Are you saying they quit rutting competely in heavily hunted areas or just rut during the night hours outside of legal hunting time? If you are saying the former, I would ask what bred all those cows that are dropping calves the following Spring! The rut does vary from spot to spot as we have also noticed what he mentioned where we hunt in Wyoming every year at about 6500'-7000' elevation. As the years have gone by it seems that the rut has gotten later and sometimes the peak isn't until the first part of October when it used to be around September 20-25. Higher up it seems like they are still rutting earlier and haven't changed that much. Where we hunt has very light to no pressure at all, so I'm eliminating that out of the equation altogether.