I caught a glimpse of antler as I slowly turned to look over my right shoulder, my head moving like it was caught in a jar of maple syrup. My shoulders tensed with a familiar thrill of adrenaline, but my heart dropped when I realized he was coming from downwind. I never expected that approaching buck to turn into a shot opportunity. I’m a religious believer in the gospel of the wind. I’ve always heard deer can smell a human from nearly a county away. I figure there’s no way to hide that kind of sin when the wind isn’t right.

But I cast a few prayers to the powers that be, hoping my fresh-earth wafers, one pinned to my hat and another on my jacket between my shoulder blades, would somehow outfunk whatever human scent was wafting on the wind.

That deer stopped once, pointed his nose up, then twiddled his antlers in some low-hanging branches. Then he squatted to pee and stepped straight onto the oak flat. A few minutes later, he was lying on the ground.

What the Wind Carries

I was no more a cover-scent skeptic than a cover-scent evangelist before that hunt. I pinned on those wafers before I left the truck because I had them and because I figured they weren’t going to hurt. I figure deer hunting is as much gambling as it is skill, and I’m game for pretty much anything that might tip the odds in my favor.

Whitetail deer have some of the most sensitive noses in the animal kingdom. One frequently cited estimate puts the number of scent receptors in a deer’s nose at nearly 300 million. Compare that to the less than 5 million scent receptors humans have, and you can start to get an idea of just how good a whitetail sniffer actually is.

With numerous intricate folds and substantial surface area inside the whitetail schnoz, there’s a good chance deer can also distinguish multiple smells at once, although it’s difficult to distinguish exactly what deer can smell since they aren’t exactly filling out surveys for us. Suffice it to say, a deer can probably pick out each individual ingredient in a stew, even when the pot is simmering on a stove somewhere down the holler.

But just because a buck can smell something doesn’t mean he’s going to react to it. Deer come across strange smells all the time. What matters to a hunter has less to do with what that deer can smell and a whole lot more to do with how it affects his behavior. The big question is whether layering a specific scent on top of human odor changes the response.

Under Cover

Hunters tend to lump a lot of different products under a cover-scent umbrella. But there are several different categories, all of which are designed to pull different types of wool over a whitetail’s nose.

Environmental Scents

Like my fresh-earth wafers, this type of cover scent is intended to make a hunter smell more like the woods around them. Think dirt, acorn, pine, and other woodsy scents. The idea is that it works kind of like your camo, so your scent blends into the background of other aromas a deer is used to.

Urine-Based Scents

These products use non-deer animal urine, including the little brown bottle of fox pee my dad used back in the 1970s. Other predator urines, like bobcat and coyote, are a different story. They are sometimes marketed as deer deterrents because predator urine can sometimes trigger avoidance by whitetails. That’s not exactly the kind of response you want when you’re sitting in a treestand.

Attractant Scents

This category includes doe-in-estrus urine, buck urine, tarsal gland scents, and other products intended to get whitetails interested, especially during the rut. Food-based scents, like sweet corn, apple, and acorn, can also fall here. Instead of masking human smells, these products are supposed to draw deer in.

Novelty Scents

Vanilla, anise, and other scents that don’t necessarily imitate something a deer’s nose is familiar with fall in this category. They’re often marketed as cover scents, but how they actually work isn’t always clear. Some theories suggest they mask human odor. Others suggest they distract a deer’s nose or create curiosity.

But Do They Work?

In 2009, Field & Stream ran an experiment that pitted a German Shepherd K9 named Blitz against a number of scent control products, including several cover scents. Blitz was tasked with finding a person hiding in a box. During different phases of the test, different scent products were used to see if they affected the dog’s ability to find the hidden human.

The cover scents didn't completely fool the dog’s nose, but they delayed detection by up to 45 seconds.

Of course, the experiment was informal. It didn’t take place in a completely controlled environment. It only involved one dog and zero whitetails. But hunters make decisions based on anecdotal evidence all the time. It’s why so many still believe the first cold snap in November triggers the rut. But there’s a difference between noticing something happen and proving why.

There’s only so much you can accomplish by layering one scent on top of another anyway. Spritzing some Nose Jammer on a turd doesn’t mean you stop smelling the turd. Before you start worrying about cover scents, start with the basics. Practice good hygiene, ditch the perfumy personal care products, and try not to haul the aroma of gas station into the woods with you. That’s a pretty good place to start. Just know, you’ll never completely fool a deer’s nose even with the strictest scent control regiment.

Final Thoughts

I would never completely change my whole approach to cover scents based on two fresh-earth discs and a single deer on a single day. I can’t explain why that buck kept coming toward my stand with the wind blowing in his face. Maybe he didn’t smell me. Maybe he was hellbent on the acorns. Maybe he just didn’t care.

But my son, who was hunting the other side of some cutovers on the same farm that same night, had a single doe approach his stand. She came from downwind. He was wearing two fresh-earth discs. That might be enough to make me a believer, or at least enough to make me pin earth-scented wafers on my lucky hat. Just in case.

He was a broken nine pointer with a tank for a body, and when I snort-wheezed at him the first time he looked for a minute and then went back to browsing. The second time I snort-wheezed, he looked for longer. Through my binos I could see him licking his lips. That’s when I knew he’d eventually commit, and he did.

Calling bucks during all stages of the rut can be extremely effective, but for most of us, it won’t be. The reasons are almost all tied to calling to the wrong deer, saying the wrong thing, or just blind calling for the sake of it. Here’s a few things to keep in mind the next time you decide to blow on your grunt tube.

You Talkin’ to Me?

The general default setting of most hunters is to see a buck that isn’t likely to come in and instantly try to call. They’ll usually reach for their grunt tube or rattle bag, and let it rip. Instead of this, try to assess the buck’s mood first and read the whole situation before making audio contact.

The buck I called in at the end of October was a prime candidate to respond to that snort-wheeze. Aside from being a mature deer, he didn’t really have an agenda. A buck that looks like he is just killing time or looking for something to do is a buck you can call in. A buck on a mission is a different story.

If you see a nose-to-the-ground deer just eating up the miles, you’re going to have a hard time convincing him to change course. If you see a buck that seems mildly spooked or just a little boogery, good luck.

Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to read a buck’s demeanor by first catching sight of him and trying to think rationally through an adrenaline dump. This means that it’s really important to pay attention when you first make contact. Get your binos on him before you call, and pay attention. How a buck reacts right out of the gate will tell you how to proceed.

Excuse Me?

If you watch any kind of deer hunting content this time of year, you’re very likely to see people rattling like crazy and using a grunt tube like they're soloing with a trumpet. There is a time and place for this, and it’s mostly right now and in a place you’re not hunting.

If you’re on a well-managed property with a solid buck-to-doe ratio, rattling and blind calling with tending grunts can be magical. This only gets more true the less pressured the deer are. In most places, this kind of calling is only going to send deer the other way.

Rattling seems to work best at first light, when bucks are on the move and looking for something to do after a long night of chasing. Tending grunts seem to work best when they are combined with snapping some sticks and selling the whole scene. They also seem to earn a better response rate when they happen tight to bedding areas and in thick cover.

As with any type of calling, the overall location might be the biggest deciding factor. If a buck can quickly assess that the deer he hears aren’t visible and should be, you’d better hope he’s so rutted up his brain is sludge. Otherwise, that little warning system in his brain is going to fire, and it’s not going to end well.

It’s also important to pay attention to the distance. You might not be able to say the right thing to a buck that is 400 yards across a picked cornfield, but you might not be able to say the wrong thing to one that is 80 yards away in a thicket.

Hail Mary Calling

Most hunters aren’t overloaded with patience. They want to make something happen, and to do that, they blind call (a lot). This can work really well, but probably won’t. Think about how often you’ve heard an actual buck fight break out in the woods. I spend hundreds of hours on stand in multiple states each fall, and I can go years without seeing or hearing a real buck fight.

I might hear a handful of grunts or doe bleats in any given season, and rarely ever hear a buck actually snort-wheeze. This makes me a very cautious caller, but a lot of folks aren’t.

The key difference is that I believe blind calling often costs me deer, especially pressured deer. I think that rut hunters often feel there is no downside to calling, but I disagree. Just like we don’t expect to hear multiple real buck fights break out on any given day, let alone at noon when it’s 75 degrees, the deer have expectations as well.

Timing of the day, cold or rainy weather, and your stand location should all play into your blind calling strategies. Mature bucks rarely come running in like some highly curated hunting shows would lead you to believe. They almost always try to circle downwind of the action. You’ll have to consider your stand location and the wind if you’re bent on calling. Don’t call just to call, but instead try a more targeted approach around the conditions that should produce the most receptive bucks.

If you’re reading this, you’ve probably consumed content in that genre at some point. Like holiday decorations in a department store, the torrent of rut predictions, rut reports, and hype over the Rutting Moon seems to only come earlier and with more intensity every year.

But is all of that guesswork really necessary?

Decades of deer research suggest that key aspects of the rut are biologically set in stone, including the central obsession of so many rut hunters: timing.

Guided by the Sun

Hardly anything in our environment is as consistent as the Sun. It rises in the east, sets in the west, and we will presumably follow the same path around it on a 365-day cycle until it explodes in 5 billion years or so. It only makes sense that other cycles in nature ended up tracking the sun as well.

As the northern hemisphere tilts away from the Sun each fall, the shortening of days triggers trees to drop their leaves, prompts bears to fatten themselves, and, according to science, keeps the rut on a strict schedule. Despite changing environmental conditions, a 2024 study in Ontario found that regional peak rut timing remained static across a staggering 29 consecutive years.

If you think that’s just a wacky Canadian deer thing, you’re mistaken. This theory has held up all the way down to Texas, where biologists gathered whitetail conception data for 3 years and saw the same pattern. Peak rut varies by region, but not by year.

That should be a huge relief for an anxious whitetailer who is dangerously close to using Tarot cards to decide when to sit that Holy Grail rut funnel. Still, some hunters can’t abandon their conviction that the Moon, not the Sun, is what gets bucks on the move.

Lunar Coincidence

Since the lunar cycle is shorter than the length of the average month, full moon dates shift backwards by about 11 days with each new calendar. The Harvest Moon is the full moon that falls closest to the autumnal equinox on a given year, and earned its name centuries ago as a convenient source of nighttime illumination in a time when you otherwise couldn’t keep working the fields after dusk.

