I enjoy this topic and have spent countless hours reading on it and discussing it and I want to take another stab at it here.
The main problem I feel with many hunters approach to this topic is they want to deal in absolutes and that is just not possible here. A deers reproductive cycle is exactly that, a cycle which is triggered and then develops fully until conception, or not, in which case the cycle will repeat itself. The entire cycleis subject to countless variables such as location, doe age, weather, the year,and herd dynamics/densities just to name a few.
I don't believe Alseheimer is saying the rutting moon is the day the deer rut just that is one of the triggers that can have an affect on a deers biological clock/cycle. I fully believe photoperiod is the initial trigger to act on the
pineal gland of a whitetail. Further I believe it happens not just because of diminised light but when the amount of lightisequalorless than dark, which is not too exact and this variable I feel has a lot to do with the difference between a North rut and a South Rut as daylengthcan vary greatly between the two areas.
For example from approx. Sept 26 to Oct 4. in the county I hunt in the amount of light and dark are nearly equal and the amount of light is less and less every day after thatuntil mid to late Dec whenit starts to go back the other way. The shortest day is Dec 12 with about 9 hrs 35 min of light. So from Septemberthrough half of Decemberthe days are steadily getting darker but by mere minutes(photoperiod), I feel it takes somethinga little more significantto cause a real spike in the rutting activity which leads me to the next section of rambling..
Despite what some have said here the pineal gland is a photosensory gland and detects/is affected by all light(including moonlight or
lack there of), not just thephotoperiod.
The pineal gland releases melatonin which is a driving force in the whitetails breeding cycle. Bright light inhibits the amountproduced while darkness increases the amount produced thus the correlation between photoperiod and the whitetail rut(less light in Autumn/Winter). Less light=more melatonin from the pineal gland=higher estrogen/testosterone levels=RUT!
So without boring you with too much more I look at it like this, thefull moonon Oct14 this yearwill bea "bright light"
(in some studies fullmoon lighthas shown decreases in melatonin production of over 50%).So I believe while thedaysslowly getting shorterhas initiated the beginning of the reproductive cycle(because whitetail melatonin levelsgradually increase as the days get shorter)that "Rutting Moon" orto put itplainly,Octobers full moon on the 14thand thebright nights before and after it can cause an "October lull" so to speakbecause ofa decrease in the melatonin output of the pineal gland.
So then what happens? I think that as October progresses andyou finally reach the new moon on Oct 28 that the dark nights prior to, during, and after that new moon cause a spike in melatonin output for the whitetail because increased darkness stimulates the pineal gland triggeringhigher levels ofmelatonin output.That coupled with the factthose levelswere alreadyon a gradual rise due to slowly shorteningphotoperiodincreases both estrogen and testosterone levels which in my opinion probably is the final trigger thatstartsmost does heat cycle (which lasts about 7 days) and causes bucks to become evenmore sexually aggressive. (IMO) Putting the actual breeding part of the rut 7 days later than the time frame ofOct 24-Nov. 5 which is a few days before the new moon and a few daysafter.(So roughly Nov.1 -12) <<< Shocking I know.
(In VA)
Of course that can vary based on an individual does age, health, etc. and I haven't even looked at the Moon Rise/Set timesfor those weeks too thoroughly). Or I could just be flat out wrong.
So in my opinion, after further review, I feel the
new moon in October should be called the Rutting Moon not the
full moon. I will forward this to Charles for his review,