The week after I shot my buck found me at my buddies' farm down south. The first morning I was sitting in a saddle and a small spike came strolling by. This little guy had spikes barely 2 inches tall....He proceded to give 2 small trees a real butt whoopin!

That alone didn't surprise me, but when I got down I walked over to look at the 2 trees......He had those babies skinned completely clean! If I would have found those 2, and not seen him do it.....I would never have guessed it was a littly bitty spike that did it.....

That has made me re-think a little about judging the size of the deer to the rubs....

I have always heard that little trees can be big or little bucks. But big trees are only big bucks.

One thing I've positively learned over the years, and information I still sometimes do not use because of brain farts.......whenever during the peak days of the rut I find one brand new fresh rub on field edges thats at least 2" in diameter..........I sure as heck better hunt it the next day. Not using my past experiences cost me a shot at a bruiser early last week. I've seen this time and again during those peak days. I neglected to hunt the immediate area of the fresh 2-3" rub put out during that timespan, the very next day the bruiser buck shows up and all I can do is watch him through binocs.

I don't get too excited about rubs unless I see them on trees the diameter of my calf or bigger. If a buck is tackling trees of that size there is a good chance he has some size to him.

Even a "big" tree could be rubbed by a smaller buck. If he can get his rack around it, he can rub it.

I can guarantee that during the "peak" rut days I've seen 140"and better bucks put a marking rub on the outer edge(especially a corner) of smaller saplings/trees while looking for does because they are out of their core area. I've seen it too many times.

I think more than one buck uses a rub and others scent mark/rub the same trees. I think you saw a little guy do it but it doesn't mean it was all done by him. He just left his calling card for the rest of the crew. Sorta like a fire hydrant for everybody....

I quit hunting buck sign when I watched 4 bucks work the same scrape in one sitting (largest was a 6 pointer)......the last being a BB that had to stand on his back legs to reach the licking branch.

The only shooter I saw that morning skirted the field the scrape was in and never even looked over there.

Here is a spike rub

Here is a good one from a couple years ago...the tree is about absolutely shredded



Here is the buck that was responsible for the rub...