The Hunter’s Moon, or Rutting Moon, is the full moon that follows the Harvest Moon. It’s unclear whether the term “Hunter’s Moon” originated with farmers who had a unique opportunity to spot game in the moonlight across their freshly harvested fields or with Native Americans who took the moon as their signal to stock up on meat and hides for the winter. Either way, there’s one thing the Hunter’s Moon was never meant to imply—that it has any influence at all on when the whitetail rut takes place. But once modern deer hunters dubbed it the “Rutting Moon,” that idea found a lasting foothold in the whitetail world.

Today, we have plenty of evidence that the Rutting Moon is a classic correlation-not-causation situation. A 2012 study of wild deer in Texas and Mississippi modeled conception dates against moon phases and found exactly no relationship. It seems that the appearance of a full moon around the time that whitetails are breeding is simply a function of having roughly one full moon per month and about a month of breeding activity.

Planning your rut-cation around a lunar calendar is most likely a complete waste of time, and the weather forecast could be equally trivial.

Weather or Not

I don’t think any demographic gets more hyped up over a November cold front than deer hunters. It’s fair to think that a buck sporting a full winter coat and a healthy layer of fat should get a little spring in his step when temperatures drop, and there is some evidence to support that concept.

In 2010, Oklahoma researchers analyzed a seven-year dataset and found that bucks moved more with lower temperatures between November and February. However, their summary of the analysis stated that daily weather variables—including temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, and wind speed—had minimal impact overall on the amount of ground deer covered. The primary driver of deer movement was still that beautifully reliable nuclear reactor in the sky.

The crepuscular nature of whitetails and their photoperiod-based reproductive response generally overrides the inconsistent elements in a deer’s world. That leaves hunters with a simple, if not always easy, choice.

What Really Matters

A lot of regions might only see about three weeks of really hot rut action, with the potential for a small resurgence a couple weeks after the main event. In the Deep South, seeking and chasing might drag on for months. But the fact remains that breeding will occur within the same window every year, and that window is relatively brief.

The best way to increase your odds of killing a buck is probably not to spend hours agonizing over the moon phase or the weather forecast. It’s understanding that deer will be moving no matter what, and time on stand is what ultimately fills a tag.

If you’re not prepared with enough grub to get you through the day, you’ll cave to that little voice whispering in your ear. Right around the time you should be focused on killing a cruising buck, that voice will convince you that you can still make it to the gas station before they quit serving the morning biscuits. Regardless of the time of day, it’s hard to focus on deer hunting when your stomach sounds like it’s trying to grunt in a buck.

I like to pack sandwiches, breakfast burritos, and some kind of fruit, but my secret weapons are no-bake chocolate oatmeal cookies. I’ve got a mean sweet-tooth, and these sit at the top of my list. I space them throughout a hunt and reward myself for making it to those odd hours of the day when I least expect deer to move. If that doesn’t sound like something you’re interested in, don’t worry, I polled the MeatEater crew for their best rut snacks. These are foods that help them stay on stand and, ultimately, kill big bucks.

A Moveable Feast

“All-day rut sits are a struggle, so I always have plenty of candy, like Snickers and M&Ms. I like jerky, granola bars, turkey sandwiches, and lots of coffee. I usually have something extra to drink with some caffeine in it as well, just to combat the midday lull. I’ve learned through western hunts and all-day whitetail sits that I need to bring food I will actually want to eat, so I’m not packing salads if you get my drift.” –Tony Peterson

The Classics

“I’m big on coffee, jerky, and cheese crackers. I always take the crackers out of the original package and drop them in a ziplock to make less racket when snack time comes.” –Brent Reaves

For Sandwich Lovers

“Homemade egg McMuffin is my go-to rut breakfast (in the stand). I’ll have Usinger’s liverwurst and butter on Latvian sourdough for lunch one and two, Werther’s Original, Hershey’s with almonds, and round out the day with an apple. I also pack a pint of hot coffee and a liter of water to wash it all down and keep me hydrated.” –Janis Putelis

The Minimalist Approach

“Lara bars, pb and J, and fruit snacks. I can run off that all day.” –Clay Newcomb

Best for Peanut Butter Lovers

“My favorite snacks are a peanut butter honey bacon wrap, peanut butter snickers, nature valley wafers, cheese crackers, and an energy drink.” –Jordan Budd

An Apple a Day

“When I'm traveling for a rut hunt, I do the apple-a-day thing. They keep me regular and that's valuable. My other favorite rut snacks are jerky, meat sticks, granola bars, and muffins. And if I'm in the Midwest, I'll also be stopping at Casey's for a slice of pizza.” –Spencer Neuharth

The Good, the Bad, and the Better

“I like a mix of ‘good for you’ and just plain good tasting to get me through the rut. That means I'll have healthier staples like an apple, PB&J, mixed nuts, jerky, and dried fruit on hand. But I also make sure to have some rewards for the long midday hours too like Oreos, Snickers bars, and Dot's pretzels.” –Mark Kenyon

These foods won’t technically make you a better hunter, but they can keep you from cutting your hunt short. And if that’s what it takes to wrap your tag around a big buck, you better bring the groceries.

Let us know in the comments what foods keep you going during the whitetail rut!

“The first thing I did was grab my phone and check my trail camera,” Adair told MeatEater. “Sure enough, that buck was standing in front of my feeder at 7:11. I was beating myself up over it.”

Adair had been thinking about that unusual buck since the previous season when it showed up on a midnight trail camera. The photo showed a buck with a mess of kickers and extra points around the base. His cousin saw it the last week of the rifle season but was hunting with a bow, and the buck was out of range. Adair spent the offseason hoping the buck made it through. In early September, he got an answer.

“Just a couple of days later, I had him on camera in the daylight. I just couldn’t believe it. That really lit the fire and got it going,” Adair said.

But other obligations kept Adair out of the deer woods on the opening day of archery season. His former high school basketball coach called him up and asked him to referee a few games. Adair agreed without checking the dates. When the coach asked if he’d still be at the first game on Thursday, Adair realized he had a conflict with opening day.

“I couldn’t cancel on him and leave him hanging,” Adair said. So he spent the evening of the opener in a high school gym. As soon as the game was over, he pulled out his phone to check his trail camera.

“Sure enough, that evening that deer was under my feeder,” Adair said. “That made me want him even more, knowing he was there and I wasn’t.”

The buck had been showing up regularly at the feeder in the mornings. Worried that slipping into the area before daylight might bust the buck, Adair decided to hunt evenings instead. He didn't see the buck that first weekend, but the trail camera kept catching it around the same time each morning throughout the following week.

By Friday, Adair had decided he’d have better luck hunting in the morning. His plan was to slip in quiet well before daylight to get set up well ahead of the buck’s regular breakfast schedule. Then he slept through three alarms.

With plans to try again Sunday morning, Adair barely slept Saturday night. He grabbed his bow and headed out in the pitch dark. Adair snuck in, climbed a tree overlooking the feeder, and settled in at 5:55, well before daylight.

A couple of does came in right at shooting light. A few more followed, along with some small bucks. He even had a seven-pointer walk right under his stand. None of them seemed to suspect he was there.

“It was getting pretty daylight when it dawned on me that he would have to be the next deer to walk out because every deer I’d seen on my trail camera was standing right in front of me,” Adair said.

Then he heard footsteps coming from behind him. “I was cool, calm, and collected up until that point. When I heard those footsteps coming, my heart started thumping,” Adair said. “I don’t know how the deer didn’t hear it.”

When the deer finally worked around to the edge of his field of vision, Adair realized it was another doe. “My heart about fell out the bottom of my boots.”

He took a few deep breaths and tried to gather himself. If a doe could get him this worked up, he figured he’d have a hard time keeping it together if the buck with all the kickers showed up. He watched the doe walk toward the feeder, then caught movement behind her.

“I saw a bush move and then saw his horns come out from behind it. My heart went right back to thumping just as hard as it was before,” Adair said.

The buck stopped about 15 yards from the feeder and stomped his foot once. Every deer on the feeder eased off to get out of his way. Adair figured this was good for him because fewer eyes would be watching when it came time to draw his bow. But when the buck settled in at the feeder, it was facing right at him.

After about three minutes, which felt like an absolute eternity to Adair, the buck took a few steps and turned broadside. Adair slowly raised the Mathews Z7 he got in a trade for a deer blind he’d built, and clipped on his release. When he moved his shoulder to draw, the buck threw his head up and looked right at him.

“I thought I just blew it,” Adair said. But then he turned and walked back the other direction, offering another broadside shot.

“There was a limb that was good camouflage for me, where he couldn’t see me too well. I pulled my arm up and drew back. I put my pin on him and picked out a rib that I liked, and I let it fly.”

Adair’s arrow was tipped with a random Muzzy fixed four-blade broadhead that he had for the past five years.

“A few weeks before the season, I was at a bow shop, and I was looking at all the broadheads they had hanging on the wall there because I was thinking about it,” Adair said. “They were like $75 a piece. I didn’t think I could make myself drop that much on a broadhead, so I passed on them and went with the one I had at the house.”

That broadhead did its job. When it hit, the buck jumped a couple of times, then stumbled forward and scrambled into the brush on its knees. “It sounded like a herd of elephants crashing around in there,” he said. “Then it just went dead quiet.”

Adair says he’d managed to hold it together until that moment. Once the woods went quiet, he started shaking like crazy. He sat in the treestand and FaceTimed his friend Zach Deal, who made fun of him because the shaking made it impossible to see.

After making one more phone call to his dad, Adair waited another 30 minutes before climbing down. He found his arrow, broken in two, about 10 yards from where the buck had been standing when he shot. Then he followed a solid blood trail for about sixty yards. The first thing he saw was one side of the rack sticking way up above the deer’s body.

“Putting my hands on him was indescribable. I leaned down in front of him and picked his head up, and I was just speechless. It was a surreal moment. It hadn’t quite sunk in yet, and I don’t know if it still has,” Adair said.

Trail camera photos had given Adair a sense of the buck's size, but it wasn’t until he saw the rack up close that he really understood everything the buck had to offer. The rack was loaded with extra points and kickers around the bases that the camera angles never really did justice to.

After counting them up, the buck had 20 scorable points. Adair and Deal measured the rack that day and estimated a gross score of 202 6/8 inches. On Tuesday, a wildlife department employee taped it at 190 6/8 inches net as a nontypical. That score is unofficial, and the rack will be measured again after a 60-day drying period.

Adair is understandably proud of that buck. He’s also proud that he didn’t need any fancy or expensive gear to get it. When asked if he had any advice for new or young hunters, he said, “Don’t feel pressured like you have to have the latest and greatest equipment. You can get by with just about anything. Be proud of what you’ve got. Just get out in the woods and have a good time.”

