Dave Richey Outdoors

Michigan Fishing & Hunting

Check out the deer sign

Reading deer sign properly allowed this hunter to score.

Reading deer sign is something that has always made sense to me. It gives me more knowledge of the animals, where they feed, where they travel, and in the end, it's this knowledge that makes hunters more successful while allowing them to accurately determine where best to set up their stands.

I'm so mindful of a big buck from several years ago. I'd seen him on three occasions but didn't know where he lived. It took me a week of reading October deer sign to pin down his whereabouts.

The area was in fairly heavy cover. I knew the buck had an exceptional 10-point spread, and reasoned he would be working over some big trees to strengthen his neck muscles before the rut began.

I'd moved slowly through the heavy cover without seeing much buck sign except for a few small rubs on some tag alders. I came out the other side of the tag alders, and entered a 25-yard by 25-yard stand of cedars and pines. That is when I worked out this whitetail puzzle.

One of those cedars was scarred by a pre-rutting buck. Lower limbs were broken off, and the trunk was scrubbed hard from a foot above ground to five feet off the ground. Mind you, I couldn't circle my arms around the tree trunk. This gigantic rub was truly huge.

Checking around let me find a faint trail that ran toward another cedar, and it too was rubbed by the same buck. Three trees within 25 yards formed a minor rub line, and the trail had exited the cover I had just walked through. This buck was leaving the tag alder to rub the cedar and pine trees, and most likely, the deer was moving out just before dark.

A nearby tree was perfect for a stand. There would be no clattering and banging required to erect a tree stand here. I'd attach a rope to my bow and my belt loop, lay the bow down flat, climbed 10 feet up the tree on limbs and stand on two thick parallel limbs that grew close together. Another limb came out at waist level, and I could stand on two limbs and lean back against the other one.

Two nights later as the sun was sinking into the western sky I caught the glint of sunlight shining off brownish-white antlers. The buck went to the first tree, thrashed it hard for several minutes, looked around, and went to the second tree and repeated the process. Fifteen minutes later it arrived at the tree just 15 yards upwind of me.

It took a minute for the buck to rake the tree to a pile of fuzzy bark curls at the base. He nosed his handiwork, lifted his head, moved around the tree to work on the opposite side. The deer was quartering-away at 15 yards, and it was an easy shot.


Properly reading the sign paid off handsomely.

It's not my policy to advise anyone to stand on cedar or pine boughs and lean against another one, and I don't suggest you follow my lead. However, I knew the limbs would support me for one evening of hunting. I was certain it would lead to a shot at the big buck on the first night, and it did.

That buck was a creature of habit, and such habits can put a deer in trouble. Once the buck stopped rubbing and visiting the nearby scrape, this idea wouldn't have worked. My adventure with that big buck was timed perfectly, and that is where knowing something about the rutting activity comes in handy. From the end of October through mid-November, that tree might not have paid off as the buck hazed does through open fields and thick cover.

Hunting one buck is an adventure, a matter of going after them one on one. It means knowing as much about the area as is possible, and being able to translate that knowledge into an action plan.

There are countless other ways of reading deer sign that will pay off in a big way, and we'll cover some other examples in the future. The important thing to realize is that studying deer sign is as much a part of deer hunting as carrying a bow into the woods.

Be alert to deer sign, read what it says, and you'll be on your way to becoming a much better deer hunter.

Old outdoor magazines bring fishing and hunting to life

Magazines with great art covers are wonderful mementos from the past.

Reliving some old outdoor passions is easy. Simply dip back in time with an old outdoor magazine and have your brain gently nudged again by something great from the past.

Kick back, dig into my old blogs, and choose those articles that are most appealing. Heaven knows, there are plenty of choices of fishing-hunting things to read about.

Do you really think reading is a dying art? If so, I'd suggest you think again. If that were so, there wouldn't be the number of people reading my daily weblog as there are. Many people who have read me for 23+ years at The Detroit News followed me after I retired from the paper, and are now reading my daily weblog in seven different venues including FaceBook and Twitter.

There are too many magazines to list and photograph. Email me and query.

