fingerz42

Mckean County and I would agree. Zero chasing activity, minimal scrapes and rubs. Very boring season on stand.

RidgeFACTOR

It was like the season never came.... have never seen such a "quiet" season and non-existent rut in all the years of my hunting.

early in

I have to agree with you Ridge. It's almost like "the deer season that wasn't"? Granted, I do hunt on State Land, but regardless, I did not see the deer activity you would expect to see during the Rut. It's been a real let down to me!

I mean I did see some deer, but not what I should have seen for the amount of time I spent in the woods! I did at least 4 dark to dark hunts, and only one shooter. He was roughly the size of my best from these woods, so he walked. I didn't see the the couple of bigger guys that were on my trail cam, of course. I didn't even see but a few doe during the week of Halloween. I mean I was in the woods at prime time too! Hey, I'm alive, right?

RidgeFACTOR

I agree Early In, I too hunt state gamelands and had some decent bucks on my trail cams all summer and then once the season came there was nothing. Around these parts (like many other places) you can usually judge when the rut is on or close to it by the amount of deer getting hit on the interstate roads, this year, up until now, there were very few carcasses compared to other years. Just don't know what happened. You wait for bow season to come all year and then it's here and gone. Maybe one day our state DNR will wise up and let us hunt up until gun season. Good luck my friend.

early in

Same here! I didn't see the road kills that I normally see
in our area either. Also, I'm in a Special Regs WMU (5-D) and they want as many deer taken as possible, yet they only allow us to take doe from the end of regular archery to the beginning of regular buck/gun season. I fail to see the logic. Last year I saw one of the best bucks in my woods and I could only watch him as he walked right on past me because it was antlerless only!!!

ijimmy

Ive been in hunting beaver county , the first 2 weeks of november , for the last 15 years , this by far was the slowest year I can remember for rut activity

RidgeFACTOR

Couldn't agree more Jimmy. I think the biologist and professionals who study the "rut" are right about predicting a later than normal rut, the rut in these parts (southwestern, Pennsylvania) is late and in some places is just starting now.

dmounts

I shot my 9 pointless south of Pittsburgh in Canonsburg PA. Every year I get a shot at a shooter on the Monday of the last week (11/11/13 this year) between 3:30-4:30 pm, same stand. I hunted all day for straight week, and saw mostly smaller bucks chasing does during daylight. The bigger bucks didn't seem to start moving around until after 3pm. Every big buck I saw chasing or nose down on the trail was after 3. But the activity wasn't as strong this year for sure.

RidgeFACTOR

More activity today 11/23/13 on the interstate roadways, too bad the season went out last Saturday.

early in

Like I say, I can still kill antlerless deer here in Special Regs WMU 5-D, but what I can not understand is why you can't take a buck during this same time? Their goal is to get the deer numbers down in this unit (you can get unlimited antlerless tags in my unit), so why not allow bucks to be taken as well? I hope somewhere down the line the Pa Game Comm changes this!