Rut & Pre-Rut Timing

[UpStateRedNeck]

Unfortunately for people who must reserve their time off a month or two in advance, we cannot be Wild and just hunt whenever (26 years until retirement!), and I think my original plan stands, take the first week of November off, work 2 days the second week, and then become tragically ill for good weather after that.

I don't think there's any "witchcraft" involved in saying female reproductive cycles are moon based though.  And I don't think it's a big stretch to say deer are loosely based on the same thing, such as when it's cold and there's a full moon, x-part of their reproductive cycle kicks in.  I think it probably relies more on temperature than equinox/solstice, but I'm sure they factor in too.

There's certainly no exact formula for it, but I think we can agree that we can get a ballpark as we get closer to the season.

[Buckstopshere]

Good questions guys. But I come at it from a different angle.

First of all, we all know when the rut is here each year. Since we hunt about every day and have for many years and write about it, so I can look back and compare data.

Interestingly, hunting blogs are a great data base. If guys see rutting action, they often post it. If they don't and it is dead out there, they post that too.

An analysis of all the hunting blogs is certainly anecdotal evidence, but it is one more support for when the rut happens.

Of course it happens in different areas of the country at different times. Like in Texas, there are actually Three separate rutting times! Must be crazy down there! But each one month apart.

I used to think that the First week of November is Always the best, here. But over the years, other weeks from the last week in October to the third week in November were the hottest...and what I mean by hottest is that time when the most deer are on their feet in the daytime and everyone is saying (even if it isn't me.) "Man, the deer are in rut, they were grunting...running, chasing does..." And a lot of bucks get arrowed at that time, even though Doc's scenario and frustration is all so true.

Nonetheless, I am fascinated by the timing of it. It changes each year. Is there a correlation? Yes there is. By keeping track on a calendar over the years and checking everything from temperature to the moon phases, sure enough. Yes indeed. There is a correlation.

What is it? It appears to be a simple formula, 10 days after the Full Moon after the Harvest Moon. Why?

Just science.

So I started looking into photoperiodism and how it effects all critters including man. How? There is a little pine cone shaped gland in our brain and in the deer's brain that is sensitive to light. It is called the Suprachiasmatic Nucleus. This little gland in some animals is considered the master gland, regulating the others with hormones including melatonin.

Among other things it is a timing mechanism so that the bucks and does can both come into sexual readiness at the same time.

There are many questions and we are just beginning to understand. But as we record what we see and jetison some of the popular myths of the rut, we come closer to answering them. 

[nyslowhand]

Suppose just for a minute you are correct, don't agree, but suppose.

Eventually we'll know exactly when the does go into peak estrous over, for agreement sake, a 7 day period.

Utilizing this science based, data supported theory, those 7 days are when all hunters will be out seeking the bucks.

This would be a great benefit to hunters for scheduling vacations or time off.

Hunting is a sport of chance and luck, minimized by experience and tactics.

Your implying it will become a scientific, controlled exercise?

It's the unexpected appearance of a buck that gets my adrenaline pumping!

If I knew when to expect this I'd more than likely lose interest in the pursuit.

Hunting as a sport would then die out or possibly simply be renamed Harvest Season.

I do believe one of the triggers for the whitetail rut is photoperoidism.

Also not convinced it is directly related to the specific full moon you're implying.

That's merely a coincidence with the specific shortened daylight needed as a factor in starting the rut.

What if - there were some natural phenomenon like a volcano eruption and it blocked the moon's reflective capabilities for the specific full moon needed to initiate the rut, it wouldn't start then until the next visible full moon?

If you have facts that support this connection of photoperoidism to the rutting moon - show me.

I can be swayed, but not by hearsay.

[Buckstopshere]

The last thing I would ever want to do was take any of the excitement and adrenaline out of the sport we love.

But wouldn't it be good for the average guy with a wife and kids and a job to know when to be out there...maybe even take those precious days off to be able to get a buck or doe with a bow?

For too many years I have seen guys (myself included) take the days off when the rut was supposed to happen, only to sit in a tree and contemplate...and contemplate. Not that that is a bad thing. That is great...but to know...or have a great expectation and know that this it the right time and just be in the right place...and things are going to happen is a wonderful thing.

Anyway, that's how I look at it. Having been a working father with kids and trying to balance everything in life and still be out in the woods. It would have been a great thing to know or have a better reasonable expectation of when success would come in on four hoofed feet.

As to what would happen if a volcano....

blocked the light and skewed the photoperiodic effect.

Well, I would expect that as in tropisms (why plants lean to the light,) things would be radically altered. But everything would scramble to live. I'd bet my bottom dollar on that!

I enjoy history. There was an instance, back in the late 1700s when what they called the "Little Ice Age." And some think that there was a huge volcanic explosion in the South Seas islands that caused it. How did that skew things? Probably to the same degree of darkness or lightness that it caused.

But it seems that the internal clocks, embedded in the clock genes in ours and the whitetail's, and everything else's DNA would not change even through a few generations, until there was a die off and selective pressures changed.

The old earth seems to shrug off some of these catastrophes like we would a cold.

Like my dog shakes off water.

A pain in the butt for a while, but the earth bounces back.

And the programming is still in the genes of the sentient life that by hook or by crook made it through to fulfill its biological imperative to reproduce.

[nyslowhand]

We're getting way off course here!!

I don't understand your undying devotion to the rutting moon theory.

But I recognize your opinion as I hope you do mine!

I absolutely understand the working person's dilemma, struggled with the optimum time off myself for a few years.

Then realized I was never going to pre-schedule my time off and the peak rut together.

Took the shotgun approach with vacation time; several long weekends, put my time in the treestand and hope for the best.

To all of you terrific working class individuals that are contributing to my Social Security, I appreciate it!

Don't be hatin' - but this is the 1st year retired and I am going to have pizzas & my mail delivered to my treestand.

So, let them boys & girls rut when they want to.

[CNYlungbuster]

I got a simple solution everybody makes your best guess as to when the rut is going to happen.  Then every one needs to go out and shoot a late season doe and measure the fetus to back date the rut..... to bad it won't tell us when the rut is and only when it was lol  .

CNY

[Buckstopshere]

I've tried that.  ;D Couple problems in the late season the fetus is so small, about the size of a kidney bean on the big ones and about the size of a couple bb's stuck together on the small side. Second is that to get a data base on the nose to rump measurement is not accurate.

Also, the more I looked into it, fetus aging has some inherent problems which have recently come to light with more rigorous scrutiny.

For instance, fetus variance in size from doe to buck skews the time (so they are averaged,) the actual measuring process is problematical, and the time frame, + or - is a few weeks at best and not precise enough to predict the week of the rut.