Photos via Kenneth Wayne Adair.

A few minutes after sunrise, two does appeared. They seemed to float across the flat, feeding at 50 yards, just beyond my comfortable shooting range. I watched their ears flick away the mosquitoes and held my breath, hoping they’d move closer. I might have been holding a different bow in that treestand, but the feeling of seeing deer was exactly the same.

A Change of Plans

If you had told me last season that I’d be carrying a crossbow into the woods, I would have looked at you like you were crazy. Then a bad fall on a martial arts mat left me with a dislocated shoulder. I didn’t realize it for two days. I just thought I was badly bruised.

When it finally popped back into place (thank you, Dr. Williams), the surrounding tendons and ligaments were stretched and pretty angry at me. It’s the kind of thing I would have bounced back from easily in my younger years. But this time, healing came slow. For months, I could barely raise my arm above shoulder level. Applying deodorant was almost impossible, let alone drawing my bow.

I’d regained most of my mobility by the end of summer, but I was far from ready for archery season. I hadn’t shot my bow in months. I’d lost strength in my back and shoulder, and I was holding a lot of anxiety about the possibility of reinjuring my still-tender shoulder. I wasn’t willing to risk reinjuring my shoulder just to preserve my draw weight, so I grabbed a crossbow.

I admit it felt like a concession, like I was quietly giving up an identity I’d spent 15 years building. But I knew it was one way to still get into the woods and, hopefully, put some meat in the freezer.

A Different Kind of Bowhunter

There’s a bit of a stigma about crossbow hunters in the archery world. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t bother me. I’d also be lying if I said I’d never scoffed at crossbow hunters myself. I’d spent a good portion of my adult life identifying as a bowhunter. To me, that category was limited to anyone shooting a vertical bow.

I loved my compound bow. The repetition of practicing draw, anchor, settle, release felt almost like meditation. I liked the challenge and maybe even a little of the badass reputation that comes with mastering a difficult weapon. (Okay, maybe a lot). In my mind, a crossbow didn’t carry the same aura. I realize I was judging myself way harder than any other hunter probably would have. But I also wasn’t ready to give up a season just to protect my pride.

Making the Change

I got my hands on a new Excalibur Hybrid X a few weeks before archery season. The model would be easy to cock with a crank system that was kind to my shoulder. But my first experience on the range didn’t feel much like shooting a bow. The thing is heavy. All decked out, it weighs over 10 pounds. My compound tipped the scales just over four.

The scope, trigger, and balance reminded me more of a rifle than anything I’d ever shot bowhunting. But there was an advantage to that. It took a single afternoon to feel competent shooting it. That surprised me. I expected a steeper learning curve. And it was stupid accurate once I got the scope zeroed. I was throwing one-inch groups at 40 yards from a bench in under an hour.

That afternoon, I started thinking less about what I was giving up and more about what a crossbow could do for me. I could cock and shoot it without shoulder pain, and I felt comfortable making accurate shots out to at least 40 yards. With my compound, 20 to 25 yards had always been my sweet spot. I was getting excited for bow season.

Trade-Offs in the Woods

There’s a lot more to deer hunting than just putting arrows on target. I wouldn’t realize the full extent of some of the trade-offs of my conversion until I was actually in the woods. That 10-pound rig felt heavy on the practice range, but it felt like hauling lead in the field. If I’m hunting close to the truck, the pounds don’t matter much. But I can feel every ounce on a long hike, especially when there are hills and rocks to contend with. Add a deer drag to the equation, and carrying that crossbow feels like hauling a boat anchor.

Still, the weight is a trade-off I’m willing to make. Once I'm settled into my stand, I don't have to draw the bow or hold at full draw while I wait for a deer to offer a good shot. That makes my shoulder happy.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t challenges, though. Holding steady and on target still isn’t easy. It just requires different muscles. Shooting offhand has its challenges, but a solid rest or a good set of shooting sticks can help.

What the Deer Don’t Know

For all the adjustments and ego bruises that came with converting to a crossbow, deer are still deer. A crossbow didn’t magically make me a better hunter, even if I can shoot it more consistently than I can currently shoot my compound. No piece of gear can replace solid woodsmanship. I still have to understand how deer move, play the wind, and be stealthy. None of that has changed. I haven’t changed as a bowhunter, either. I still need to judge the distance to my target and wait for a good angle or clear path to vitals. That is the most reassuring part of this whole transition. The crossbow hasn’t changed the kind of hunter I am.

I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss my compound bow. I miss the familiar rhythm of practice, the challenge, and, honestly, the identity I gave myself when I hunted with a compound bow. I like being a badass, and a crossbow just doesn’t carry the same reputation for me.

But I’m starting to believe the gear I carry into the woods might not define me as much as I thought it did. Maybe I’ll go back to my compound bow next year. Maybe I’ll keep the crossbow in the rotation. I haven’t decided yet. Either way, I’ll probably ease up on the crossbow shade I’ve thrown in the past. At least a little.

Crowell first heard about the buck in November 2025, when a photograph taken by a UPS driver started making the local rounds. He didn’t know the photographer, but had a general idea of the area where the photo was allegedly taken.

“I nicknamed the buck Rumor because it was a local legend,” Crowell told MeatEater. “But in today’s world, with AI and everything, nobody knew if the picture was even real.”

Real or not, that photo was enough to send Crowell on a mission. Every night for nearly a month, he crossed state lines, driving his truck around and glassing for evidence that the buck in the photo was real.

He finally spotted the buck through his binos in late December, when the season was practically over. The buck was indeed real, but Crowell would have to wait for another season to get a chance at him. In 2025, Crowell killed a 208-inch net non-typical in Ohio, so his bar was set pretty high. The buck he called Rumor would give him something even bigger to chase.

“I spent the entire spring and summer trying to figure out how to gain access to the area I needed to hunt,” Crowell said.

Photo via Paul Lyle's Creations

He finally gained access on September 21 and headed to scout the property and hang trail cameras. Around 3:30, Crowell spotted the buck less than 150 yards away, looking straight at him. Crowell immediately dropped down and waited about five minutes. When he stood back up, the buck was gone. He hung five trail cameras in the area but never got a single photo of Rumor.

Crowell had a walleye trip lined up on October 2, but wet weather and a cold front caused the clients to cancel at the last minute. Since Crowell had already arranged for his dad to watch his two young kids, he took the opportunity to head back to the property and set a stand. He wasn’t planning to make an aggressive move on the buck, just hoping to lay eyes on it again. He grabbed his Mathews Halon 32, a Lone Wolf treestand, and some climbing sticks and headed for Indiana.

The only tree that made sense was covered in poison ivy. Despite usually being sensitive to the plant, Crowell decided the buck was worth the risk. He took his time, trying not to make any extra noise as he hung the stand. It took him almost an hour to get set.

“I didn’t even have a little hand saw with me,” Crowell said. “I used the threads on my screw-in bow hanger to saw through the vines so I could sit with my back against the tree. It took me 20 minutes, but I finally whittled away the vine.”

The tree was on a fence row overlooking a late-planted beanfield that was still vibrant green. Crowell noticed the deer were still hammering it and hadn't been sitting long when three does worked into the field. They seemed a little uneasy, despite the wind favoring Crowell’s position. The does eventually worked out of sight.

At 6:30, Crowell caught a glimpse of a much smaller buck through an opening in a thicket. Then at 6:50, the smaller buck entered the field 80 yards from his stand with Rumor right behind him. Crowell watched as the giant buck slowly worked his way out into the field.

“It took him 30 minutes to go 30 yards,” Crowell said. “He would take a bite of beans and then pick his head up and observe like a statue. He was being super cautious.”

The buck eventually worked his way to around 50 yards, feeding roughly parallel instead of heading straight toward him. When the buck angled slightly, like he was getting ready to work away, Crowell says he realized he should probably get ready to shoot. Crowell had been shaking like crazy when the buck first stepped out into the field, but watching him feed for that long helped settle Crowell’s nerves.

Photo via Paul Lyle's Creations

“He turned away from me to scratch his side. That’s when I drew my bow and settled my pin on him.”

He released an arrow tipped with a QAD Exodus fixed-blade from 51 yards. The arrow struck the deer’s spine, dropping the buck in its tracks.

“That’s a long shot. I’m not going to lie to you,” Crowell said. “Sometimes you have to shoot your shot, and I definitely did.”

Crowell immediately lowered his bow and got out of the stand. He wanted to get another arrow in quickly, but when he approached the buck, he realized it wasn’t necessary.

“I just took a minute to let it all sink in,” Crowell said. “It’s hard to describe the emotions. It’s unbelievable. I never thought this would happen to me.”

His first phone call was to his dad, who was watching his children.

Photo via Paul Lyle's Creations

Rick Busse scored the buck at 266 4/8 inches, which sets a new Buckmasters Indiana state record for a compound bow in the irregular category.

The buck was also green-scored before the 60-day mandatory drying period by Tony Wright, a certified scorer for Boone & Crockett. The net score was 251 3/8 inches.

“There was so much more luck involved with killing this deer than skill,” he said. “I tried to strategize, but I also had luck playing a part for sure.”

Still, without that first photograph, Crowell would never have gone looking. “The picture that the UPS driver took is what killed that deer, because it made me a madman with a mission.”

Such talk at Old Tamarack—Heberlein's hunting shack near Mellen, Wisconsin—was usually light-hearted. As Professor Heberlein knew too well, death isn’t something you order from menus or schedule on calendars. By the time I became an Old T regular 25 years ago, he had long before buried his father and all the camp’s founders, friends, family, and other originals.

Heberlein especially liked stories about hunters visiting their father, uncle, or friend on their deathbeds and requesting they send a big buck past them next deer season. He wondered why that was such a common bedside wish. Nothing he knew about Judeo-Christian beliefs suggests God grants the newly dead power over Earth’s creatures. And yet many hunters ask that favor during final visits with loved ones.

Then again, maybe they’re just making small talk to convey love and affection they otherwise struggle to share. It’s easier than speaking from the heart, especially when others might eavesdrop.

Heberlein knew one thing for certain, though: He did not want to die while hunting, especially from a heart attack, whether from excitement or while dragging a buck to camp. “Who’d want to die that way?” he’d ask skeptically. “Heart attacks hurt! And they aren’t always quick! And it would ruin everyone else’s hunt!”

Then he’d clutch his chest in mock agony, buckle his knees, and belt out his best death rattle.

The author (left) and Tom Heberlein at Old T hunting camp.

