Any ideas on the rut time
Ohio
First 2 weeks of November... Same Bat time, same Bat channel year after year...8^)
To be more precise, Nov 5 - 11, has been the peak week action days in my area... Rain or shine, bucks will be moving those days, regardless of moon phase... Furious active scraping seems to slow down after about the 13th or 14th, although any date from the last few days of October up to gun season opener anything can happen... As Wensel's book is titled, "Come November"...
Have shot 3 of my last 4 bucks on the 13th, mid morning, 9 to 11, but seen em moving all day around that date. Like Zbone mentioned, 1st 2 weeks of November seem to be the most consistent
So if a guy had to choose when to take a week off? I was planning on hunting almost all day from Oct 30 to Nov 7. Should I push it back a week?
I personally love, love, love Halloween and the week after it. Shot my 2 biggest bucks back to back Halloweens in 2015 and 2016! Weather is always a factor and cannot be decided on until you get closer to the dates...although I've shot several great bucks when it was sunny and in the 60s!
U guys expect to see mid day movement last couple days of October if the temps are cooler than the average? Like funnel movement, or are u still trying to get in tight onto bedding?
I would hunt 6-12 if I had one week.
I would hunt 6-12 if I had one week.
SIP, With cool temperatures in the last days of Oct. I will hunt all day. I start at the outside of my property and hunt in as the season progresses so I am hunting easy access, low impact areas. I am hunting rut movement more so than feeding patterns. Bucks will be in their home area so I am probably hunting bucks that live there. I do not worry much about hunting near buck bedding areas except that I do not want to blow them out.
Lone Wolf - I think your right on with your week... Personally have only one week this year and my vacation begins October 30 and have to return to work on November 7th... Would have preferred a couple days later but just the way my schedule fell... My experience through the years have seen more ACTION the first week of November, cruzin'n, chasing, fighting, scraping, etc... The big ones seem to be hooked up more with does by the second week causing less movement.... That first week they all seem to be chasing and higher odds of catching one on the move... Better chance of catching them out during the middle of the day running scrapes and cruz'n that first week... Not that they'll seize scraping but they seem to tire of working scrapes about the 14th or 15th... By Mid-November they might still run scrap lines and smell them but some times seem to lack the enthusiasm to work and fresh them... But put a hot doe in the area and the dirt will fly again...8^)
Lone Wolf, personally don’t like dark of the moon period which makes up much of the first week of November.
Hunt whenever you choose but I would no why that I am making that choice. Halloween is a great week but I hunt public ground and I need the testosterone to be flowing to get big bucks on there feet in the daytime.
Lone Wolf, personally don’t like dark of the moon period which makes up much of the first week of November.
Hunt whenever you choose but I would no why that I am making that choice. Halloween is a great week but I hunt public ground and I need the testosterone to be flowing to get big bucks on there feet in the daytime.
LW, dark of the moon period should be good too but I prefer Four to five after the dark of the moon or full moon for that matter.
Both weeks are good but everyone has their preferences as I have mine.
I was watching Deer & Deer Hunting on YouTube and their rut predictor calender says that the best hunting during the rut will be Oct. 30th thru Nov. 8th. If you believe in Charles Alshiemer's moon phase theory. They said to schedule your vacation for those days.
Great information. Thanks
I agree with them. I'm on vacation that week.
If I remember correctly, I think the one time P&Y WR Beatty Buck from Ohio was killed on Nov 8th...
Oops, double post, my bad...
Peak Nov. 9th, Mature bucks starting Nov. 3 (occasionally earlier). Starting about the 10th it gets more random. After the 15th cruising bucks hoping to find a doe in heat. If I had 1 week 11/5-11/12. If I was worried another hunter would kill my buck a couple days earlier. Crossbows are legal and very deadly.
Some of the big boys chasing does hard mid day today in the CVNP.
Thanks for sharing cord62, although I don't work up by there anymore, luv CVNP... One of the biggest wild bucks I ever seen alive on hoof was there... I know he had 20+ points with kickers and stickers going every which direction...
Got skunked today. Still getting pics of bucks at night
Cuyahoga valley national park, i believe. South of cleveland
Yeah Cuyahoga Valley National Park... The quaint little village of Peninsula in about the center of the park which run north and south a couple miles along the river from north of Akron to south of Cleveland... I reported to Hudson, but worked most of the phone exchanges around CVNP, Hudson, Peninsula, Richfield, Northfield, etc... The brute I seen wasn't far from Peninsula, a good viewing area is under the gigantic bridges of I80 and I271 across the valley... There is/was and active Peregrine falcon nest under one of the I80 bridges... I spent a lot of lunch and break time under those bridges...8^) Careful driving Riverview and Akron Peninsula Roads this time of year...
Maybe Matt will chime in, and only assuming, but I think he's more up towards Brecksville...
I have been getting a few nice bucks on camera with some being in daylight. Big change in the last week.
I know that some will think this is hogwash. But, childhood friend has been hunting by tne moon. But, he only hunts according to the apigee and perigee. He has taken many big whitetails in both Pa. and Ohio along with his brother and his brothers friends. He told me to be out 3 days before and 3 days after the new moon this year. He said that the moon will be in the perigee stage. He is not hunting this year because he had a stroke in Feb. And he only 63.
Running cameras in Ohio on my family's farm consistently since 2015, best daylight activity I have experienced is Nov 7-9th. Add in a week on either side of that and you are in the heart of it. Agree with Zbone, the rut never changes, just folks perception of it...if you aren't seeing activity, its simply going on somewhere else or at night.
Saw a couple of good bucks tonight. One came out earlier and fed with a few does before moving off. I grunted him to 30 yards with no shot before he caught my wind. He disappeared to opposite side of field only to come back out when 2nd nice buck got close to that side of the field. They did a half circle around each other (I thought they were going to fight) and the first one continued to leave where the 2nd one came from. Neither one showed interest in chasing/running any does around, BUT, they were on their feet before dark.
