Summer to fall deer shift

[Mschmeiske]

I was wondering if we could take a moment to talk about summer to fall deer shifts. In particular, bucks! I feel I always do well with inventory, but then you know how it goes… fall comes, and some of them just disappear. There’s always the rut, but I don’t like banking on stuff like that. I mean, they didn’t just go POOF into thin air, right? I was curious how some of you more seasoned veterans adapt and handle these things, how do you catch back up to some of these deer you saw during the summer?

 

[thedutchtouch]

following. deer were nowhere to be found today in the area that i saw a dozen a few weeks ago- i'm a newbie so not sure why yet, perhaps they'd shifted to different acorns? but thanks for posting, hopnigto learn as well.

 

[neonomad]

Maybe there are studies that show how it happens, but I wonder if a lot of it isn’t just due to browse and crops changing (like soybeans browning), acorns dropping across the landscape, and then how the hierarchy of bucks are plays out once they stop getting along. I hunt a lot of private ground so once they’re gone they’re gone. But sometimes they’ve just contracted back into the woods, and in that case I’m usually poking around in there anyway.

 

[Jtaylor]

Maybe there are studies that show how it happens, but I wonder if a lot of it isn’t just due to browse and crops changing (like soybeans browning), acorns dropping across the landscape, and then how the hierarchy of bucks are plays out once they stop getting along. I hunt a lot of private ground so once they’re gone they’re gone. But sometimes they’ve just contracted back into the woods, and in that case I’m usually poking around in there anyway.

I'd agree with all this and add increased human presence in the woods and drought effects my areas I hunt.

 

[Coachschaller]

I noticed herds of deer on my cameras when the soybeans were green. Now that there are no more leaves, the deer have dwindled.