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hunting the rut lockdown phase | Muddy Outdoors

Hunting The Rut Lockdown Phase

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Tips for Hunting the Rut Lockdown Phase

To suggest that there are phases of rut is ridiculous. The pre-rut, rut, rut lockdown, post rut, and second rut. To think you can delineate each one of the phases of the rut apart from each other into a particular set of days or weeks is hopeful at best. In theory, it is a great way for so-called experts of the industry to describe deer activity to your everyday hunter. The biggest problem in this delineation is that it does not describe deer activity 100% like it seems it should do. Rather a complex algorithm is at play, fluctuating deer activity a different way for every property. Sex ratios, weather, hunting pressure, property layout, acorn production, and crop status all have drastic effects on deer activity during all “phases” of the rut. While each phase paints a clear picture, it is never 100% accurate due to these reasons. However, If one phase above all was particularly spot on it would be during this week. This week the Midwest, in general, is experiencing peak breeding. Hunting the rut just got tough due to the rut lockdown!

November So Far…And In The Future?

Up to this point, November hunting has been what is expected during November. Chasing, seeking, cruising, and a steady stream of bucks and does coming by the stand. The onset of warm temperatures during much of the first half of November slowed things down, but just recently the floodgates opened. Cooler temps and the first frosts have hit, bucks were on their feet, the rut is in full swing.

Trophy Pursuit S5 E31, “The Chase is On” | Rut Hunting

As you can see in this week’s episode of Trophy Pursuit, the chasing, cruising, and daylight movement by mature bucks was easy to take advantage of. This opportunity was easily exploited by hunting with strategies and tactics unique to rut hunting. These rut hunting strategies and tactics were clearly outlined in our last blog Rut Hunting 101.

To summarize some of the best takeaways from the blog we have provided some of its information.

When To Hunt

The Morning:

  • Bucks will seek out does around bedding areas
  • Focus on where does will be bedding after they return from feeding
  • Pick a stand location on the downwind side of the bedding area
  • Access the stand from the opposite side of the food source

The Evening:

  • Does are still feeding in open area, for the most part, bringing the bucks with them
  • Both the morning and the evening is based on does and where they are feeding or where they go after they feed.
  • Hunt a funnel or an edge of a feeding source
  • Do not walk on, or across the main run or section deer will access the area with, keep your scent away from the trail

Trail Camera Tips for the Rut

Remember these settings and tips when you are setting up trail cameras for the rut!

  • Location: where the does will be (food sources, doe bedding areas, transition areas between food and bedding)
  • Setup: At a 45-degree angle from the run, trail, or funnel. High to avoid spooking bucks.
  • Settings: long video ( 1 minute +) or series of multiple photo bursts (6-8 ) with a short delay ( < 10 seconds)

From: Trail Camera Tips For The Rut

So why is this important? If you have ever looked at a bell curve you would understand. The action was hot during the first part of November, but as we approach the middle of November we approach the lockdown. After the lockdown phase of the rut passes, we start descending on the bell curve meaning the action heats up again. Bucks start looking for does again, start desperately seeking, and again opportunities are present for the taking.

What Is the Lockdown?

The lockdown phase of the rut occurs when the majority of does come into estrus. Why? The gestation period of a whitetail is right around 198 days, meaning timing the conception perfectly, times the fawn’s birth perfectly. This aligns fawn drop right when spring arrives where an explosion of growth means quality food, quality cover, and nutritious milk. The arrival of peak breeding is determined and brought on by photoperiod. This is why the rut, or peak breeding happens on the same dates each year regardless of weather and moon phase.

This can be a dramatic event for hunters. When the majority of does suddenly come in bucks go on lockdown! Bucks will lay up with does for usually 24-48 hours. To some, this is not enough time for a hunter to realize the buck is laid up, but then again it is. Put yourself in the scenario. It’s November 15th, high pressure, hard frost, a slight 3 mph wind….a day that should result in a lot of deer movement. Instead, the day results in a yearling and button buck…not at all what you expected. Why? So many does are available, that literally every 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years old + is lockdown with a doe that day and perhaps the next.

