I was curious whatyou think constitutes the pre-rut? In other words, to your thinking, what activities/sign do you need to see, toindicatepre-rut?

Scraping, heavy sparing, heavy rubs, light chasing and more deer on the move.

scraping some rubs maybe a little chasing

To me, the pre-rut is from the time the velvet comes off, until they get heavy into the seek/chase phase. “Rut type” sign will be sporadic. You may see 2 bucks sparring pretty good & rubbing up trees, and in the same field a buck standing next to some does & feeding like they weren’t even there. As it gets later & later in the pre-rut, more and more bucks are showing “rut-type” behaviors. Eventually you hit the seek/chase phase where a few does are in, and nearly all the bucks are looking.

I live in east central Illinois and as a rule I use halloween as the day I start hunting the pre rut /rut

Here's my take on It....


1. They are no longer In there bachelor groups anymore, the older bucks anyway.
2. There patterns change significantly.
3. Fresh scrapes In early October- Field edge scrapes I could care less about. It's the scrapes In the big part of the woods that tells me there getting there.
4. Fresh rubs In early October.

For me here in Northern Virginia. Bucks out of their bachelor groups. Aggressive rubbing on trees, and many of them. Bucks cruising and scent checking. MY favorite time of the year! Usually for us, it is around Halloween that we see this aggressive behavior start rapidly picking up.