Honoring that theme, Heberlein sent me an email on March 6, 2019, after reading an obituary in the newspaper “Dagens Nyheter” in Stockholm, Sweden, where he lived much of the year. The obit told of a well-liked and respected 44-year-old man who worked hard helping vulnerable youths. The man had established a successful residential-care home and worked for the Swedish National Board of Institutional Care.

Heberlein respected all that, but that’s not why he sent the man’s obituary and translated its highlights. He liked the obit’s conclusion and knew it would make me smile, too:

“On November 11 last year his heart suddenly stopped during an otherwise successful hunt with his friends.”

And then Heberlein asked the question every hunter would ask: “What was he hunting?”

The obit never specified. I’d guess the poor guy’s “otherwise successful hunt” involved a deer species, either a moose, roe deer, fallow deer, or red deer.

After all, when we read about hunting-related deaths, it usually involves deer, and it’s usually more from heart attacks or treestand falls than accidental shootings. Sometimes it’s even someone you know, such as my late friend Tom Tilkens, who died Nov. 8, 2017, at age 72 when dragging out a buck he arrowed while crossbow hunting in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.

Plus, research in 1996 by Heberlein and his friend/colleague Rich Stedman found that deer hunters, more so than bird hunters, suffer more dramatically from “buck fever.” This instant and often convulsive adrenaline surge strikes hunters when they spot a deer and anticipate a shot.

Heberlein and Stedman weren’t just speculating from barstools at the Drop Tine Bar & Grill in Cayuga, just down the Conley Road from Old T. They had data proving it. They had hooked heart monitors on 10 hunters to measure their responses during 56 hunts for ducks, deer, geese, and upland birds (ruffed grouse and woodcock).

Their study found that deer hunters’ heart rates jumped an average of 33 beats per minute higher after spotting and shooting a deer. In contrast, heart rates jumped 28 beats for goose hunters, 22 for duck hunters, and 10 for upland-bird hunters.

But Heberlein and Stedman also conceded theirs wasn’t a huge sample size, and they explained how responses can vary by a hunter’s age, fitness, and experience. Wildlife managers, for instance, tend to be less excitable than their fellow hunters when spotting deer, waterfowl, or upland birds, given their training, fieldwork, and professional detachment.

Further, hunting has infinite variables. Duck hunters, for instance, regularly out-sweat the average deer hunter. Waterfowlers often must work hard to hurriedly set decoys before first light, especially if they’re slogging through soft muck and knee-high waters in heavy, clumsy chest waders.

The late Don L. Johnson, a longtime Milwaukee Sentinel outdoors writer, once told me a story about a duck-season opener he covered in the 1960s. Johnson said he was hanging out at a boat launch, interviewing hunters as they returned from nearby sloughs and marshes, probably along the Mississippi or lower Chippewa rivers. As each boat approached, Johnson took photos and helped tie their boats to the pier before retrieving his notebook and asking about their hunts.

After helping one crew tie off their duck boat and skiff, he was stunned when one of them said something like, "We had a great day, except Charlie died while we were setting up. We almost quit and brought him back, but then we talked about it. We agreed Charlie would have wanted us to stay and hunt. Either way, he wasn’t going anywhere. We’re glad we stayed. The ducks were really flying!”

What?! Johnson looked again at their boats but didn’t see a body.

Two of the hunters rolled back one of their hand-tied wire-grass blinds. There lay ol’ Charlie in the bottom of the boat among some decoys, his cased shotgun tucked beside him.

Heberlein loved that story when I shared it years ago during an Old T visit. Unfortunately, I never thought to ask Johnson if he had written about it for the Sentinel, and Don’s been gone since January 2006.

But I did think about all this a few weeks ago after clicking on an email from Heberlein’s wife, Betty. Her note included photos of Heberlein’s gravesite 200 yards south of his shack. The photos showed a newly engraved headstone, a flat-faced chunk of red granite that Old T’s caretaker, Al Conley, pulled from a nearby trail.

I hope Heberlein is pleased with his modest gravesite atop a knoll on Old T’s back 40. A heart attack didn’t put him there, and the site offers pretty views of each sunrise over the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. Plus, visitors can watch while standing at attention, or relaxing on a Leopold bench Heberlein provided.

Tom Heberlein’s humble gravesite on his 40 acres near Mellen, Wisconsin, rests about 200 yards south of his old shack known as Old T.

Just realize, of course, that Heberlein shoulders no obligation to send a big buck past any visitor, whether you’re there to hunt, cut firewood, or seek his silent counsel.

Heberlein cared most about hunting ruffed grouse. Woodcock and waterfowl, too. He never fancied himself a deer hunter, and it’s too late to start now.

Just after sunrise, I heard a combine start up from the property next door. I sat for another 45 minutes until the rumbling sounded like it was coming from my back pocket, climbed down, and called it a day.

Back at the truck, I could see the combine cutting through the corn, blowing up dust that billowed across the field to settle in a thick layer over my windshield. My carefully planned October morning had turned into an entirely different hunt, and I hadn’t done a darn thing wrong. That’s the reality of hunting in ag country. Your plans can change as fast as the farmers’ do, and you’ll need to adapt, just like the deer will.

When the Crop Comes Down

It’s easy to think about a field of corn, soybeans, peanuts, or other agricultural crops as a food source for whitetails, but they offer more than something to eat. They also provide cover and security. When that crop suddenly disappears, so does much of the cover, and the change can have an immediate impact on how deer move across the property.

A buck that might have felt comfortable crossing a field of standing corn during daylight hours may feel too exposed to make the same trip after the field is harvested. Even familiar field edges can turn into wide-open runways once the combine comes through.

But that doesn’t mean the deer have abandoned ship. Just because the field has been harvested doesn’t mean the food source is gone. Combines are efficient machines, but they aren’t perfect. Depending on the crop and how it was harvested, there could still be plenty of groceries sitting in that field. It can make for a pretty attractive dinner table, especially right after the combine comes through.

The problem is getting a deer to walk up to the table during legal shooting light. You might see plenty of tracks and sign along the field edge but never see a deer in the field during daylight. The deer may still be using the field like a highway. They're just waiting until you can't see them.

Hunt Staging Areas

Deer are understandably reluctant to step out into an open field during daylight. But they still know good food is out there, waiting for them. Instead of hunting the field, hunt where deer hang back in cover, waiting for darkness to fall before making a move toward the food. You probably have a better chance of getting a daylight shot there than in the field itself.

Staging areas can be subtle. If you can tell where the deer are entering the field, either with well-worn trails or trail camera evidence, start by working your way backward from there. Look for bends in the field edges, corners hidden from the road, and trails that dump into the field. Pay attention to fresh tracks, droppings, and browse that show deer are spending time in the area, not just rushing through it. The goal is to find places where deer can stand in cover and assess danger before stepping into a wide-open field.

If you have trail cameras, pay attention to the timestamps. A camera can tell you that deer are using a field entrance, but the timestamps can tell you when they're using it. If most of your photos show deer entering the field after dark, try moving the camera back into the cover to see where they're staging before sunset. Those photos can help you narrow down where to hang your stand and whether deer are moving through during legal shooting light.

Be careful not to charge into potential staging areas. Deer use them because they feel secure, and you don’t want to blow that with carelessness. Think about wind direction and access routes, and plan your entrance and exit strategies accordingly.

Food Beyond the Field

Once the crop is cut, you just have to reassess the property to see where the deer’s priorities have shifted. Dropping acorns, weedy edges around a cutover, browse along a creek bottom, or pockets of soft mast fruit are all potential deer magnets. It’s not that the field stopped being a food source; the deer just may have other options that feel more secure during daylight.

Look for fresh sign around those areas, and pay attention to how they connect to bedding cover. Trail cameras can show you if the deer have shifted their grocery runs to a new location. If their activity shifts to an oak flat or a brushy edge, that may be a better place to spend your time than watching an empty field.

That’s what happened on my oak flat. It took less than 12 hours for the does and yearlings to flood the oak flat, which is less than 400 yards from the cornfield. It took a little longer for the bucks to move in, but I had several show up on my trail cameras 36 hours later. The combine hadn’t chased the deer off the property. It just changed where they wanted to be.

Set Up Smart

Finding where the deer are moving during daylight after the combine comes through is only half the battle. You still have to be able to hunt those spots without blowing them up. Before setting up on an oak flat, a high-traffic trail, or a staging area, think about how your scent is going to travel.

A picture-perfect spot is easily ruined if the wind carries your scent across it. Set up so the wind carries your scent away from where deer are likely to be, and if the wind doesn’t play right, choose a different location.

If you’re hunting areas with any kind of elevation, you’ll also have to consider thermals and the time of day. As a general rule, thermals tend to drop in the evening toward sunset and rise in the morning as the sun does. Of course, there’s always an exception depending on the terrain, wind speed, and canopy cover. Just make sure you assess the wind before and during your setup.

Don’t forget access and egress. A route that was hidden when the corn was still standing could leave you totally exposed after the harvest. Avoid crossing fresh trails or traipsing through bedding cover to get to your stand.

Hunt the Property You Have, Not the One You Had

That combine didn’t ruin my October when it rumbled to life in the cornfield that morning. It just ruined the plan I had before it showed up to cut the field.

That’s one of the realities of hunting ag country. The property you scouted in September won’t be the property you hunt in October. It only takes the purr of a diesel engine to redraw the map. When that happens, don’t stubbornly keep hunting the property you remember. Instead, hunt the property you have in front of you.

Becca knows what it’s like being married to a hunter. She hunts, too, and the couple often scrolls through trail camera photos together and calls dibs on certain deer. She wasn’t exactly surprised that Tyler was getting antsy.

Tyler had a date with a buck he’d been watching since 2024. He had a couple of encounters since then, but didn’t realize until recently that it was the same deer he’d be thinking about at that ultrasound appointment.

By 2025, the buck had turned into a big-bodied bruiser with thick bases who pushed the other bucks on the property around like he owned the place. The buck didn’t just show up on trail cameras, either. Tyler watched him through rifle season and noticed there was a chunk missing out of the deer’s left ear.

“If I would have had my pistol with me, I probably would have taken him,” Tyler tells MeatEater. “Because that would have been pretty cool. But I don’t have a lot of fun hunting with a rifle anymore. It just doesn’t seem like enough of a challenge.”

This year, the buck showed up on Tyler’s trail cameras with a drop tine, and he decided it was time to go after the bully with his bow. After the ultrasound appointment, Tyler grabbed his Mathews VXR and headed to his hunting property in Bargersville. He climbed into his saddle around 5:15 p.m., overlooking a creek bed and a grove of burr and chinkapin oaks.