Hunting The Rut Lockdown Phase

It’s a blessing and a curse. The lockdown phase comes in dramatically but exits the same. Hunting the rut lockdown isn’t necessarily hard. You have to concentrate in the right areas for hunting and simply wait it out. On any day, and at any time during the lockdown phase, a buck can come off of a doe. Here are two videos that help supply information on hunting the rut lockdown.

Whitetail 101 S1 E13, “Hot Doe or Bust” | Rut Lockdown

The overall advice in this week’s Whitetail 101 is to stay away from the feeding areas and start working your hunts towards doe bedding areas. Does that are out feeding have most likely already been breed and are simply staying away from bedding areas as they are avoiding being pushed around by bucks. Touching on this further with the concept of the “hot doe or bust” is this week’s trail cameras weekly episode.

Hunting The Rut Lockdown | Trail Cameras “Weekly Week 7”

Again, this episode not only touches the concept that hunting the rut lockdown means that on any day and at any time a buck can come off a doe. This means all day sits could prove successful. This also means bucks will desperately seek does once they come off a doe, and after peak breeding slows. Also know that during this time a doe can pull a buck anywhere at any time, meaning your rut hunting strategies and tactics like hunting funnels and bedding areas are still creating opportunities. This episode proves the concept as Jeremy Flinn encounters a hot doe with a buck locked in.

Conclusion

Hunting the rut lockdown will only last a short period. It is important to not only keep hunting during this time, but to hunt the right areas. Hunting does, as far as funnels and doe bedding areas go is a more successful tactic for hunting bucks during any other time during the rut.

For more deer hunting videos and weekly hunting, web shows like this visit Muddy TV. Also be sure to check in every week for new hunting tips, tactics, and strategies at Muddy’s Blog.

hunting the rut lockdown phase | Muddy Outdoors

Rut Hunting 101
rut hunting strategies tips tactics | Muddy Outdoors

Rut Hunting 101 | Strategies, Tips, Tactics, and Videos

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Rut Hunting Strategy, Tactic, Tips, and Videos

The weeks of November…the weeks you have been waiting on for months, are finally here! The next 3 weeks will be the best action in the whitetail woods. You hit-list buck’s guard is down, his hormones have him up on his feet, and he now stands a very good chance of making a mistake within range of your tree stand. Yes the rut is upon us and your chances look good, but it doesn’t automatically mean success. These rut hunting strategies, tips, tactics, and videos will dive into exactly what you should focus on during this time.

Pre-Rut to Rut Transition

The transition from the October lull, to the pre-rut, and now soon to be the rut is fast paced. The rapid changes are hard for hunters to stay on top of and adjust. What was once slow, variable movement, depending mostly on weather fronts has now given way into what can be perceived as even more variable action. The last week of October was expected to bring out more opportunities but instead, your high anticipation might have been met with little to no movement. As the pre-rut approaches the transition to the rut, it is important for you to understand what exactly is going on.

Hunting The Pre-Rut
(video) November is finally upon us. In this episode, the Trophy Pursuit team is hunting the pre-rut, and the action is definitely heating up!

 

This week on Muddy TV, Trophy Pursuit encountered classic pre-rut deer activity. Both Tayler Riggen and Alexandria Dunkin had bucks showing common behavior. The bucks in this episode relied heavily on scrape use, but also showed they were scent checking and actively searching for does, but seemed to have a reserve to them. During that time bucks scent checked areas and scrapes for signs of the first does to come in. Why they were not actively dogging does and running through the timber, they did show signs that the phase was actively approaching. During the pre-rut phase, hunters relied heavily on their trail cameras to reveal which bucks arrived with an increased home range, which bucks left, and which bucks were susceptible for an encounter with daylight activity. Our mock scrapes were hot, and deer sign like rubs and small scrapes seemed to be visible everywhere in the woods.

With the last week of October now behind us, and the first week of November at our doorstep, we can’t help but wonder what strategy should we change, and where we should be our November hunts on.