Reading a blog is like reading my column every day; it's primarily for the Michigan fishermen and hunter, although people from all over the world read it.

Anyone want to read old outdoor magazines? The answer is quite simple: Many people do. It's cheap and super entertainment, especially when some of my magazines date back to the early 1920s. Some are worth good money.

Many years ago I inherited Ben East's records, memoirs, files, letters and outdoor magazines after his death 20 years ago. I've kept his magazine collection intact even thought he told me I could use any of the files, including his magazines, in any way I chose.

I've wrestled with the prospect of selling this huge stash of old outdoor magazines. After having stored them for 20 years, walked around the many plastic tubs filled to the gunwales, I've decided to share at a reasonable price, these treasured magazines. Most have articles by master outdoor writer Ben East, and most of them contain stories that are about fishing or hunting in Michigan.

There's an old saying I'm fond of. It state's that it's impossible to know where you are going if you don't know where you've been. I've been at this writing business for 45 years, and Ben East was at it for more than 60 years. There are many things of his that I won't sell, but 1,000 magazines take up a great deal of room.

These magazines, ranging from 1922 to the early 1950s, covered the hey-day of outdoor writing and outdoor magazine art. All of these magazines, with the exception of perhaps only a few, are illustrated with an artist's painting or sketch. Those drawings and paintings that appeared on the front covers were great pieces of period art.

They do what today's magazine covers can't do – they capture the moment, a short but defining period in time when something great, sad, death defying or just the marvel of a bird dog pointing a grouse, pheasant, snipe or woodcock, occurred. The artist captures the emotions of the hunter and of the dog as it stands quivering, tail as stiff as a fireplace poker, and waits for his master to walk in to flush the bird.

Art covers capture moods far better than photos.

Magazine covers were drawn by hand, and the artist captures the magic of that precise moment when blue-wing teal zip low and fast over the decoys or when pintails whiffle down out of the sky. Or as a bunch of Canada geese approach the decoys, their feet grabbing for land or water, their heads arched down as they scan ahead for danger while their wings cup the air as they descend to a landing or fall as the nearby hunters shoot.

There are covers, lots of them, that deal with trout fishing. These magazines are sorted by categories such as...

  • Atlantic Salmon
  • Bass
  • Bear
  • Brook Trout
  • Comic or Mood Scenes
  • Deer Hunting
  • Ducks & Geese
  • Elk Hunting
  • Esquire
  • Exotic Wild Game
  • Game Birds
  • Hunting Dogs
  • Lake Fishing
  • Misc. Outdoor Action
  • Moose Hunting
  • Muskellunge
  • People
  • Rabbit Hunting
  • River Fishing
  • Saltwater Fishing
  • Various Wildlife
  • World War II-related fishing and hunting topics

The covers of these magazine which are, for the most part, in fine to mint condition bring out the raw emotions of a day on the water or afield with or without a dog. They elicit feelings that a mere photograph cannot capture. People soon grow tired of seeing a photo of a big buck on the cover. Scoop's Books, offers not only fishing and hunting books but old outdoor magazines as well.

Please remember: some of these magazines are 60 to 80 years old, and many look as if they were printed yesterday. They are not $5 each as some people seem to think they should be. An average price of $25-30 is about right, and magazines with superb cover art by the masters artists of that era, can range up to $125 or more. Most of these magazines, although not all, have a Ben East story inside.

One thing is very important, and I stress it here. Most of these items are one-of-a-kind. Email me to determine if a specific item still exists. Do not send money without checking with me first. People do it all the time, and I have to email them back, and ask specifically what they are buying. Check ahead avoids disappointment when an item sold just before your order arrived.

I take bank money orders, cashiers checks, company or personal checks, and PayPal. I do not take credit or debit cards. Business and personal check must clear my bank before any magazines are sent.

Postage, as we all know, has gone up. My postage rates may seem high at $5 each, but I usually ship in boxes, and each book is well padded. I ship with insurance in most cases, and purchase delivery confirmation. You don't have to be home to get the package but the delivery confirmation notes that the package has been delivered. There can be no squabble over whether or not books or magazines were delivered. I will know precisely what time delivery took place.