When the buck reappeared on Tyler's Trail Camera it was sporting a drop tine.

Tyler is a saddle hunter who likes to stay mobile instead of relying on preset stands. He knew the buck regularly traveled along a creek bed to reach the oaks from a bedding area, so Tyler picked a tree close to a narrow strip of CRP. The thermals would typically pull his scent toward the opening instead of down into the creek bed.

“I just wanted to get a good look at him,” Tyler says. “Cameras can be very deceiving. I think we sometimes put too much clout on what we think we’re seeing on a trail camera.”

The buck dropped into the creek bed around 6:30 p.m., and Tyler watched him for around 20 minutes as it fed through the bottom. When the deer moved toward the chinkapin oaks, Tyler spotted the drop tine and the buck’s massive bases. That’s when he knew the trail camera photos weren’t lying.

As he watched the buck feed along the creek bed, a button buck entered the scene, bleating and running everywhere except downwind of Tyler’s stand. Tyler was relieved when the youngster finally headed back the way he came. Then he came back, only this time with a doe.

As the drop-tine buck climbed out of the creek bed and worked toward the oaks, the doe walked to the base of Tyler’s tree.

“Right before I drew my bow, I looked down, and the doe was extending her head to sniff my step on the tree,” Tyler says.

Figuring the doe was about to blow things up, Tyler drew his bow and held his pin low toward the heart.

“I knew as soon as I let that arrow go, she was going to flinch, and he was going to drop,” Tyler says.

The buck stepped broadside at 20 yards. Tyler released the arrow, shooting a Rage Hypodermic NC broadhead. Tyler said the shot felt good, but he could see about 12 inches of arrow sticking out of the buck’s side as he jumped back into the creek bed and ran toward the bedding area.

“That’s not good,” he thought. Like most bow hunters, Tyler wanted a pass-through shot. He called a buddy to help him and bring a light, then gave the deer about 20 minutes before climbing down to look for blood. He didn’t have to go far to find it. He walked maybe 40 yards and found blood everywhere.

He also found his arrow. There was gut material on it, which confused Tyler. He had seen the arrow sticking out of the buck's side, just behind the front shoulder.

Tyler and his buddy caught up with the buck later that evening. The deer ran about 150 yards from where it was standing when Tyler shot. The arrow apparently struck the buck’s heart but somehow exited farther back.

Tyler had a tough drag out but he was all smiles after finding the deer.

“I don't know how he did this with where the arrow hit right behind his shoulder,” Tyler says.

He said it was surreal to walk up on a buck he’d been watching mature over multiple years. Tyler’s buck had massive bases that measured almost 7 inches around, and he tipped the scales at 208 pounds.

The buck nearly had 7-inch bases.

Getting him out of the woods took some effort. Between the creek, the briars, the burrs, and the stinging nettle, the drag was miserable. Tyler had biceps surgery in April 2025, and getting back to shooting his bow had already been a challenge. Hauling a buck that big through that mess didn’t make things any easier, but I’m sure he’d say it was worth it.

In doing so, Massachusetts joins a number of other states that have already banned or restricted natural deer urine and other deer-derived attractants over disease concerns.

Synthetic deer scents are still legal, meaning hunters can still freshen up a mock scrape or try to fool a rutting buck, but anything derived from an actual deer can’t come along for the hunt.

So why the sudden restriction? According to MassWildlife, the new regulation is intended to prevent the spread of chronic wasting disease (CWD), a fatal neurological disease affecting deer, elk, moose, and other members of the deer family. The disease is caused by infectious proteins called prions, which can be shed through an infected animal's urine, saliva, and feces. These prions can contaminate the environment and remain infectious for years, raising concerns about the use of deer-derived scent attractants.

However, Massachusetts has never recorded a confirmed case of CWD within its borders. That makes the new regulation a precautionary measure rather than a response to an active outbreak. State wildlife officials hope that eliminating deer-derived attractants will reduce the chances of introducing the disease into Massachusetts, where it has so far remained undetected.

But can a bottle of deer urine really spread CWD?

Research has shown that infected deer can shed infectious prions through their urine, sometimes months before showing any symptoms. Since many commercial deer urine attractants are collected from captive deer, there is concern that contaminated products could introduce the disease into areas where it hasn't been detected.

However, according to a 2025 report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, the role of commercial urine attractants in spreading CWD remains undocumented. While the potential risk exists, researchers have yet to establish how much these products actually contribute to the spread of the disease.

So will this new restriction actually make a difference? When MassWildlife proposed the regulation in June 2025, officials shared results from a survey of Massachusetts hunters showing that 16% reported using deer urine as an attractant. The survey results presented did not specify whether those hunters were using natural deer urine or synthetic alternatives. With such a small percentage of hunters reporting urine use and no documented cases of commercial deer urine spreading CWD, it's difficult to determine how much of an impact the ban will have.

For now, Massachusetts is taking a precautionary approach to keeping CWD out of the state, and only time will tell whether the new restriction makes a measurable difference.

He wasn’t the only one to tell me that, and it became clear that Hollywood had inadvertently made archery popular with the youth of our nation. It was one of those moments that showed me that pop culture can influence consumer behavior in a huge way.

While that might seem obvious now, there’s a reality hidden in there that a lot of us probably don’t pay attention to. Consider the hunting industry. How many people do you know who say they can accurately age bucks on the hoof? Maybe you do, too. This came straight from the outdoor television world, where we had to stop shooting “trophy” bucks because the optics of trophy hunting aren’t so great.

We pivoted to “mature” bucks, and suddenly everyone could age deer easily. The vernacular associated with a lot of popular platforms certainly bled through the hunting masses, as well.

And of course, we all now mrrp to stop our bucks before we shoot. That came from folks filming, and it’s pervasive amongst deer hunters. But that doesn’t always make it a good option.

The Speed of Sound

Sound travels at 1125 feet-per-second. Even the fastest crossbows on the market will only hit about a third of that speed. What this means is that the moment you bleat or mrrp to get your buck to stop, you’ve made audio contact with him. Not only does this put him on red alert, but it also primes him to do what deer do very well, which is run away from danger.

The instant that you trigger your release, or maybe touch off a shot with your crossbow, you make audio contact again. But this time, he’s very likely to drop to load his legs and get the hell out of Dodge. Does he have enough time to fully get out of the way? That depends entirely on the shot distance and the speed of your arrow or bolt.

After filming a lot of deer getting shot with both vertical bows and crossbows, I can tell you one thing—they almost all start to drop at the shot. Our brains don’t quite register it on most encounters, but the camera does. Even deer that I don’t stop with some sound, all drop to some extent.

Now, that doesn’t mean they get away every time. They don’t, but it does beg the question: is it a good idea to stop them every time?

No, but not just for the obvious reasons.

Panic Time

Buck fever is simply fight or flight, panic time. You want that deer more than anything, and your brain tells you that you better get it over with before he walks out of your life forever. What ramps up buck fever?

Well, when you go from having a deer completely unaware of your presence to intentionally letting him know something is there. If you watch our 12 in ’26 film from Nebraska last year, watch Steve when he shoots his buck. He mrrps, and almost instantly rushes his shot.

You might think that is a telltale sign of a whitetail newbie, but it’s not so simple. Go out to your backyard range if you get the chance and draw your bow. Aim at your target, and just mouth bleat like you would to stop a buck. You will probably feel an instant change come over you. We have almost conditioned ourselves to at least lightly panic when we make that sound, because we only make that sound in one type of scenario.

Read the Room

A buck that has his head down and is snuffling through the leaf litter for acorns is a buck that probably doesn’t need to be stopped. A buck that is hellbent on finding a girlfriend and is cruising along a fenceline between two woodlots is a different story.

The more encounters you have with deer, the more you start to understand the nuance of the whole thing. If a buck is headed right for a scrape and you’re waiting on him, you know he’s probably going to stop naturally and pose up (all while being distracted). A buck that is grunting his head off and practically running a sidehill trail is a different story.

There is also the reality of calm deer versus keyed-up deer. I shot a buck on that same Nebraska hunt last year that was so rutted up he was almost oblivious. I shot him three times and missed him once, and every time it was like he was just waking from a coma. A few years ago I shot at a different buck that dropped so far on my shot that he left a belly print in the snow (and a sadly clean arrow buried into the ground).

A calm or rutted-up buck is a prime candidate for a mrrp. A deer that has caught a whiff of you or has otherwise shown you he isn’t feeling really comfortable is a buck that will take that audio contact and use it as a reason to flee the scene.

Choose wisely, and remember, you don’t need to stop all of them.

Vermont’s no-doe hiatus, which began after the 1987 gun-deer season, will end at dawn Nov. 14 when roughly 77,000 deer hunters hit the woods for opening day of the gun-deer season. The state’s Fish and Wildlife Board voted 7-5 in July 2025 to reopen antlerless hunting during firearms season this year. The delay allowed the Department of Fish and Wildlife to assess antlerless quotas and success rates for the state’s 21 deer-management units and publicize the changes early to reduce confusion.

Although other states occasionally restrict their annual rifle/shotgun deer seasons to buck-only in some regions, only Vermont imposed a statewide doe ban for nearly four decades. Vermont, however, has offered either-sex bowhunting during archery season since 1955, and it has issued antlerless tags during its muzzleloading deer seasons since 1993.

Nick Fortin, Vermont’s deer and moose project leader, said he’s pushed for antlerless hunting during gun season since taking the job 11 years ago. Fortin said milder winters, declining hunter numbers, changing land practices, and less hunting access made it increasingly difficult to control deer herds in some areas with arrows and muzzleloaders.

“We’ve struggled to harvest enough antlerless deer in our more productive areas,” Fortin told MeatEater. “Most of our board members saw the old system not working the past few years, and that message is getting through. It’s been a long, slow process changing the program, but we think we can better apply hunting pressure where it’s most needed by issuing antlerless tags to gun-hunters.”

In fact, since Vermont first regulated deer hunting in 1912 with a three-week firearms season, only three times—1979, 1980, and 1981—has its statewide antlerless harvest exceeded the buck kill. That happened after Vermont’s Legislature surrendered its regulation-setting authority to the DFW in 1978 after the state’s herd boomed during the 1970s.