Rut hunting Strategies

Before diving into strategies, hunting tips, and tactics, it might be important to discern what we are actually talking about with the term “rut”. The “rut” or actual breeding peak is not what hunters associate with the term. Instead to hunters the term “rut” means endless buck activity, chasing, dogging, fighting, and everything we associate with being the best days in the woods. For the cases of this article “the rut” will encompass the intense action, what hunters might call the “lockdown”, and even the action of the “post-rut”. Why? To think there are actually “stages” to base your hunting off of during November is favorable thinking at best. It’s a hope that you can actually be spot on in predicting what you will see, when in fact, breeding, activity, and behavior will be regional, and very often property specific. With this said, the first 3 weeks of November are the best times to be on the stand, regardless of which “stage” or time period we are determined to be in.
For hunting the “rut” or better said, first three weeks of November, you need a strategy that puts you where the action is! Many hunters hold the belief that just about anywhere, or their tree stand location they call “old reliable” will get the job done. While this might just work with the amount of action and activity we are approaching, a better strategy would be to base your tree stand sites around what actually draws in bucks…does!

Early Rut Hunting Strategies
(Video) Bill Winke covers early rut hunting strategies and exactly where to concentrate hunting efforts on during the morning and the afternoons of early November.

 

Where should you hunt during the rut? Bill Winke breaks it down into morning and afternoon.

The Morning:

  • Bucks will seek out does around bedding areas
  • Focus on where does will be bedding after they return from feeding
  • Pick a stand location on the downwind side of the bedding area
  • Access the stand from the opposite side of the food source

The Evening:

  • Does are still feeding in open area, for the most part, bringing the bucks with them
  • Both the morning and the evening is based on does and where they are feeding or where they go after they feed.
  • Hunt a funnel or an edge of a feeding source
  • Do not walk on, or across the main run or section deer will access the area with, keep your scent away from the trail

Trail Camera Tips for the Rut

During November the best trail camera tip can be to not completely rely on your trail camera information. Activity is at an all time high, bucks can suddenly appear or disappear on a property without warning, or being caught on your trail cameras. Even if you have a camera per 10 acres, your chances are still slim to catching ALL deer movement. This means that your trail cameras are not always correct or reliable for making decisions on. The fact is that you should hunt in the locations above, regardless of what your cameras tell you!

However, you should still optimize every trail camera location and site to capture as much activity as they can. The information will guide hunting this year but more importantly will reveal how the intense deer movement worked across your property for next year’s hunting. The cameras might also catch information pertaining to which bucks leave the property, stick around, or are extremely daylight active, giving you insights on who to target next year.

Trail Camera Tips For November and the Rut
(Video)- This week go with solid tactics and trail camera tips, which are placing trail cameras on food sources, by bedding areas being reasonable with human pressure, and of course on funnels!

 

Remember these settings and tips when you are setting up trail cameras for the rut!

rut hunting strategies tips tactics | Muddy Outdoors

  • Location: where the does will be (food sources, doe bedding areas, transition areas between food and bedding)
  • Setup: At a 45-degree angle from the run, trail, or funnel. High to avoid spooking bucks.
  • Settings: long video ( 1 minute +) or series of multiple photo bursts (6-8 ) with a short delay ( < 10 seconds)

Trail cameras with settings such as 4 + photo bursts or longer than a 1-minute video are not common. The Muddy trail cameras feature these settings and more, and it might be well worth having the extra capabilities during the peak of deer activity!

Insert Pro Cam 12 PNG on left with info on the right – https://www.gomuddy.com/muddy-outdoors-trail-cameras/

rut hunting strategies tips tactics | Muddy OutdoorsPRODUCT DESCRIPTION

  • 12 Megapixel
  • 2 – 8 Photo Bursts
  • 1280 x 720 HD With Sound or VGA (32 FPS) with Sound Video
  • 2-minute video capability
  • 6 Second Trigger Speed
  • Invisible Flash with 36 HE LEDs
  • Simple to Program
  • Backlit LCD Screen to easily navigate through settings any time of day

Make the most out of November and the rut with these rut hunting strategies, tips, and tactics. If you liked the information and series of deer hunting videos and web shows used in this blog, visit Muddy TV  each week. Shows like Trail Cameras Weekly, Whitetail 101, Trophy Pursuit, and Hallowed Ground relay the latest information from their hunts, trail cameras, and observations to support their content and predictions so you are up to date.