If possible, send all available information for what you'd like to buy.

Some folks may think that some of these magazines are unfairly priced. Prices hinge on many things:

  • overall condition of the magazine
  • quality of the cover artwork
  • author's reputation
  • whether the cover artist did any drawings or sketches inside the magazine
  • names of the various writers
  • whether magazines are collectible because of those names

Some artists are very collectible because of their quality work. People such as...

  • William Harnden Foster
  • W. H. Hinton
  • Lynn Bogue Hunt
  • Edwin Megargee

and a wide assortment of others can push the cost of an old magazine ever higher. Some magazines sold becomes more expensive because of their content, and as is true with most antiques, provenance is important. Each magazine will come with a letter from me attesting to the fact these magazines once belonged to the Ben East estate. That provenance, if provided with the magazine if it is ever sold, will keep the proof of these magazines belonging to Ben East clear. Note that East obtained some magazines from other people, as proven by an address label.

These magazines, and many other things such as signed Ben East letters, and letters sent to Ben East, are further proof. I still own one of Ben's old four-drawer file cabinets and it still houses some of his extensive files.

People collect old outdoor magazines for many reasons. They like to read about what went before, and they come to love the old artwork that can and will capture the soul of true sportsmen. Many people horde these magazines as a link to their outdoor past.

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this basic truth. Some people, whether I like it or not, have no love for the magazines but collect the old ones for their covers or as a hedge against inflation. Many who own fishing or hunting camps clip the cover off a magazine and put up a moose or trout cover and use the rest of the magazine to start a wood fire.

We need to communicate to make this work.

My job isn't to be the fire marshal or the magazine police to watch over people to see how they treat these treasured magazines. If a person wants to clip a cover or cut out an article, slit out fishing or hunting ads, that's up to them. I'd hate to think it would happen but I'm not so naïve to believe it won't.

I welcome e-mails asking for specific issues or requests for particular authors or artists or artwork. I will try to accommodate. Feel free to write and ask the price ahead of time. Don't be scared off by the high price because there aren't many of those magazines left.

Here's a chance to travel down memory lane with an imaginary rod and reel or firearm over your shoulder. It can be a thrilling adventure to read some of the magazines from your youth or your father's youth. Or, it can be a major thrill to take a tour of yesteryear, and learn what it was really like back in the Good Old Days.

I get excited by severe weather

I thumped this bruin with two well-placed rocks. He left us alone.

There's something about storms that light my fire. I'm not certain just why I find them so intriguing, but I suspect it began near Flint when brother George and I were 10 years old.

We were outside playing catch. Even though I had (still have) small hands, I could throw a knuckle-ball. George was the person who could catch it.

He had a little nickel curve ball and I had my wobbling knuckler. It's what we did in the early 1950s. Occasionally one of us would uncork a wild pitch, and one of us would go chasing the ball down the street.

Head for cover when the big winds come blowing in.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, up came a big wind. Mind you: we were skinny little kids, and I doubt either of us weighed over 60 pounds. The wind was so strong we had to push hard against it to get indoors.

What we had felt was the outside winds of a massive tornado that followed an east-west road about seven miles south of our home and in the north end of Flint, and it covered two or three miles before lifting back up into the turbulent clouds and disappeared. It left nothing but death and destruction behind.

Several people were killed, and the big wind would destroy three or four houses in a row, lift up to dodge a house or two, and drop down again for more devastation.

It made a big impact on me, and several years later, Max Donovan of Clio and I were traveling back-roads. He had me drive, and we were in Tuscola County when I saw a twister coming across a field at us.

"Out-run it," Max hollered. He had an old gutless station wagon, and it was no contest. The tornado hit us, lifted the car two or three feet into the air, and then slammed us back down. My foot was still standing on the accelerator, and away we went, no worse for wear.

