I envy you bowhunters out there who have a season that coincides with the peak of the rut. Here in Florida, if I want to hunt the scraping and breeding periods I have to compete with the rifle hunters. How many of you have this same predicament.

Ben, at Raiford WMA the peak of the rut this year was 3 weeks ago. Opening day of bowseason. There was a chart showing the peak day of breeding for every county. I only remember Bradford county Sept.20 and Duval county which is Oct 19.

Ben, our gun season starts nov 8th this year, so we bowhunters will have a week or 2 to hunt the pre rut. the peak rut is usually around the middle of nov.

Thundermug, say what?! I thought way down south the rut didn' t occur till like December or January or somewhere close.[]

In my area from east of the St. Marks river the rut starts in November. About 20 miles west of here it starts at the middle to end of December. 80 miles west it can run all the way into February. The rut is just plain weird in Florida

In my NJ area the peak of the rut is usually around Nov 10th to the 20th. Somewhere in that timeframe...I' d have to say 11/12 to 11/15 would be the ideal timeframe to be out there. This falls during our permit bow season so we don' t have to worry about shotgun hunters ruining things for us.

Of course, the majority of my vacation time from work is from Halloween until Thanksgiving!