This week take the advice and do yourself a favor. Setup trail cameras, tree stands, and hunting sites based on where the does will be. Just as the videos have shown you, get out and hunt, these upcoming weeks will be filled with some of the best action you will see!

deer hunting cold fronts trail camera tips | Muddy Outdoors

How To: Deer Hunting Cold Fronts in October

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Deer Hunting Cold Fronts

Have you got the rhythm down yet? Are you back in the saddle so to speak?  When it comes to bow hunting it feels like it can take a week or two to finally get used to waking up earlier, master walking quietly across parched leaves, and perfect the art of patience, little movement, and silence. Bow season is here and whether you are ready or not does not concern the deer and more importantly the fleeting month of October. Deer hunting during October is short lived as is, and more often than not, several opportunities go without recognition and “seizing”. The worst of these missed opportunities takes the form of deer hunting cold fronts during October.

Digging deeper, many hunters will come to realize that it is the rapidly changing behavior of deer…not time itself that lets us perceive October as short. During the first part of the month or so, patterns exist, food sources are still intact, and there appears to be a very real opening to harvest a buck. However once the second and third week of October arrive everything changes. The shifting weather, food, hormones, landscape, and much more create a list of factors that seem to alter everything we knew about our property and the deer going into October. The second and third week of October (October 10th – 24th) seems to throw hunters a curve ball.

Acorns, Ag fields harvested, cooler weather, varying attractiveness of food plots, intolerance due to heightened testosterone, and of course the pressure of the approaching rut seem to mix up deer behavior so badly that they themselves do not understand what’s going on….let alone us hunters trying to figure it all out. If someone figured out exactly how to hunt October, you would know the absolute authority on the subject, but no one will ever be able to figure it out entirely. Why? You cannot control Mother Nature…

What Is a Cold Front?

By definition (to a hunter) a Cold Front is Mother Nature’s answer to the hunter’s mercy plead. Curve ball after curve ball, Mother Nature has taken us through the ringer no doubt, but it’s nice when she answers our prayers. A Cold front is a hunter’s saving grace so to speak. When deer movement seems to be slowing down, or unpredictable a cold front is a sudden snap to get deer and more importantly mature bucks on their feet.

A Cold Front – advancing mass of cold air trailing the edge of a warm sector of a low-pressure system.

When should you hunt a cold front?

A great source for hunters as far as weather patterns and cold fronts is Weather Underground. Customize the 10 day weather forecast to show temperature, the chance of precipitation, pressure, wind speed, and humidity can also be an advantage. Hunters are by no means meteorologists, but knowing the simplest things can make a huge difference to the action you witness in the woods.

deer hunting cold fronts trail camera tips | Muddy Outdoors

https://www.wunderground.com

In the picture, you can clearly see when the cold front is advancing. This graph was exported from a state in the Midwest this year, 2016, last week in fact from the date this blog is posted. From the period of Tuesday the 4th to Friday the 7th you can see a period of high temperature hovering around 80 degrees or so. Friday afternoon marks the entrance and arrival of the front. When the front is passing is typically seen as a drop in temperature > 5-10 degrees, and an increase in pressure. You will also either see nasty weather or precipitation increase as the front passes. The amount of temperature drop isn’t necessarily the main take away or reason a cold front is so productive.

Notice the days before the cold front arrives. You have hunted these days before…the same boring, long, and hot days that are common in October. Low 80s High 70s during the day for several days in a row, plus the combination of nasty weather as the front arrives signifies how “productive” the cold front will be. Deer movement will be slow or what you will normally experience during the days beforehand. During the nasty spell of weather, deer will undergo intense stress. When the skies break open (Saturday-Sunday), pressure increases, and temperature plummets deer will be excited to get on their feet, especially to feed on available food sources.

