stump and when the salt block is gone the deer will eat the stump.

[LoneWolf]

We like to put the salt block on an old stump. Then when in rains the salt will go into the old stump and when the salt block is gone the deer will eat the stump.

I agree with diesel here. Like him, if I can find an old rotted out stump, I'll put a salt block on top of it and when it rains the stump will soak up the minerals then the deer will destroy that stump to get the minerals out of the rotted wood/stump. I've also put made some right on the ground/soil as another member mentioned, and like he said they will dig the ground right up to get at the minerals that has soaked into the ground. It's best to make the licks where there is top-soil and clay rather than sand.

Here a link to an old thread on mineral licks from last year.

http://www.excaliburcrossbow.com/phpBB2 ... salt+licks

LW

[Moxie]

I have several mineral licks I refresh every spring and in the fall if I get to them. This is accomplished with 200 pounds of mineralized salt in 50 pound bags. I also add 4 gallons of liquid Deer Cane. Usually, by the time I get into the camp Memorial Day weekend to refresh them, they have already been hit very well. I find that after mid August they are hardly touched anymore.

[crazyfarmer]

damn, ya'll are diehard LOL.. i just hunt fields, bottoms, and marsh edges

Nothing like a tender crop of soybeans to atractt deer.. and where the doe are, the bucks will come

but yes deer like salt since it has minerals they need. Same for cattle and horses.

[kendo kid]

Salt licks is only a partial description of what is in the salt block. The critical factor is the not as much the NACl but rather the Ca and P that accompany the "lick". Most licks or blocks nowadays come with the minerals in the block. It is not correct to say the minerals are in the browse. If the minerals are in low concentrations in the ground they will be in low concentrations in the browse. Additionally the pH level of the soil has a huge impact on the availability of the minerals to the plants and thus to the animals that eat them (including cattle or dairy cows). The most important elements are the Ca (calcium) and P (phosphorus). Both elements are critical to bone development for the fetus in the doe as well as the milk she supplies to the fawn. Bucks also require large amounts of Ca and P "salts" for antler development. The road salt is generally CaCl and is impure. This means it carries significant levels of P, Mg, etc all of which are important elements in lesser degrees to growing animals. Bucks have the ability to translocate Ca and P from various parts of their body, usually the ribs, to its antlers during antler development.

So the salt is not really the NaCl we normally think of as salt; but rather a mix of other salts constituting macro and micro ingredients necessary for good development. Genetics plays an important part of the ability to produce good racks and healthy doe and fawn populations. However, the levels of P and K (potassium) as well as N (nitrogen the building blocks of proteins) are more available in farm crops than in natural browse. Deer raised on natural browse do not realize their full potential if they can not access good quantities of salts. A soil test will indicate if your area is short or has sufficient supplies of these vital elements. If it is not in the ground it is not in the plant and can not be in the deer.

[wabi]

I keep a salt block out near the food plot and it gets hit heavily through the spring & summer by deer. Come fall & winter not so much use, but it's there if they want it. I've also seen squirrels use it!

[kendo kid]

Wabi,
Exactly right. Spring and summer are when the fetus and demands for milk are heavy on the does. The demand is high for the bucks in antler development. In the fall the horns stop growing and demand declines. The does stop nursing and begin to prepare for breeding and the start of the cycle. It is amazing to see the different soils surrounding the Great Lakes. Some are sweet and usually have high pH due to be formed during the period when we were an inland sea. These soils can be high in Ca due the presence of coral head calcium cabonate formed during that time. Soils running higher than 7.8 pH may have the minerals in them but they are locked up with a tight chemical bond that is un-effected by the area around the rootlet (rhizosphere) as it attempts to free the nutrients by altering the electrical charge attaching the mineral salts and nutrients to the soil particles. The soils, formed from the era of the fresh water and great forest, are more acid based. The ideal pH for maximum nutrient availability is a slightly acid 6.8 pH. I hope everyone uses a soil test to really give their deer the best start and mineral balance they can.

