Creating a watering hole or placing a watering system on your property is a great way to provide the deer herd with a constant source of water. This will keep them healthy throughout the hot summer months and could encourage them to look for bedding areas nearby on your property. We’ve got a few tips for how to create and maintain a watering hole on your hunting property.

1. Choose a Prime Location

If you already have Feedbank Deer Feeders on your property, it would be beneficial to create a watering hole close to them. Deer love simplicity. If you provide them with a food source and a water source in the same area, they’ll be more likely to frequent the area and could choose to make their bedding areas nearby as well. Deer love it when all three comforts: food, water, and bedding, are within a reasonable range. Watering holes are most effective when there is no other water source nearby, so make sure you’re not placing it near an existing stream or other natural water source.

You’ll also want to make sure you’ll have a clear shooting area between the food source, water source, and/or bedding area. If you place the watering hole in an area with nowhere to put your Stump blind, that won’t help you when hunting season opens. You don’t want to hunt directly over the water source, but you don’t want to be so far away from it that you can’t hunt the deer herd’s path to it, either.

2. Keep it Filled

Make sure you maintain the watering hole with plenty of water. Once you’ve dug the watering hole and placed your tank inside, you can use our Wild Water® Bladder to fill it up. The Bladder holds up to 100 gallons, so you don’t have to make multiple trips back to the house to fill it up. Once you’ve filled the Bladder, you should be able to fill your watering hole easily with minimal trips. It comes with four heavy-duty D-rings so that you can secure it to the bed of your truck or ATV during transport. It’s also made of a puncture-resistant material, so you shouldn’t need to worry about anything that might be lingering on the bed of your truck puncturing it.

If you don’t want to create your own watering hole, you can use our Wild Water® 50, 100, or 300 systems. The numbers correspond with how many gallons of water it can hold. Each system comes with a trough that the deer can drink from. The float valve system automatically shuts off when the trough is full, so you never need to worry about wasting water. The lid is secure, keeping the water fresh and other animals out.

3. Use Minerals

Whether you use our Wild Water® System or make your own watering hole, you can fill it with our Wild Water® Mineral Supplement. The minerals help provide the deer herd with the adequate nutrition they need for overall health and antler growth. Deer know when they’re healthy and when they’re not. Once they realize that the water on your property is keeping them healthy, they’ll come back for more. Each mineral package treats 50 gallons of water. You can choose between apple, grape, vanilla, persimmon, or our unflavored minerals, or purchase the variety pack to get all five. You can also decide to get the Starter Kit which a package of mineral supplement, a 50 gallon system and a bladder.

However you choose to place a watering hole on your property, you should be able to see the benefits by the time hunting season starts. Check your state’s regulations for supplemental feeding and nutrition before you create your watering hole.

Do you have a watering hole on your property? What tips do you have for maintaining one? Let us know in the comments below!

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