In 1970, my father and I joined another father-son team from Ontario, for a northern Ontario fly-in trip. We were crossing a large shallow lake that was filled with big pike when a storm popped up. We fought to keep from capsizing for two hours, and finally wallowed ashore on a deserted island. We waited until the storm passed, bailed out our boats, and went fishing, again none the worse for wear.

The Indian guides blamed me for pointing at the unnamed island.

That storm was the edge of a tornado that hammered its way through Sudbury, Ontario, causing massive destruction. We weren't in the actual tornado but caught some of the heavier winds generated by it.

This Arctic grayling was caught on the Northwest Territories Great Bear Lake.

Some years ago, the sky turned that dark greenish-purple color as clouds rolled and tumbled in the southwestern sky with an ominous sound. The direction was a good clue for possible severe weather, and I watched the tops of nearby maple trees bend almost flat as my wife screamed for me to come inside.

No twister for us, but a neighbor a mile away watched a tornado demolish his brand-new garage. Again. no injuries and the neighbor had insurance on his garage. It was a big inconvenience, that's all.

Kay and I got caught in a hellish big storm on Great Bear Lake in Canada's Northwest Territories in the late 1970s. This lake is just slightly smaller than Lake Michigan. The lodge owner came by in a much larger boat, and took Kay with him. My guide and I followed the larger boat for miles, rising 12 feet into the air on the crest of a wave, and then we'd plunge into the trough with water all around us.

Up we'd go, and there would be the larger boat with Kay aboard, and it was pulling slowly away from us. We traveled into the waves within 10 feet of a sheer rock wall six feet away, and one mistake would find the waves pounding us and our boat into bloody tin foil against the rocks.

We made it into a safe haven called Gunbarrel Inlet, and there were several boats milling about with smoke rising from a small wood fire on shore. I asked someone why they were not up near the fire.

A bear had reportedly "chased" them from shore and out into their boats.

"A bear chased us away," came a reply. I told my guide to head for shore. I put more wood on the fire, shucked out of my rain-soaked rain gear, and stood steaming near the roaring blaze. The first head we'd had in hours..

Someone hollered "Bear!" from a boat, and pointed down the shore. Here come a 200-pound black bear, and I picked up a rock and hollered at him. The bruin stopped momentarily, and I took several steps closer, and my old pitching days came through. No knuckle-ball ball this time but a high hard one that thumped his rump. The second rock was a bean-ball, and he ran off. We returned to the warming fire. We were chilled to the bone.

So the snowstorm and it's eight inches of snow a few nights ago really didn't seem to be anything special. We may see lots of snow, some strong winds and moaning sounds from the eaves, but as far as storms go, this one didn't have the making of anything worth writing about.

But what am I writing about. I've already mention tonight's storm, so in some way, it does influence my thoughts. Personally, I'd just as soon seen it get cold and freeze up the slop for two or three days and then go away.

The most recent storm can't even compare with a few of them during the winter when we'd see 15-20 inches of snow. Storms are interesting, but these little guys are nothing but a little bump in the highway of life. Storms that can kill a guy are those worthy of great respect.

Missing bow shots



Shoot the left buck while aiming for the off-side shoulder, and wait for this one to turn.  If shooting from the other side, the twig in snow could deflect an arrow.


It happens to everyone at one time or another. We miss an easy dog shot at a whitetail buck, and it runs off – alarmed and spooked – but unhurt. Many hunters can dredge up a dandy excuse for the miss.

Instead of trying to come up with a believable excuse for a missed shot, it makes more sense to go through the entire  sequence in your mind. Don’t let the fudge factor kick in, but analyze it from the viewpoint of learning from your mistakes.

If the scene is mentally replayed and you study the missed shot from all angles, you’ll probably find that something happened that could have been a contributing factor to missing the animal.

It happens to everyone. Learn from your mistakes.


Some hunters cut wide shooting lanes in all directions from their stands, and the coop or stand looks like the hub of a bicycle tire with spokes leading off in all directions.

Deer often are frightened by such cleared areas. Hunting in thick cover is much more difficult, and many of the stands in my hunting areas are in thick cover or very close to it. A few stands may be out in the open, but over many years I’ve learned that thick-cover locations can be very productive.