From 1971 through 1978, Vermont’s growing deer herd generated an average kill of 9,515 bucks and 1,073 antlerless deer, a 9-1 buck/doe ratio. Further, the annual buck kill ranged from six to 16 times larger than the antlerless kill. The 1971 tally was 7,871 bucks, and 480 antlerless deer (16-1); while the 1978 total was 7,430 bucks, and 1,336 antlerless deer (6-1).

Controversial Change

When the DFW took charge of the antlerless quotas and regulations after 1978, the buck kill increased even further but finally fell short of the antlerless deer kill for the first time in modern deer hunting’s history. Even then, the combined archery/firearms deer kills weren’t lopsided:

1979: 6,921 antlered bucks and 9,591 antlerless deer (1-1.4) 1980: 10,219 bucks and 15,708 antlerless deer (1-1.5) 1981: 8,601 bucks and 11,636 antlerless deer (1-1.4)

But after a brutal winter in 1977-78 and other harsh winters in the 1980s hit the herd hard, the Vermont Legislature rescinded the DFW’s deer-regulations authority after the 1987 hunting season. Deer numbers had declined in the mid-1980s, and hunters blamed the DFW—not harsh winters—for killing too many deer. Lawmakers sided with hunters, even though the annual antlerless kill from 1982 through 1987 never exceeded the buck kill, averaging 6,641 bucks and 4,240 antlerless deer annually.

Even so, Vermont lawmakers reclaimed control of antlerless quotas in 1988. The Legislature also forbid the DFW from issuing antlerless tags during November’s 16-day firearms season, a hunt that generates 93% participation rates by the state’s deer hunters.

From 1988 through 2025, Vermont relied entirely on bowhunters and muzzleloader hunters to shoot antlerless deer. The state’s archery season attracts 43% of Vermont’s deer hunters, while December’s muzzleloader season attracts 39%, and October’s muzzleloader season draws 24%. But not once in the past 39 years did Vermont’s antlerless kill exceed the buck kill statewide, and nothing in the data suggested that system would ever manage the state’s deer herds.

Still, Vermont’s bowhunters and muzzleloaders tried to make it work. Harvest data for the past 20 seasons (2006-2025) show muzzleloaders shot 4.4 antlerless deer for every buck they harvested, including a high of 5,059 antlerless deer and 1,146 bucks (6,205) in 2018. Likewise, Vermont bowhunters arrowed three antlerless deer for every buck they killed from 2006 to 2025, including a high of 4,877 antlerless deer and 1,292 bucks (6,169) in 2020, a 3.8-1 ratio.

Unfortunately, muzzleloading hunters typically filled only 14% of the available antlerless tags each year. Further, few Vermont deer hunters (all weapons) shoot more than one deer annually. In 2025, for example, 80% of all successful hunters (11,241) shot only one deer, while 15% of them (2,185) shot two deer, 4% (528) shot three deer, and 1% (152) shot four deer.

Fortin said the Vermont DFW will take a cautious approach with its restored authority to regulate the deer harvest. He said his predecessors in the late 1970s used an aggressive plan to reduce deer numbers, which “possibly worked too well.” Though smaller herds in the late 1970s and early 1980s helped habitats and browse conditions improve, and bucks produced phenomenal antler growth and body measurements, the biological data didn’t convince hunters to stay the course. And thus began Vermont’s nearly 40-year run of buck-only gun seasons.

Conservative Quotas

Meanwhile, as the new century unfolds, Vermont is seeing fewer severe winters to control the herds, and deer-license sales have tumbled 30% from 174,281 in 2000 to 121,961 in 2025. License sales have stabilized a bit, but the DFW thinks it isn’t enough to control herds in many areas without help from gun-hunters filling antlerless permits.

Fortin said the DFW will keep permit levels conservative this year, gauge the state’s new harvest rates, and adjust accordingly in 2027. “We’re easing back into it,” he said. “We’re trying not to repeat the early 1980s.”

Fortin also said the DFW will monitor how hunters respond to a new regulation that allows them to “earn” a second buck tag in some areas by killing an antlerless deer and a buck with at least three points on one side. The second buck, however, must be taken in a different, later season than the first buck.

Fortin expects more hunters to support the DFW’s new opportunities for increasing antlerless kills, but he knows it won’t be unanimous. “Most of our younger hunters are aware of the importance of hunting antlerless deer,” he said. “But among our hunters over 60, there’s still a big chunk who are dead-set against antlerless harvests. In general, if they can remember the mid-1980s, they adamantly oppose these changes no matter what we show them.”

A researcher who studied Vermont’s deer hunters 20 years ago understands that opposition. In his 2009 book, “A Matter of Life and Death: Hunting in Contemporary Vermont,” Marc Boglioli, an anthropology professor at Drew University in New Jersey, discussed his visits with hunters at several Vermont deer camps. Boglioli wrote that weather and deer regulations dominated all discussions about the deer herd’s size and health.

What topic seldom arose? Boglioli wrote, "What always surprised me was the extent to which habitat does not come up in these conversations. Indeed, the hunter who describes habitat as a key determinant of the health of the deer herd is a truly noteworthy informant. On the other hand, in my conversations with Fish and Wildlife personnel, habitat conversion and fragmentation are considered the most important factors influencing the deer herd.”

Boglioli thinks little has changed in the 17 years since his book’s release. “I checked in with my brother (who lives and hunts in Vermont), and his feeling was that people still don’t think the state knows what it’s doing,” he told MeatEater.

And when Boglioli contacted a local hunter he knows for his thoughts on the new regulations, the hunter responded, "We're still blaming Fish and Wildlife, lol. I improved my habitat a lot, though. The deer hunting was just starting to get good, it seemed, and they’re now going to allow doe hunting. Gonna wipe them out again.”

Boglioli wasn’t surprised by those responses. “This is what I was hearing 25 years ago,” he said. “Even when people see how better habitat improves their own area, their ‘big picture’ thinking is that doe seasons are a bad idea.”

Conclusion

DFW commissioner Jason Batchelder acknowledges that antlerless hunting with rifles and shotguns remains contentious, but he sees no way to avoid it. “The Board’s vote (7-5) to approve these changes was a nail-biter,” he said. “But ultimately, they supported Nick Fortin’s position. Nick’s a thinker and a pragmatist, and he has a goal for the herd that we won’t reach without modern firearms.

“Wildlife managers don’t have it easy,” Batchelder continued. “Theirs is the only profession where you go to work every day knowing someone will say you’re wrong. If you’re a mechanic and you tell customers their car’s struts are shot, they don’t say, ‘No, it’s the brakes.’ People typically trust their professionals in everything except deer management.”

I watched three does saunter past right at shooting light. About an hour after sunrise, as the fog burned off the swampy road, I saw one of the biggest bucks I have ever laid eyes on. Only instead of crossing the road, he was walking head-on toward my blind, nose out, antlers shining in the early morning light.

I raised my rifle, steadied my breathing, and waited. There was no way I was going to blow a shot on such a heart-stopping bruiser, and I didn’t want to ruin it with an iffy forward-facing shot. So I stared down my iron sights as he came another thirty yards straight down the logging road. My trigger finger was getting itchy, but I held steady.

Then he just stepped off the road and disappeared into the brambles and switch cane. I never fired a shot, but it took a good while for my heart rate to get back down to normal. My encounter with that buck drove home an important point. Just because there’s a deer lined up in your crosshairs doesn’t mean you should squeeze the trigger. It can be hard to remember that when you’re staring down the kind of buck dreams are made of. But sometimes the best thing you can do is let that deer walk.

You Have a Bad Angle

That buck was well within shooting range, and I had a steady rest. But none of that mattered since he only gave me a frontal shot. A lot of hunters feel confident taking a frontal shot, but I personally don’t like the risk. If I had taken that frontal shot, there’s a chance I would have killed him. But I knew there was minimal margin for error, and there were so many things that could go wrong. I could strike bone instead of vitals or end up with an injured deer and a crappy blood trail. My bullet could ruin meat. I wanted that buck enough to let him walk and hunt him another day.

Frontal, straight-away, or a steep quartering angle are all solid reasons to keep your finger off the trigger. If you don’t have a clear path to vitals, it’s best not to shoot.

You’re in a Bad Position

Last archery season, my target buck came from an unexpected direction. I heard soft footfalls to my left (my weak side), almost behind me. He stood broadside at 30 yards, nibbling acorns like he had nowhere to be.

It should have been the perfect shot, but getting into a good shooting position would have required some serious gymnastics on my part. I would have had to twist my torso into a pretzel and lean way out of the treestand to get the shot. I spent several minutes quietly hoping and praying he would come around to a spot where I could make a better shot, but it never happened. It’s tempting to make awkward shooting positions work. But if you’re twisted, off-balance, reaching, or almost hanging out of your treestand, it can make a chip shot almost impossible.

Forcing a shot from an awkward position makes it hard to control your weapon. If you’re shooting a bow, it can make it hard to get a good anchor or even break down your form. If you’re shooting a rifle, it turns a steady shot into a shaky one. The deer might be within your range, but your form might fall to pieces.

There’s Something Behind Your Deer

“Know your target and what lies beyond” is a cardinal rule of firearms safety. What if you have a solid rest and you’re staring at a broadside deer, but there’s a doe standing behind it? Or another buck is moving through the same opening? Or maybe a few cattle are happily grazing in the pasture just beyond your target? The shot is no good.

When your target buck lines up perfectly in your sights, it’s hard not to get tunnel vision. But every shot has a destination beyond your target, and you're responsible for all the damage that shot does once your finger squeezes the trigger.

If there’s another deer tangling up your shot, it may only take a few moments of patience for it to work itself out. If there’s a road, a house, livestock, or anything else you can’t afford to accidentally hit, there shouldn’t be any internal debate. Wait for a clear shot or let the deer walk. Ideally, you shouldn’t put yourself in a shooting situation where those other factors present a risk.

You Feel Rushed

The pair had appeared almost out of nowhere. I saw the doe first and then the buck hot on her tail. I got my gun up and tried to line up the crosshairs on a buck still on the move. Then that doe crossed my scent line and put on the brakes. She threw up her nose, turned her head straight toward me, and stomped the ground twice. The buck was still oblivious, but he was closing the distance between them fast. I was running out of time before she blew the whole thing.

At that moment, it was hard not to panic. I was playing against the clock in my head. That’s when a perfectly fine shot can turn into a bad one. Maybe a deer is about to catch your scent, disappear into thick brush, or it’s just continually moving.

Your heart rate spikes, breathing quickens, and brain narrows focus. When buck fever kicks in, it’s usually a good time to slow yourself down. Give yourself a second to breathe, settle your weapon, and decide whether it’s a shot you can confidently make. Sure, you might miss an opportunity, but that’s a lot easier to live with than making a bad shot because you convinced yourself you were running out of time.