About 9 years ago I worked with a farm suffering from high lamb losses. The farmer also, in passing, mentioned he always saw a lot of dead fawns. After soil test it was very evident the old fields were simply "played out". The Ca, P and K levels were on the floor. Using yearly applications of steamed bone meal, and sul-po-mag we reversed the lamb losses. The farmer stopped seeing dead fawns and it was a happy ending with increasing herd numbers and health it became a great place to hunt for some heavy racked bucks.

[LoneWolf]

It is not correct to say the minerals are in the browse. .

kk, Just so you know, the info I write down on these forums isn't just coming from the top of my head. The information I put down on these forums are either from actual personal experiences, or something I've read in books while doing some research. Yes, I agree that in some areas the trees will have more minerals in them than the same trees will have in another area, As you said, the more minerals in the ground, the more minerals will naturally go into the browse. That's why some areas grow bigger antlers on the bucks and healthier animals than in other areas. I'm gonna look in my library and I'm gonna try to find the book I read that in and I'll post the tiltle of the book.

[LoneWolf]

double posted for some reason???

[kendo kid]

Lonewolf,
Deer can SURVIVE on browse no matter how poor it is. If deer are to optimize their potential they need high protein food sources with loads of trace elements specifically Ca, P, Mg and a host of micronutrients. This reason domestic animals do better when fed grains and nutrient supplements in their feed. Have you ever seen or eaten a chicken in China that grew up on what it could scratch vs an organic chicken feed grains. The difference is gnawing chicken and eating chicken. . . survival vs allowing the animals to reach its full potential.

I have 35 years experience in agriculture and have read thousands of soil tests from 4 continents. I certainly know the soils and their shortcomings from PEI to SK. I am very familiar with the soils of Ont. and QC. LOW in available Phosphorus, as these soils were burned out 80 years ago and most of the available Ca and P were transported to the cities in the form of meat, bone and milk. SK mines Phosphorus and Potassium and sell it to farmers in Eastern Canada and the US. The big racks of the Midwest US come from the most fertile ground in North America and man are they bean and corn fed. I call them dairy deer. The success of all animals depends on its ability to obtain nutrients. Please look at Japan as an example. My wife's mother represents the generation born and raised before and during WWII. Look at the difference in size from my wife's generation raised on a very different diet. It is the same for all species.

The best way to ensure good fawn survival and the biggest racks the gene pool can produce is to do a soil test. Apples, acorns, berries and all nut and fruit trees and plants require large amounts of Ca and P to produce their seeds. Phosphorus spikes can be purchased at the landscaping center and driven into the ground around some of the major mast producing trees to assist in good yields. I have used them on around the oak trees in Ont. It really helps.

But then do what suits you.

[LoneWolf]

bstout, I agree, minerals are in the dirt.

kk

I'm not disagreeing with what you're saying, cause I'm by far not a biologist nor an earth/dirt "expert". And I'm sure you could probably teach me a few things when it comes to agriculture. After all, you do have 35 years of experience in agricuture. All I know is, after 6 or 7 years of planting food plots, and over 10 years of putting out licks, I've definitely seen a difference in the antler growth on the bucks and a healthier herd all together. That said, what I'm doing seems to be working just fine. I've been catching more and more big racked bucks on my trail cams, and I've also harvested three Ontario Record Book bucks back to back for three years in a row for the three past seasons, with one of them making Pope & Young as it was harvested with my compound, and not the crossbow. I must be doing something right, woudn't you say?

P.S. I do have a Bio-Logic ph gauge ( for soil samples), and before I start a plot I always take a soil sample to see what it's lacking so that it can be added.