Hunting thick cover can lead to some missed shots. Often, in many tree stands, there will be only one decent shooting location. Often, that is all we need. But, know this: deer that move through thick areas can travel on any trail or make one of their own. Knowing where a shot can be taken is very important to success.

Always check for that one good natural shooting lane, and then start looking for other possibilities. Bigger bucks often are found in heavy cover, and learning how to pick a hole through the cover for a bow shot can be a lesson in frustration. Do it right, though, and don’t forget about leafy branches, twigs sticking out or that often unseen branch half the size of your little finger that can deflect a shot.

Study that area where a shot was missed, and do so from the ground and a tree, and there’s a good chance you’ll learn why you missed. Taking a shot in heavy cover means picking a hole where the arrow must pass.

If necessary, use binoculars from different anglers, to spot twigs.


My eyes are bad, and binoculars are a must for me to find these holes and any offending twigs or weeds in them. It also pays to examine such areas from different locations. Sunlight glinting off a twig may not be seen from one angle but will be visible from another. Look for them.

This means careful attention to detail. Don’t forget that it takes only a twig – a tiny twig – to deflect an arrow and cause it to fly harmlessly off course. Miss one of these shots, and it becomes increasingly important to study where the shot was taken and why it missed.

The most common reason for a miss is the arrow clipped an unseen twig or a branch that suddenly jumped out in front of the arrow. We know that one blade of grass or a tall weed, hit right, can deflect the arrow in mid-flight. These things  can and do happen. Learn to pick a hole where the arrow will pass through without nicking anything.

Know exactly where you can or cannot shoot & stick with the best spots.


Those little holes become increasingly difficult to see once the sun does down. The heavy cover is darker, and tiny twigs are virtually impossible to find. You must know exactly where they are located, and there’s no need to worry. If the hole is missed, the arrow will miss, and hunters will know what happened. Pinpointing the holes, and memorizing their location, is a big part of the game plan.

Blaming the wind, a piece of blowing dirt in the eye, shooting into the rising or setting sun, and a whole raft of other excuses are a waste of time. Learn to study the situation, replay the shot, and determine where the wheels fell off on that shot.

Studying missed shots can be a brutal piece of masochism as you beat yourself about the head and body, but knowing what went wrong makes it far easier to correct or avoid a similar problem in the future. Making a mistake is human nature, but brushing it away with some lame excuse simply enables the hunter to commit the same mistake over and over again.

And the cycle of missed shots will continue.

Late-season deer hunting



Cold weather will make bucks move. Be alert to it.


K, Christmas is over and out of the way, and I managed to continue my longtime shopping record. Chalk up another year that I failed to make it into the first store to buy gifts.

Many may consider me Scrooge or a dummy, but I dislike shopping with a passion and my wife dislikes it as well but she does enjoy buying for the little grandkids and our great-grandsons.

Now me, I'm content to watch her trudge out the door. I can tell, because I'm a trained observer, that Kay doesn't care one bit about joining the Christmas shopping throng at the local stores. I wish her good luck before Christmas when she went shopping, and I'd often have her drop me off at a friend's house and I'd climb into a tree stand for a few hours.

It seemed the perfect situation: her shopping and me hunting.


There I was, out in the weather with muzzleloader or bow in hand, depending on the season, and she would stop and pick me up three or four hours later. It seemed to make perfect sense to me. She dislikes hunting in cold weather, and I can't say it's my favorite thing to do but there was little cold temps to worry about.

Each day I'd watch for deer. Some days a few would pop out, and I'd make the decision to shoot or don't shoot. The hunt wasn't about killing a deer so much as it was about hunting for deer.

As my butt snuggled deeper into the foam rump pad, I'd think warm thoughts while the end of my bow was tucked into the top of my left rubber boot. My release was on the string, and seeing and hoping to shoot a deer meant waiting for the proper time to draw and shoot.

Numerous button-bucks and doe fawns were seen, and several mature does, but bucks with significant bone between their ears were conspicuous by their absence. As a matter of fact, not one well-antlered buck dared show his rack at any of my hunting spots.