Final Thoughts

Sometimes the hardest part of hunting is knowing when not to shoot. While a missed opportunity might make you replay that scene over and over, a botched shot stays with you. There’s no shame in passing on a deer when the shot isn’t optimal. It’s okay to let him walk so you can hunt him under better circumstances another day.

This article covers shooting situations to pass on, but if you need a good resource for where to shoot a deer, check out this article from Tony Peterson.

Whether you learn from a parent, mentor, mishap, or the deer themselves, there’s always a lesson to be learned if you’re listening. Here are a few deer hunting nuggets from the MeatEater Crew to remember when you hit the woods this fall.

Tony Peterson: Hunt the Bucks Where They’re At

Most hunters don't try hard enough to truly learn where big bucks like to walk. This might seem simple, but we often hunt deer where we want to hunt them, and not where they want to be. To compensate, we call and use scents to try to convince a buck to orbit into our world. A better bet is to scout deer sign, employ some type of mobile setup, and go to the deer. This is especially true for anyone hunting pressured bucks.

Mark Kenyon: Sweat the Small Stuff, But Also, Don’t

One of the most common traits of consistently successful deer hunters is that they get the details right. They pay attention to the little things that ultimately stack up to something meaningful. It’s the reason why some people almost always fill their tags and why some only do when it’s their lucky day.

At the same time, it's important not to let this go too far or overthink it. You can become so obsessed with getting every little thing that you sabotage yourself. So keep this balance in mind. Work hard, do as many of the little things right as you can, but remember that deer hunting is supposed to be fun. Sweat the small stuff, but not at the expense of your deer hunting joy.

Janis Putelis: Learn to be a Woodsman

One of my oldest hunting mentors told me, “move your eyes first, and then your head, when scanning the woods for a deer.” This is an exercise in stillness I still practice today. My advice now is to learn to be a woodsman. Know the tracks and scat of all the animals. Learn how to read and interpret the sign. Listen to all the calls. Identify the plants deer eat. Not only will this make you a better hunter, but your experience in the woods will be so much richer.

Spencer Neuharth: Avoid the Crowds

My best advice is to hunt when and where others ain't. The most basic form of that is hiking further than everyone else or crossing a stream that nobody wants to cross. But it can also be hunting on a weekday when the woods are quieter. Or pushing your "rutcation" up to late October instead of early November. Or getting out there when the weather is the bad-kind-of-good, like a 70-degree bluebird day. The deer will still be there, but most hunters won’t.

Clay Newcomb: Just Hunt More

If you’re not a very good deer hunter or you don’t have great spots, there is a way to beat the odds by sheer will. Just hunt a lot. Spend more time in the stand. Volume hunt the heck out of your hunt days. I learned early on that I wasn’t a better deer hunter than most people, I just hunted more than them. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good, but all the hunting turned me into a competent whitetail hunter, and spending a ton of time in the woods is never a bad thing.

Brent Reaves: Just Because the Rut’s Over Doesn’t Mean Your Season Is

Everyone loves to hunt whitetails during the rut. It can certainly be one of the most exciting times in the deer woods. But for me, while I love seeing bucks chasing does, the post rut is my favorite. This is the time I feel more confident in being able to pattern a big buck when they ease up their chasing and start feeding again.

Sure, it might be hard to do if you only have a couple acres, but small(ish) properties of around five acres or more can still feel like a hunting camp even if you don’t have thousands of acres outside your backdoor. Luckily, these three improvements can make your property feel more like a hunting camp.

Build a Skinning Rack

You can always skin a deer on the ground or your tailgate, but a simple skinning rack can give you more room to work and even keep you out of the conditions. You can make your skinning rack as basic or as extravagant as you wish. Some require little more than three 4x4s and an inexpensive winch. Others might include a sink, covered roof, concrete slab, butchering table, etc., but that all depends on your budget and access to utilities.

Regardless, having a skinning rack makes it easy to quickly clean your deer when it’s on the same property. If you have a good drive from your hunting property to home, getting your deer cleaned and on ice before you get home saves a lot of time and work.

Aside from the convenience that skinning racks offer, they provide a natural gathering place after someone’s killed a deer. You can hang your deer, chum it up with your hunting buddies or family members, and revel in the fact that you harvested a deer on your own property.

Hang Some “Permanent” Stands

You should always reevaluate your stand locations to make sure you aren’t trying to relive successful hunts. However, there are some locations that naturally funnel deer every year all throughout the season. If you have such a spot on your hunting property, you should put a permanent stand in that location.

That permanent stand might be a lock-on or a comfortable two-man ladder stand. It should be something you can access quickly and quietly. This is the type of stand location that usually gets named after a family member who killed a big buck there, defining terrain feature, or even the most famous buck that fell in that spot.

Of course, you’ll want to make sure you aren’t just blowing out this stand by disregarding the wind or overhunting it. The goal isn’t to beat it to death. Instead, it’s good to look at it as a reliable spot when you don’t have a specific game plan, or maybe you have a friend joining you and you don’t want to gar-hole them.

These permanent spots aren’t meant to limit you, and they shouldn’t be viewed as the only places you can hunt; they’re meant to give you and others options. In essence, they’re sort of like pin-out spots in a hunting camp. Naming them will certainly make it feel that way.

Install a Small Cabin or Shed

The most obvious way to make your hunting property feel more like a hunting camp is to, well, set up camp. I know folks who simply park their camper at their property, but adding an affordable cabin or shed feels more established than a camper or RV, even on small properties.

You can build your own cabin if you’re handy enough, but if you don’t have the skills or time, you could go with something like a Stor-Mor portable shed, specifically their cabin-style sheds. If you’re wanting to make your property feel like a true hunting camp. You can go with one of their bare-bones models or customize your own to fit your needs.

They’re not huge, which makes them ideal for smaller properties. Their compact footprint gives you plenty of options when it comes to placement, and while it can certainly be a permanent fixture, you can always have it moved if you wish.

The Stor-Mor cabins offer plenty of space to get out of the rain, warm up, and have a hot meal between or after hunts. Those simple things can feel like a luxury after a long day of hunting.

Start Your Own Tradition

You might not have grown up around hunting camps, or maybe you experienced a few bad ones. Starting your own, even a small one, can give you, your family, and friends a deer camp experience that leads to good times, cool experiences, and a lifetime of hunting.

But, I never know if they are asking me what his personality is like, if he’s a good hunter, if he tells amazing stories around the campfire every night, if he’s a considerate cuddler in a tent, or what. I’m not going to address all of those, but I’ll say this—he has some deeply engrained attributes that all of the best hunters have, even whitetail hunters.

Allow me to explain.

Curiosity Killed the Cat (And Anything Else You Can Get a Tag For)

In whitetail hunting, we strive to take the mystery out of the game as much as possible. The primary method you’ll see portrayed in a hell of a lot of whitetail hunting content all involves taking the what-ifs off the table. Plant a food plot to make them come to you, or put out an automatic feeder that spins a cupful of corn onto the ground at exactly the same time every day.

Make a mock scrape and hang a cell camera on it. Whatever we can do to reduce the unknowns, we will do. Look, you do you, Boo, but the truth is that if you want to be a good hunter, you have to not only be curious, but foster curiosity in yourself.

I’ve had the good fortune of getting to ghost-write for a couple of extremely successful guys in the outdoor space who are self-made millionaires a few times over. They are both crazy curious people, and so is Rinella. If you aren’t asking yourself questions and then trying to answer them, you’re at a huge disadvantage. When it comes to whitetail hunting, asking yourself why a buck did this and not that, or why they always use that trail and not another one, or why this camera is dead but that one is just full of activity, you’re not growing as a hunter.

Think about the folks who just always get it done on public land, and ask yourself if you view them as generally curious people. They are, and it’s one of the main ingredients in being a successful hunter, but it’s not the only one.

Go with the Flow

This week you’ll have the chance to watch the film Steve and I made with his buddy, Pat Hoffman, down on Pat’s family ranch in Nebraska. I was tasked with being the setup guy for that hunt, so I had to scout it and develop a rut plan. After e-scouting it, then walking the property for a couple of days in July, I knew one thing—we were all about to decoy in big bucks during the rut.

When I went back in August to hang stands and put up blinds, I felt even more sure that the doe decoy factor would be huge. The ground on that working cattle ranch is mostly open, and that visibility paired with cruising bucks, would seal the decoy deal.

We ended up shooting three great bucks in four days, and never once took a decoy out. What I was so sure of, was just dead wrong. This happens to me a lot when it comes to whitetails, and it’s always a moment where my ego is forced to wrestle reality, and if I’m lucky, reality wins. The best hunters out there learn to develop a plan, but to also go with the flow. Hunt with conviction, but also be very open to new information, and how that can alter the best strategies.

This mindset works, but only when it gets paired with more and more experience. This is the key to finding the balance between trying something for enough time, but pivoting if it doesn’t work instead of riding a dead program right into another buck-less season. It’s not easy, but that’s why it works.

Trust the Process

If you watch that Nebraska film, you’ll see Steve out setting traps, during the first week of November, while Pat and I find ourselves in bow-range of great bucks. I’ve written a ton about patience in the whitetail woods, so I won’t go too deep here, but I’ll say this: If you aren’t patient, you’ll never be good at this stuff.

It is, without question, the most crucial skill to develop as a hunter. Second guessing is the enemy, and time on stand is your friend. No one talks about how hard it is to do dark-to-dark sits, or spend hours on a spot with no deer activity because you believe one will show up, but it is truly difficult. I hunt a lot of public land, and I often see parking lots clear long before the morning is done. There’s a good lesson in patience there.

If you learn to trust the process and put in enough time to see a plan through from day to day, you’ll string together something that will lead to success. This is something Rinella is really good at, and I have no doubt it at least partially comes from his penchant for trapping. There is a process to it that involves reading the land, putting in the physical work, checking the lines, and deciding if you made the right moves.

Almost all of hunting follows a similar path, and I know whitetail hunting does. Scout enough to build a plan, implement it, and then listen to what the deer tell you. Be patient with them and the process of finding them, and eventually you’ll start to encounter big bucks on a regular enough basis to make those long dead sits completely tolerable because you know eventually something is going to happen.

Click here to watch Steve and Tony’s Nebraska whitetail hunt.

I heard the reason for the scene before I spotted it as a few bur oak acorns tumbled to the ground. One massive tree was dropping hard and had seemingly pulled every whitetail in the county into its orbit. My months of summer scouting became obsolete in an instant, and I filled my buck tag under that tree two days later.

