The Whitetail Rut

“The Rut“. That special time in the deer woods that deer hunters all over North America live for. We dream about it. It consumes hours of our daily thoughts. We save our precious hard earned money and vacation time just to participate in it. We even talk about the rut endlessly often over analyzing it until we have talked ourselves into believing what we want it to be.

This annual autumn spectacular phenomena of nature cannot be described to the average wing shooter or berry collector. It must be experienced and lived. Often this takes years to understand and appreciate. Nothing in the hunting community is more magical or frustrating.

Yet we as deer hunters often live and hunt a rut of our own. This describes my 2011 whitetail deer season in Minnesota. I have spent years scouting year round, setting trail cameras, and carefully hanging stands in all the right places. I practice scent control and play the wind every time I sit in a stand. Even when I enter and exit my stand sites I try to be silent and careful with the least amount of disturbance. Despite all of this I just did not see the deer I expected to encounter from my stands. These stands are located in areas that have always been so productive for me. The buck sign I was used to seeing just was not present. I told myself the deer numbers were down.

I didn’t realize until the last few weeks while out shed hunting that I was the one in a rut. I started walking all the areas I usually expect to see deer travel and just like this past deer season, there was no sign. Then one day while taking a short cut back to the truck I stumbled onto a rub line with some of the biggest scrapes I have ever seen. They were within 75 yards and paralleling the very logging road I used to walk to my stands. Were these bucks watching me when I walked in and out of the woods? It sure seems like it. In the next few days I proceeded to check tiny spots of cover, unusual corners near roads and every woodland crawl space and unconventional deer habitat I could find. It was a real eye opener for me. The buck sign I could not find all season was there all the time. The deer had patterned me and adjusted to do what they do best, survive.

Never underestimate the whitetail deer. There are the smartest survival machines in all of North America. You must be on the top of your game every season when you enter their world. We always have to be learning and adjusting our tactics and skills. If you have ever closely watched a deer walking through the woods you know how alert they are to their surroundings. A whitetail will make changes every day if needed. As hunters we need to learn from these masters of the woodlot.

Next year the rut I hunt will not be my own.    

Enjoy our woodland treasures, and take care of natural resources

Jim