1shotkill1993

I beleive it.

davidmil

Location can have some effect no doubt. There are a couple states/areas that just defy normal patterns. That said, there are so many "EXPERT" out there now days. I have seen the same stories written over and over for 50 years. Everyone is trying to get published or meet a deadline. I honestly have seen some stories over the years that are just plain Bull Hockey. These "Experts" I feel sometimes get all besides themselves trying to come up with a new revolutionary(the eXPERT ) thingy. If you were to try and prove this guys THEORY??? or is it an EXPERT SPECIAL SUPER DUPER OPINION????Well if you took it across the country I think you'd find it so full of holes and bullcrap he'd be laughed off the presses. Yet, he's a respected(let's call him a writer.... not necessarily the ultimate expert). So his latest attempt to be different, or tell the old story differently was published and people(experts like yourself) are saying... WOW.... how about that. I never would have thought. In fact, we probably shouldn't ever think it. We've been doing this for 50 years and never seen it once in our woods. Personnally, I wouldn't want to put my October season to a test with it.

BobCo19-65

Did he shoot a compound or recurve?

Jimimac

Doesn't matter...He's only pure in spirit if he went with the whole self bow routine including making the thing from primitive tools and such.

Scott/IL

I'm not to sure really, but I can recall 2 years ago I saw a 9 pointer chasing a doe all over the woods one afternoon. This was October 3rd.

Shot the guy about a month later

As far as the mini-rut and the famous october lull well I don't really know. I hunt harder the first 2 weeks of October than I do towards the later part of the month. Most of this is just because I am trying to stockpile hours at work so I can sneak out a few days during November.

When it comes to a mini rut I tend to believe that there is another (smaller) round of does that are being bred into the first part of December. I have seen a mature (4.5 yr. old) bedded up with a doe as late as December 16th.

I don't let these sightings change my way of hunting during these periods. In early season/late season I am still focused on feeding sources.

GregH

davidmil,
I think you're on to the same thing I was thinking.

I don't believe in a "Mini-rut", I believe it is a comon occurance that has been happening all along. Some does do come into estrus early...... in October. I call it the start of the rut. By him calling it a "Mini-rut", I think it could mislead people.

Second of all, him hunting in mid-October BEFORE the October lull kicked in, must have been a mistake. His outfitter buddy even refutes his statement.

I believe that mid-October is when the bucks start coming out of the lull.

dukemichaels

It is a biological fact that whitetail does come into their first "false" estrous cycle about a month (or more sometimes) before the real one.. so to speak.

Not to mention mother natures plan to stagger newborns over several weeks or months to ensure survival of the species.

What can I say.. I read alot.

Primetime/IL

As soon as a buck sheds its velvet, it is capable of breeding so to see chasing or any interest along those lines anytime in October is not suprising. As duke michaels has said, does actually come into a so called "estrous" a month before her real one, and I have heard that as well.

As far as the Lull goes, to me theres no set time of the lull, it doesnt have to happen at the end of october or beginning for that matter there are many factors that come into play when experiencing it. I think temperatures play the biggest part, some years when it so happens to be warmer around the end of october(which usually it does)of coarse you will see the greatest sign of it. October does also seem to have the greatest fluctuation of temps.

MichaelP

I think you meant sheds his velvetjust bustin your chops man. With as many people as we have on this site you could probably write all kinds of articals on the things we have seen individually, and they would not fit into any "scenario". But I am in agreement that he is trying to group the start of the "RUT" inot a seperate group called a mini rut... for a new angle to the same old song.

Edcyclopedia

I certainly don't have as much data as some of you older gentleman have. but,
I have found that most of the buck activity starts right around my brothers b-day...
Oct. 21st
Which tells me that the main breeding is about to start, as everyone can imagine.
Could they come into heat a week or two earlier or later, I would guess yes.
If feed, weather, age or other unknown causes may cause some variance.

Guys ~ deer are not machines or cloned!
Just like us humans, there are variations amongst their species. You could "generalize" a bigger percentage of what deer do.
However, the only predictable thing about a deer, is that their UNPREDICTABLE.