Two or three small bucks were seen during December in another hunting location but they were always too away from my preferred bow range of 15 yards. A buck at 25 yards if outside my vision, and therefore outside of my shooting range with a bow. And, I don’t shoot small bucks,

No big bucks were seen this fall, and I’ve shot enough small bucks.


Shooting a muzzleloader is a bit different. I have a good scope on my black powder rifle, and can easily shoot bucks at 150-175 yards. I love my center-fire rifles, but thoroughly enjoy shooting bucks (and does when I have the proper permits) with a front-end loader.

The slightly colder weather is a turn-on for me because I know whitetails must move in colder weather. I'm still hoping for two or three days of 10-degree weather. When it gets that cold, I know the whitetail bucks and does will be up and moving.

The burning question right now is will we see weather that cold before the season shuts down on the evening of New Years Day. It looks very doubtful that we will have such weather until well into January when the season has shut down.

I don’t think we’ll have any bone-chilling cold between now and New Years Day.


Who knows? If all the talk about global warming is true, than what we are not seeing is what we'll probably be getting in the years to come. With the warmer weather will be more east winds, more swirling winds, less cold temperatures, possibly less snow, and a quicker spring break-up. It doesn't sound like my kind of winter deer-hunting weather.

So, between now and then, there is no shopping left to do. What excuse can I use to have Kay drop me off at one of my favorite spots, and pick me up on the way home?

I'll need to come up with something to get me through these last few days.

Hunt rutting bucks


Trying to anticipate what a buck will do during the rut is like listening to a politician's promise. Both are risky ventures.

Frankly, the only predictable thing about a rutting buck is his unpredictability. They do things that make absolutely no sense to the bow hunter, but apparently, their actions make sense to them.  

The oddities of rutting bucks have been well documented. What is seldom stressed is how their mood swings influence their actions, but seldom will they be totally clueless. They do not lose their inherent fear of humans, and a buck that hears, sees or smells a hunter, will waste little time getting out of there.

Rut hunting is no time to be careless about human scent.

This means that hunters can take no liberties with being downwind of known travel routes. We also must sit still, don't move and take only high-percentage shots. Another thing to note is that bucks are seldom still, and hunters must be prepared for a quick and accurate shot.

The most predictable thing about a rutting buck is he will never be far from his latest squeeze. Of course, as soon as he's had his way with her, he is off on a continuing search for other estrus does to breed.

Remember the buck will always be near the does. He may hang back in heavy cover near a food source, but once she moves, the buck is on her trail again. It's one reason why hunters often set up a stand in the heavy cover near a food source.

A buck will cruise back and forth as the doe feeds, and will check other does to determine how close they are to estrus, but he'll be keeping a close watch on his current lady friend.

Bucks will often be seen crossing open fields as they course a doe. He will go where she goes, and if she is almost in estrus, he will be everncloser. If she goes left or right, he will cut her off, and if she head-fakes him into going one way while she goes the other, he will soon catch up with the wayward doe.

Hunting rutting bucks can be easy or difficult, depending on the animal.


Hunting these animals can be great fun, and almost every hunter will say; "So close and yet so far away" at one time or another. The bucks and does often travel just out of bow range, and it's not a deliberate thing. The hunter makes a mistake by setting up just out of effective bow range.

It's difficult to go wrong by hunting fairly close to fields where does will feed. Choose one of the corners, and especially the field-edge corner with the heaviest nearby cover. That is where bucks will hang out to watch the does, and it’s here they often pace back and forth.

That doesn't mean the buck won't enter a feeding field, and often by luck or design, a doe will lead an amorous buck past a ground blind or tree stand, but it's not something to bet the homestead on.

Tending bucks are vocal bucks, and a buck about to breed a doe will be grunting with almost every step it takes. This tending grunt is low and guttural, and sometimes it can be heard for 100 yards and at other times the buck may only be 20 yards away when the sound is heard. In some cases the sound is like a ventriloquist "throwing" his voice; it's almost impossible to tell where the sound comes from in heavy fog.

