Joe Bucher goes in depth on how learning about thermals will help you to conceal your scent during deer season.

 One great benefit of hunting from a treestand positioned far above ground level is how it affects your own scent stream downwind of your position and across trails deer likely go down. From the ground, you’re sure to get nailed by any whitetail traveling downwind of your position. As soon as you elevate your position, however, your scent is likely to waft undetected overtop a scent-sensitive whitetail. But the actual time of day you hunt and the terrain you’re on can have a huge bearing on how your scent travels no matter how high you are off the ground.

Without getting too technical, remember that human scent is more likely to carry upward for a greater distance in the morning as the sun heats up the ground, creating a rising “thermal” condition. Conversely, your scent is much more likely to drop like a bomb right into the deer’s path after sunset on a cold, clear evening as the thermal reverses itself, cooling the high spots and plunging more dense, cooling air downward.

A warm, strong, southerly wind early in the evening might blow your scent harmlessly away from all deer that are downwind, until sunset. Then, if the wind suddenly dies down after sunset and skies remain clear, any ground heat quickly escapes and is replaced by a massive cool-down that plummets the air downward. In many cases, it even reverses its direction after sunset, pushing your scent right at every deer below you. This is called a “thermal reversal.” Whenever you get “winded” by a deer, but were certain you were in a wind-friendly spot, this is exactly what has happened—you experienced the phenomenon, thermal reversal.

To learn about the importance of elevated treestands and there art of concealment, check out Joe Bucher’s full feature article in the October issue of MidWest Outdoors magazine, available the first full week of October at a newsstand near you.

To listen to a full-length MWO Podcast interview with Joe Bucher,  click here.