Rutting Progress Journal 2011

[umpiremark]

Pictures on the food plots were way down this past week, less and less daytime feeding by the does and fawns. Pictures of bucks in scrapes at midnight, 1:00 a.m. but no daytime sightings. Weekend hunt (28, 29 & 30) saw only a few sightings of does from the stands. Neighbor to the east shot a nine late in the evening hunt of the 29th. Nice buck, not any we had on camera - we think. Sunday's rain stopped about 3:00 I thought for sure they'd hit the turnips. Nope, nothing but one fawn wandering by.

October lull? Anyone??

I hope this thing doesn't kick into high gear next weekend (4-6th) because I have to go to my neice's wedding. Next "all-out" bow hunt is Nov 11-13th.

[rmontez]

I normally take the long way to and from work. I noticed yesterday 2 bucks in different areas running doe. One of the bucks, a nice 8 point, had his nose right to the ground running a doe down a gravel road. I drove within 50 yards of him before he noticed me and walked off the road. Still haven't seen anything in the woods yet.

[Jimbo]

Seeking and chasing have definitely started in southwestern Wisconsin.

Reports from my camp in Washburn County are also good--lots of scrapes and more daytime buck sightings. The next full moon is in 10 days, so I expect we should have pretty good action now up until the Gun opener.

Jimbo

[Drhunter2k]

I'm hoping the bucks will be out moving next week. I have not been out much this year due to other demands but I do have Nov.4th thru 13th off and plan to be in my stands each of those days. I am so pumped but don't know what to expect this year. I did check my cameras last week and have does only but where the does are the bucks will follow. Hopefully something shows up. Good luck to all.

[BassFishingBowKilling]

Hows up north looking for the rut...as in Crivitz and north of.... Really hoping to take something this weekend but activity has been very minimal thus far by me.

[Nwest]

Saw a small buck running around in a freshly cut cornfield last night (30 Oct 11), he appeared to be looking for something but we never saw any does out there. I also got a nice picture over the weekend of the buck I'm hoping to get a shot at. Previously I had only gotten pictures of him at night. Saturday night (29 Oct 11) he walked in front of my camera around 5:00, of course I wasn't there. I have Friday and Monday off this coming weekend, so I'm hoping to get a lot of hunting in. Hopefully I timed my vacation days right. It seems to be heating up.

deer10.JPG (69.16 KiB) Viewed 277 times

[Jslotter]

The big boys are starting to move during daylight in my area in Dunn, St. Croix, and Eau Claire counties. I been looking at my buddy's trail cam pics. Im also hearing some reports of chasing going on. Mostly small, young bucks. Its kinda "here and there", nothing wide spread yet as far as I've heard from other hunters. I haven't been in the woods since last Thursday, I got an itch to get out and fill my doe tag...

[willypete]

Sounds like the rut is starting to pick up in the Eau Claire area. I was driving back this weekend from putting up stands and trail cams for gun season and there was a MONSTER crossing an opening from some woods to some corn a little before dark. He was with a group of does, but it didn't look like he really cared to much.

[abrouch]

Hunted in Brown county tonight (11/1) about 20 minutes NE of Appleton. Got into my stand about 3:30pm. Between 5:30 and 6pm I saw 14 deer including five bucks. two of the bucks went through trailing does. Had three different bucks about 80 yds behind my stand that were fighting and grunting at each other like crazy. They did this for nearly 10 minutes - it was really cool. 2 of the bucks were big, I had a hard time seeing the other three as it is pretty thick around my stand.

Needless to say the rut is on in NE WI - just couldn't get any of those bucks close enough tonite.

[willypete]

Went and switched cards in trail cameras today and got a very large number of bucks out in the day. Most were some small rack 7 or 8 pointers, probably 5 different bucks. The were two photos of different 8pointers that were decent in the day, while I had the usual monster buck from the years before who usually shows up when the rut starts going. When the rut is starting to heat up he usually sticks to a area with no trail cams. I got this other buck on the can that I have never seen and wooooooooooow did it have a spread on him! He didn't have a lot of mass, but his spread is insane. They seemed to be chasing a little. So the Eau Claire area rut is just about to get really hot...next week to the weekend after will probably be the peak.


Oh one of the bucks rack was almost vertical on his head...and I mean vertical not just a upward angle. Has anyone ever seen this.