Was in southern ohio this weekend. Cut our trip short because it was crazy green in the woods yet, majority of the scrapes were untouched since before the rain thurs/friday. Really felt like October 5th…. Saving the vacation days for when the bucks are more likely to be on their feet mid day. We will try this weekend, temps look great, we will see if anything changes tho i dont feel like 4 days is enough for what the woods looked like… Was very surprised to day the least.
Hunted eastern Ohio yesterday. I never saw a deer. Dad passed a 120ish buck working scrapes, and a few does. Worst Halloween weekend for movement I can remember. Feels like it’s at least a week behind.
Watched a big mature buck tending a doe at 4:50 PM this afternoon, hours before dark... It's on...
Halloween has always been good to me yet this year saw nothing in the morning, not one deer and the afternoon was slow also but saw several bucks. Did some calling and had a decoy out that seemed to get some attention. Not quite there yet imo. Seems like fall is a few weeks behind. No frost yet to my knowledge in October, lots of leaves still up and green. Colder temps this week should pick up activity and I hope to capitalize this wknd!
A little story.... Locally have a couple family groups of 5 does and 2 fawns seen all summer and especially the past month and a half or so since I planted rye in the back field and they show daily in the evening in the rye... Haven’t seen a buck in the neighborhood all year… At least two maybe three of the 5 does were mature enough to have had fawns this spring but at this time there are only 2 fawns left, one each to different mothers... One is a button buck, one is a doe fawn, but in July there were at least one set of twin fawns, but now seems only one is left... What happened to the other I don't know and only assume coyotes I hear and see occasionally... Of those 5 does I assume a couple of them were fawns last year and too small to breed, but of the 5, how many actually gave birth I don't know, but do know only 2 fawns left... Most of the time all 7 seem to hang together and of these now mature 5 does I look at them as bait the next couple weeks...
Last night November 2, as I pull in my driveway just before 10 PM, are a couple of deer laying together in my front yard just a few feet away off the driveway, which is not uncommon because they are there all the time, even during daylight hours eating acorns from the 3 huge oak trees in the front yard... Yeah, they bed in my front yard at night and sometimes during the day drive right by them just a few yards away even allow me to get out of the vehicle to walk to the door without spooking... They're pretty humanized by the neighbors and I not bother them much, although my Teckel takes great pleasure running them out of the yard once in a while…8^)
At first I thought they were two of the does laying there less than 10 yards away… So I stop to get a better look and they both stand up, and to my surprise I now see one of them as a little dink half rack small forkhorn…. This little buck had a little spike with a fork on the end of it… Before they moved off, I couldn’t tell if the other side was broke off or just didn’t grow…
I’m like, mannnnn, couldn’t this doe find a bigger buck to hook up with, this sux...
Gotta love the first week of November.. Beautiful calm, quiet evening, they were running crazy this this day...
I'm calling him a 13-pointer...8^)
Oh sweet! Congrats!!
What a weird rack but I like it !
Did you know this buck ?
Thanks Pat... Yeah, got to know the buck the past couple years or so... He's either 4 or 5 and was likely 2-1/2 when I first seen him I think three years ago, but it may have been two, have to check notes... Rack frame seems smaller than last year for reason not known but kinda doubt age, only guessing nutrition...
Sounds like you're having fun in Ohio Pat...8^) Glad to hear...
You ask if I knew that buck,,, finally had a chance to look at notes and pix... I've known him for three seasons... Pix attached on this post was in 2019 as a 3x3 when I first started noticing him... May have seen him years prior as a dink but didn't notice... From the first time I saw him until he died, he walked with a right front leg limp likely causing his freak rack but am sure it was healed enough by the time he grew this rack pictured which am only guessing he was a 2 year old... Don't know, maybe 3 with that condition... When skinning, we found a big knot at the knee, so my buddy and I was going to have a bet as to what it was...8^) Looking and feeling at it, buddy thought broken bone, I said either broadhead or .22 bullet... So to settle the bet, we started digging into it... Yuck, after getting into it, a rubberish type substance like hard pus started to come out and grosses us both out, so we quit and dispatched the leg... We joked, well, we will never know...8^) It did not affect the meat though because he is delicious...8^) Amazing he walked/run around like that for at least 3 years... Although he favored that leg and didn't seem to want to plant it firmly in the ground all the time, it didn't seem to bother him much... He was still in the rutting game chasing does and scent flamen (sp) and he'd work the heck out of licking branches and even scrape with both legs... But when another buck approached, he quickly back down... Matter of fact, it was another buck that pushed him past me for the shot...
Passed on him a couple times here in 2020 as a 6x3...
Since this thread is about timing, thought I'd share that a huge buck in an area I hunt was road killed November 9th, and a buddy shot a nice one yesterday...
Statewide Youth Season this coming this weekend make cause a few to go back under cover...
The blaze orange army invasion in the morning likely ending most daylight rutting in many areas, although have seen breeding during gun season but notice how the meat pole postings have tapered off the past couple weeks... Again the first two weeks of November being the peak... Same bat time, same bat channel next year...
I’m tagged out and back home so hopefully the deer refuge on my farm for gun season. I have acres of impenetrable thickets. There’s quite a few bucks I’d love to see make it another year.
I’m tagged out and back home so hopefully the deer refuge on my farm for gun season. I have acres of impenetrable thickets. There’s quite a few bucks I’d love to see make it another year.
First two weeks of November…that is when most hunters are in the woods. So, no matter the case, deer can only get shot if hunters are in the woods hunting them.
Ohio deer/auto crash statistics confirm first two weeks of November peak activity without hunters numbers...
