You're aware that wasn't a happy Dog glad to see you tail wag?
Well, with some of my doe, it's hard to tell what is going through their head sometimes. In this case, what I suspect was that she was curious at first. Here was a big old boot print in her path. She was in a little lane that opens into a narrow pasture to the north of my luxury box at Midway. I'd gone through that way on my way to the stand. My guess is she stuck her nose down in there to see what had made the print. For a moment she froze, and then resumed her course, twitching her tail as she went.
My interpretation is that she was seriously considering the print, but there was so little human scent she disregarded its import. The tail flicking was of a sort that would indicate she was back at ease. You can't help the smell crushed grass makes when you step on it, but you can reduce your own personal stink enough so the deer don't bust you.
My point in bringing it up was that here was an instance where a deer actually did find my backtrail, but there was enough scent to cause her alarm. I'd made the print less than an hour before. That same instance, if I'd been out hiking about a month earlier without minding my scent would have caused her to go on alert.
MInd you, in a remote place with a mature buck, the animal might have taken off for the next county. However, the Trans-Bluegrass is a heavily hunted region. Deer and humans live side-by-side.
