The heat is on

Serious white-tailed deer hunters throughout the Inland Northwest have had this week blackened out on their calendars for a long time, and God forbid any interference by significant birthdays or anniversaries. The rut comes only once a year. This is the best chance to fool those big whitetail bucks that are masters of hiding during the early hunting seasons. Although the timing of the deer breeding season – aka “the rut” – might vary from region to region and state to state, when it starts most of the does in an area tend to come into heat within a few weeks.

With does in heat wandering around everywhere, bucks tend to become less cautious. Surging hormones urge them to troll the woods for receptive does. They trail them and chase them – sometimes into the sights of a savvy hunter.

Using techniques such as aging fetuses in road-killed does, state Fish and Wildlife Department biologists have pegged Nov. 20 as the statistical peak of the white-tailed deer breeding activity in northeastern Washington.

“The date isn’t necessarily precise or the same every season, but it’s a clear bell curve over the years,” said Steve Zender, department biologist in Chewelah.

The Fish and Wildlife Commission closes the late buck hunting season at the peak of the rut simply to prevent hunters from killing too many big breeding males, Zender said.

The weather, however, can be more important than dates in determining hunter success, he said. The best odds for hunting success during the rut occur when the weather delivers:

“Extreme cold – “Deer are more active during the daytime in cold weather because they have to eat more and put more wood in the stove,” Zender said. “Bucks are following does and if the does are moving around feeding, the bucks will be moving around, too. The breeding activity is the same when the weather is warmer; the difference is that in mild conditions more of it occurs at night.”

“Deep snow – “Ten inches of snow at mid elevations is enough to drive deer down to winter ranges where they are concentrated and more available to hunters,” he said. “Those big early snow years are the years we check the most bucks.”

He cited the mid-1990s as a good illustration.

“In 1994 we didn’t have really high deer populations but we had deep snow and cold conditions and hunters had a really good buck harvest. Then there was 1996, the year of ice storm. The snow and cold and dealing with power outages drove most of the hunters out of the woods, but those who stayed had exceptionally good hunting.”

That winter of 1996-97 lingered on to be the worst in years. “It was just as well that hunters killed a lot of deer that season,” Zender said. “Most of the old bucks and young deer died that winter anyway.”

News that 49 Degrees North Ski Area opened for skiing this weekend – the earliest opener in 10 years – is a good sign for late buck hunters in the lowlands below.

Many hunters are willing to invest considerable time and money to taking advantage of the rut.

Game calls and scents tend to be more effective in the late season than they are during the early hunts, and sport shop sales indicate that hunters have caught on.

“The hottest stuff the last couple of years have been the Bleat In Heat deer calls,” said Tim Nizich of Clark’s All-Sport in Colville.

“Most manufacturers are making a version that you just turn over to activate the bellows that create the sound. It’s the same thing they used to put in little toy cows, but now they’re a big business in hunting stores.”

Nizich, who’s been hunting the northeastern corner of the state for nearly 30 years, said a grunt tube also can be effective.

“If nothing else, you might be able to blow it and stop a buck that’s moving through the trees,” he said.

While whitetails are infamous for being sneaky, people who have studied them know they can be surprisingly noisy with various forms of grunting, bleating, hoof stomping and antler rubbing and rattling.

The best hunters do their field work to find good stands where deer are active. Sometimes it’s best to sit quietly. Other times they can be more effective by using doe bleats mixed with aggressive sounding grunts that might lure in a dominant buck that doesn’t like competition in his territory.

Rubbing and clicking shed antlers together, a hunting tactic called “rattling,” is generally considered to be less effective during the peak of the rut that it is in the pre-rut.

Reasoning: A man might detour from the trail of a hot female to pick a fight, but a buck isn’t that dumb.