There are dozens of physiological and environmental factors that turn clockwork summer patterns into a pile of question marks by October, but acorns are arguably the most important for an early-season deer hunter to understand.

Perfect Timing

There’s a lot of protein propaganda in the whitetail world, and not without good reason. Protein is a necessary macronutrient for all living things, and it’s especially critical for summer whitetails in the midst of antler production, lactation, and regular body growth.

Crops such as soybeans and alfalfa are a hot commodity while protein needs are high, which create the pre-season trail camera and glassing opportunities that deer hunters drool over. However, once antlers harden and fawns are weaned, the looming energy demands of fall and winter push protein to the backseat. That happens to also be when acorns hit the ground.

Acorns can’t compete with most destination food sources for protein content, but they wipe the floor on the energy front. Nothing allows a whitetail to rapidly pack on fat like a hearty acorn crop, and they know it. A 1975 study in Virginia discovered that acorns accounted for over two-thirds of the diet volume of monitored deer in years of high abundance.

Another Virginia study found that deer expanded their home ranges to include acorn-rich areas and spent half of their foraging time on acorns alone during peak mast-fall, which conveniently straddles archery opener and pre-rut across much of North America. Acorns are a prime suspect when early-season deer suddenly vanish into the timber, but their influence varies by year and by species.

All In The Macros

Sadly, deer hunting is not as simple as finding acorns. Not all acorns are equal in the eyes of a whitetail. North American oaks are divided into two main subgroups: red and white. Acorns of the red oak subgroup are generally higher in protein and fat than white oak acorns while being comparably high in carbs, but they’re also significantly higher in tannins and fiber. That makes them both less palatable and less digestible for deer despite appearing to have a better nutritional profile.

White oak acorns also germinate almost immediately after falling, which spurs whitetails to gorge on them as much as possible while they’re fresh. Bitter red oak acorns, on the other hand, overwinter as a nut and germinate in the spring. In areas where both subgroups are dropping, red oak acorns can be almost completely irrelevant until most of the white oak acorns are off the table, either due to consumption or germination.

To successfully target acorns, you need to know which kind you’re looking at. A white oak crop is highly valuable for a short period of time in the early season, but red oak acorns often take the lead by November and only increase in worth until closing day.

The influence of a good acorn crop on whitetail behavior is consistent. Unfortunately, annual acorn abundance is not, and it changes everything.

Boom or Bust

The whitetail-acorn dynamic mirrors a typical predator-prey relationship. Oaks, like cottontails, have boom and bust years, and whitetails, like coyotes or bobcats, respond in kind. The same Virginia study that found deer spent 50% of foraging time on acorns in years of above-average acorn production put that number at less than 5% during below-average years.

Likewise, a nearby study in Georgia showed that the observed home-range expansion of boom years did not occur in bust years. Instead, deer seem to stick to local row crops, food plots, and standard natural browse and forage when acorns are scarce.

Science still hasn’t found a reliable way to predict how many acorns will drop each year, and production can vary not only regionally, but also from ridge to ridge and even amongst individual trees of any given species. If you don’t want to miss out on some of the hottest action a whitetail hunter can get, you better be prepared for some in-season scouting. And if your oak ID isn’t the best, don’t sweat it. Fresh sign and a few sits in a nearby tree will tell you if deer are actively interested in the little brown nuts you found.

“I was like, oh, I didn’t kill the biggest deer up here,” Kufahl told MeatEater.

Kufahl was running trail cameras in three counties and had never seen this buck before. Ten days later, it showed up again. Kufahl decided his season wasn’t over after all.

“I had a gun tag,” Kufahl said. “I decided that was the only deer I was going to hunt. If I found him during gun season, I was going to hunt him.”

Kufahl's 2025 buck.

Kufahl spent the next several weeks relocating cameras, trying to find the big buck’s core area. Then two days after the season closed, he had it. The buck showed up in the same spot for three days in a row and made several daylight appearances. That’s when Kufahl moved all of his cameras into the area, just to keep an eye on him in the off-season. The buck even dropped his sheds right next to one of his cameras. Kufahl has those sheds from last year, which he estimates would have scored around 188 inches. Kufahl’s target buck disappeared for much of the summer, only showing up on camera about once a month. It was enough for Kufahl to track antler growth. But people in the area were already talking. Hunters were swapping stories about the buck at the local bar and flashing their own pictures of him.

The giant buck dropped his sheds within feet of Kufahl's trail camera.

“I figured there would be people crawling all over there this year. They know he’s big,” Kufahl said.

But Kufahl already knew roughly where the big buck was bedding, and he had a plan. Unfortunately, the wind didn’t cooperate with that plan. On opening day, September 12, the wind was coming out of the northwest, blowing almost directly from Kufahl’s stand to the buck’s bedroom.

“But I thought I could beat him,” Kufahl said. “I got in there and I sat and didn’t see anything.”

When the buck disappeared from his cameras for three days after that first sit, Kufahl figured he blew it. Rain kept the deer from moving much on Monday, Sept. 14, but Kufahl figured they would be up and moving again following the storm. They did. The big buck turned up on his trail cameras again on Tuesday evening, but Kufahl was at his daughter’s volleyball game and not in the woods.

Wednesday’s forecast called for more rain after dark, so Kufahl hit the woods early. He figured the deer would move before the front, so he slipped into the woods early in the afternoon.

“It was dead calm that day,” Kufahl said. “I know big bucks usually don’t like the dead calm. They like a little bit of breeze to move. But I knew it was early season, and anything could happen.”

And it did. Right at dusk, just as Kufahl was about to throw in the towel for the day, he heard footsteps. They sounded really close. He slolwy cut his eyes toward the sound and saw his target buck standing in bow range and staring right at him. The buck snuck in and Kufahl never heard him coming.

“I was like, holy smokes!” Kufahl said. “Stay calm. Just don’t look at his rack.”

The buck finally took a step, putting a big oak tree between the two of them. Kufahl took that opportunity to draw his Mathews Helon 6. When the buck stepped out on the other side of that oak, it was almost broadside, quartering slightly toward him. Kufahl released, sending a Carbon Express arrow tipped with a QAD Exodus broadhead right in front of the buck’s shoulder. It pierced the animal’s heart on its way out the other side.

Kufahl knew the shot was good, but the buck ran toward private land after the shot. He didn’t want to bump the buck, so he collected his gear, headed back to his truck, and called a buddy for help. It was almost 9 p.m. when the two returned to the area to look for it. Luckily, it didn’t take them long to find him.

“I had my little flashlight, and it was getting kind of hard to see, so my buddy turned on his floodlight,” Kufahl said. “It looked like a blood bath going over the hill.”

When they crested the hill, Kufahl’s buddy spotted the buck first.

“He was piled up on the edge of the brush, and there was just this massive rack sticking up.”

Kufahl with his 2026 buck.

They managed to snap a few photos with their cellphones before the rain started pouring. Kufahl knew he had a big buck on his hands, but he wasn’t fully prepared for just how big.

“He was probably 10 inches bigger than I thought he was,” Kufahl said. “The spread is 22 ¾ inches inside. Last year he was a perfect 12. This year, he was 11. If he had matching G5s like he did last year, he probably would have pushed 200 inches.”

Kufahl and his buddy were able to snap a few pictures of the deer before a rainstorm hit.

Kufahl has a shoulder mount planned for the buck, but with his taxidermist on an elk hunt, he had to scramble to find a freezer big enough to hold the rack until he gets back.

“He called around and found somebody with a big chest freezer that was empty,” Kufahl said. “I drove it down there on Friday and put it in there.”

Luckily, that was the hardest track job of this hunt for Kufahl.

Photos courtesy of Matthew Kufahl.

Answer: Like all good questions, it depends. Generally, the faster you can break down an animal and get it cold, the better. In hot weather, you should prepare ahead of time so you don’t risk meat spoilage. While “hot” might be relative to your geographical location, anything above 40 degrees requires special care. Temps above 70 demand expediency. Anything above 90, every minute counts.

If you can quickly retrieve your deer in a truck, cart, or side-by-side, you don’t have to stress too much, especially if you can get to the processor within the hour. A lot of folks don’t want to process a deer in these conditions. However, if you want the least amount of spoilage, I would suggest field dressing your deer before dropping it at the processor if the temps are above 40 degrees. Also, consider that your processor might not get to your deer right away. They could be backed up or short-staffed, and it could be even longer before they’re able to break down your animal. A good processor will do away with any spoilage. A less thoughtful one will throw it in your grindpile. If you want to avoid either, just take an extra 5 to 10 minutes and gut your deer.

You might not always be a hop and a skip from the processor. In these cases, you definitely want to field dress your deer or even debone it in the field (where legal). Let’s say you don’t have far to drag your deer, but you won’t be able to drop it at the processor for at least a few hours, and the temps are above 70 degrees. First, field dress your deer. If you’re transporting it, buy a bag or two of ice and stuff it in the cavity to help keep it cool. This will give you plenty of time to get your deer to the processor without exposing it to warm, bacteria-forming temps (anything above 40 degrees) for an extended period of time.

On the other hand, you might find yourself miles from the trailhead. In temps above 70 degrees, I’m deboning a deer. One, because it’s just not feasible to drag a deer in some of these scenarios. Second, it’s crucial to start cooling meat when the mercury rises. In hot, humid environments, this is especially important. Besides, there’s nothing better than knowing you don’t have to clean a deer after a long walk back to the truck.

Make sure you have a solid set of game bags and a hunting pack that allows your deer meat to breathe. Contractor bags are a cheap way to go, but they don’t allow your meat to cool adequately. When you make it back to the truck, get your meat in the cooler and ice it fast. The meat will still be dissipating heat, so try to separate it as best you can in your cooler. Don’t just pack it tight.

Still, other factors like the recovery time and whether or not you gut shot your deer also factor into meat spoilage. Rupturing the intestines and exposing the bacteria that live in there to the rest of the deer doesn’t bode well for warm temperatures. If you gut shot a deer and have to leave it overnight in temperatures above 40 degrees, you’ll want to check the deer as you clean it. For instance, if you smell stomach bile on the meat as you’re breaking it down, you’ll have to consider whether or not it’s worth the risk of eating it. I’m not proposing that you flippantly waste meat, but it might help you determine whether or not you should take a questionable shot in warm temps.

Have a whitetail related question? Send it to wiredtohunt@themeateater.com and check back to see if we cover it.