[kendo kid]

Lonewolf,
Man you are definitely headed in the right direction. Soil tests are excellent for the food plot. Now go take a test in the forest where there is a good concentration of mast (wild apples, nut, berries) and see what the results show. Use this browse area just like a food plot. I did this with a black berry patch. The location was an old logging landing that had been taken over by the berries. I was hunting in Tenn. With realtives and any time between around Nov. 15, depending on when the first frost hits and kills most of the forbes, the raspberry and black berry leaves act like a magnet as they are still green. By providing some P and K to the patch in spring I gave them a good shot of winter hardiness. (K provides the roots with elastic qualities to stretch and retract without breaking as the ground freezes and thaws.) The healthy berry leaves drew a nice doe as the sun was coming up. She was enjoying the snack as she headed back to her bedding area. About 15 minutes later a nice buck stopped by for a munch as well. I shot the buck (270 rifle) he ran about 30 yards and dropped. She stood there contentedly eating the black berry leaves without a care in the world. She stayed until she was full. All the commotion the buck made did not deter her one bit. I really belief the palatability of the leaves was greater due to the increased sugar provided by the extended photosynthetic process of the healthier patch.

In the fields I use a refractometer to measure the sugar levels of various field crops. It is an excellent indicator of how well the crops are doing. I applied these same techniques of "production" to areas in the forest producing mast. My best xbow deer in Ontario is a 14 point 161 taken on the farm, I mentioned earlier, with the sheep.

Good luck on your great string of big boys.

[sidekick]

Around here, the logging companies spray something on the roads to cut down on the dust and help with erosion. It's somewhat vicous and has kind of a sweet smell, but I have know idea what's in it...all I do know is, deer come for miles to lick the roads. I've seen deer lick a hole in the road to the point where they look like a bunch of ostrich out there with their heads buried in the sand.

[kendo kid]

Sidekick,
It is probably CaCl in an impure state. This means it has many other kinds of salts in it also. The more pure it is the more expensive it is. Food Grade is the high quality stuff and used only for food products. Again table salt is NaCl but ingredient salts for manufacturing thousands of other products are frequently other types of salts. A great and fascinating book to read is the History of Salt. It sounds dull but is far from it. Only 150 years ago it was one of the most valuable commodities on Earth. The salts were nearly all manufactured using an evaporation system for either sea water (still used today in the Dead Sea region and still loaded with impurities) or shafts drop into salt deposits where water was poured down the shaft and brine hauled. Each area of the world manufactured different types and colors of salt. The English word "wich" like in the name Norwich is the Celtic word for "place of salt". The towns carrying this term as part of their name reflect their history as salt manufacturing locations. In the 1600's in North America during the measuring of salt for a customer, no one was allowed to even walk across the room for fear of disturbing the scales of this very necessary and expensive product. It was not until the discovery of salt in northern New York state (Cayuga) (forgive my spelling) that things began to change. Here salt was discovered to reside not very far below the surface. Brine operations began as it further explorations as to the direction and size of the salt vein. It turned out to be one of the largest salt discoveries in the world. The vein so fast it extended from northern New York state to east shore of Lake Huron. In fact the world was changed. Direct mining of salt began in vast quantities and still continues under Lake Huron with 100's of kilometers of salt dome tunnels. The salt no longer had to be brined and evaporated. Cost plunged to become so inexpensive as to be "as common as salt." China was the leader in shaft and evaporation techniques for pumping the brine. When be were so proud to have drilled and pumped oil from a depth of less than 100 feet, China as already 20 times deeper in Zagong at its pumping operations for salt. Zagong has fallen from favor during the past 100 years. I hope I will see it before to many more years.

bstout:
The road salt and salt blocks return to a brine state when it rains. The salt brine soaks into the soil where the salt attaches to the soil particles. Once the light electrical bond is established between the soil particle and the salt, it is difficult to break. However, it will leach out of the soil over time. The deer are consuming the soil (mud) as that is what the salt is attached to. Deer have not figured out how to build fires and evaporate the salt so they do not have to eat the dirt. They do not much care if they have to eat a little dirt to get to the salt. With out these salts all creatures on this planet would not survive long. Salts assist in establishing an electrolyte balance in the blood as well as contribute to an entire host of other functions in the body.

I hope this helps everyone understand a little more about salt and the need we all have for it.