That covers when you should be deer hunting cold fronts, but not “where”. Unfortunately, the “where” is a bit trickier than the “when” and subject to a lot more opinion and variability.

Deer Hunting Cold Fronts: The Big Question is Where

So up to this point we have told you “when” you might fake a sudden cough or take a vacation day off work, but the next important thing to decide is “where”. Where should you go “all in” on what seems to be your only and best chance at a buck in October. While we cannot give you a definitive answer that is a sure fire tree stand location, we can offer plenty of well thought out and proven suggestions.

While October is leading up to highly anticipated action-packed weeks in November, the majority of the month’s deer activity revolves around one thing…FOOD. Two big food sources are competing during this time frame and a third is thrown into the mix if it is available. Above all acorns and cut corn fields should be on the hunter’s radar, but food plots can also be thrown into the mix.

Acorns

Trail Cameras Weekly “Week 2” Oct 10th- 16th | October Cold Fronts and Acorns
(Video)- As the second week of October arrives, strategies must change accordingly. In this week, two major players are present, acorns and October cold fronts.

 

Acorns are a staple for deer during the month of October. White oak and red oak acorns rain down from mature timber canopies across the Whitetail’s range, offering a continuous and reliable food source. Unfortunately, it is also a plentiful food source…meaning the little package of carbs that is known as the acorn can spell disaster for hunters. This abundant food source’s availability means that deer do not have to work very hard or move very far to get to a food source. When deer are on acorns, it can be very hard to pattern them, but with the help of some landscape features like fingers, saddles, ridges, funnels, creek bottoms, and transition areas it can be done. Muddy TV’s Trail Cameras Weekly touches on these features and how acorns, with the addition of a cold front, could mean success.

Cut Corn Fields

Whitetail 101 S1 E8, “October Cold Fronts” | Best Way to Hunt October Cold Fronts
(Video)- On this week’s episode of Whitetail 101, Bill Winke discusses October bow hunting tactics, food sources, and October cold fronts.

 

Cut corn fields, a common site this time of year is one of the only food sources that can pull deer off of acorns. As Bill Winke mentions in the video from Muddy TV’s Whitetail 101, freshly cut corn field offers “easy pickings” as far as deer are concerned. The missed kernels and mangled ears of corn can leave a significant amount of food left scattered across the tangle of stalks. The combine leaving the field is a dinner bell for deer and has the power to bring brutes out of the timber for a quick buffet. Again a cold front moving through, with some nasty weather in the forecast may just prompt a farmer for a quick harvest, meaning you will have a cut corn field to hunt over while deer hunting cold fronts, both bumping deer to their feet to feed.

Green Food Plots

Trophy Pursuit S6 E6, “Close Calls” | Close Encounters with Mature Iowa Bucks
(Video)- This week on Muddy’s Trophy Pursuit, several team members have great encounters, close calls, and trail camera photos of mature Iowa bucks.

As always a well-planted food plot, with the right species, in the right location can always be a dynamite spot to sit when deer are on their feet. As you can see in Trophy Pursuits Episode 6, the team encounter several hit list bucks moving through, around, and to food plots. Clovers, brassicas, and species like oats can attract deer throughout October and even through November and later. This is especially true for years with low acorn production, or in areas with little mature timber and ag crops. Food plots such as the ones you witness in this episode work great as staging areas and transition plots as deer begin to filter out into larger areas such as cut corn fields or oak flats.

deer hunting cold fronts trail camera tips | Muddy OutdoorsTrail Cameras Will Tell You Where

Overall the secret to perfecting deer hunting cold fronts and bow hunting in general in October is relying heavily upon your trail camera data. As you noticed in all the weekly deer hunting videos and web shows on Muddy TV  this week (Trail Cameras Weekly, Whitetail 101, and Trophy Pursuit), they all relayed intel and information from their trail cameras to support their observations and predictions.

Take the advice and do yourself a favor. Setup trail cameras based on the available food sources. Await an October cold front, and base your hunt around the most recent information you have….you won’t regret it.