Bucks will sometimes still check ground scrapes, but once the rut really kicks offs, they stop opening up and freshening scrapes. They have used those scrapes over the past 10-14 days to locate estrus and soon to be ready does, and every buck in the area knows which does will soon be bred.

Learn about rutting bucks by hunting them, and learn from your mistakes.


This is when young bucks try to mount the does, but most does will not stand for a lesser deer unless the big buck has been killed. Few 1 1/2-year-old bucks do any breeding. Their day will come in two or three years unless they get shot by a hunter.

Hunting the rut is entirely different than hunting bucks at other times. Hunters must start thinking like a buck, and once they figure out where the does are, and where the thickest cover is (where much of the breeding takes place), it becomes a bit easier... but not much easier.

Rut hunting is never easy, but it stimulates your brain and makes hunters think. And that is always a good thing at this time of year.

Hunt during mid-day now



My wife Kay shot this 12-point in Alabama during the January rut with these tactics.


The buck was banging its antlers against a tree, and I listened to him working a scrape for 30 minutes late last October. The buck was within 20 yards of me but was screened by thick brush and invisible.

I sat in my tree stand and listened. He was close enough to hear the urine hitting the scrape, and he was upwind and the pungent ammonia odor was strong. He worked that tree over, yanked at the overhead licking branch, and for all the noise and commotion he made, the buck was impossible to see.

I checked the spot the next day. He'd been working two scrapes, and one was eight inches deep and as big around as two large turkey platters. The buck had pulled the old licking branch down, and I replaced it. It suited him just fine because the scrape had antler tine marks and a hoof print in it, and the new licking branch looked pretty ragged. The second scrape was opened up, and the licking branch was chewed to a frazzle.

That buck had chewed the licking branch to a frazzle & punished the scrape.


What was even more interesting was that the buck had opened up a third scrape. Huge clots of wet earth was piled at the north end of the scrape, and he had made it the night before. How do I know?

Buck scrapes have dirt and debris piled at one end or another, and if the dirt is piled at the end closest to thick cover, it generally means the deer is tending that scrape in the evening as he leaves the bedding area for a night of chasing cute little does.

This told me several things: One is the rut had not started but the chasing phase had set in. This chasing phase lasts several days before the full rut starts. As long as fresh activity is seen at the scrape, and it is being tended one or more times daily, the rut has not begun. Once the scrapes show no sign of activity, that means the rut is underway.

One thing few hunters realize is that the mid-day hours just before and during the rut can produce a fine buck. A person just needs to be there at the right time/

This buck may have had other nearby scrapes it had been working, but once a buck is shot and is taken out of the woods, another buck will usually take its place. Nature abhors a vacuum, and when a big brown trout or a big whitetail buck is removed, another moves in and takes over.

Hunting from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. works well during the chasing stage and the rut. If possible, be in your stand by 9 a.m., and sit patiently. The bucks will move during the mid-day hours.

I first learned of this phenomenon many years ago while hunting ruffed grouse. Two days in a row a buck was seen darting away from me in the same area. I checked the area, found his scrapes, and went back and set up a stand 30 yards downwind of it. The buck came by that first day at about noon, wind-checked the scrape from downwind, and offered me a 12-yard shot.

Hunting the pre-rut and the rut during mid-day hours can pay off. Sure, many can't take time off work to hunt those hours, but keep it in mind for weekends. Hunt near natural funnels between bedding and feeding areas, and once the rut kicks in, start hunting the heavier cover.

Hunt the heaviest cover near feeding areas.


My only real problem with hunting the mid-day hours is a personal one. I'm good for three hours maximum in a tree before everything gets sore. I'll stick it out until about 2:30 p.m., grab a bite to eat, and then hunt from 4 p.m. until legal shooting time ends. It means spending long hours in a tree, but it can pay big dividends with a husky whitetail buck.

This method has worked for me, and can work for you regardless of where you hunt. Try it this fall and see if it doesn't produce action at a time when no one is hunting. It's rut hunting's biggest secret, and now only you, me and several hundred thousand other people also will know it.