Rut Status

What’s everyone else seeing for rut?

Been very slow in 179 (Grand Rapids) area thus far in the 1st 4 days. Plenty of does hanging around (most with this years fawns). Sat for all but 2 hours over the weekend and only saw one doe late on Sunday. She was looking over her shoulder so I was hoping Mr. Right would come along before dark. Didn’t happen. Very limited sign of rut (no scrapes / rubs). We do have our 8ptr still around as he has showed up on camera 3 times in last 10 days. 7AM 1 day before gun season.

Hoping the rut picks up starting Friday as I have two more days of sitting Friday & Saturday. Neighbors are almost tagged out with 2 small deer and one other one we didn’t get to see.

I’m ready to drop the .

Its insane in the Hammond area today. I tagged out after sitting for 40 minutes. I was hunting a bonus tag so had to tag a lady. In those 40 minutes I saw 13 deer: I had three does and a buck come right up the trail I just walked in on….the does in high gear and the buck grunting like a hog following, within minutes another small buck was harassing a small doe and finally at 2:55 a very nice mature 6 point with a heavy head came thru about 90 yards away with a six doe harem. He was batting at the one I shot and he hung around for over ten minutes while I got my stuff together and climbed out of the tree. Not until I got within about 30 yards of him did he finally boogie but he only went 100 yards and fidgeted while I dressed the doe out.

Sunday we saw only one doe all day and had no less than 6 bucks come thru. A buddy hammered one, a real pig ten point that must have weighed over 250 dressed. I’m glad he tagged it because the thing stunk to high heaven. Bad. Nothing worse than a tarsalled buck that’s covered with urine. The thing reeked.

East of Hinckley, MN.

Last weekend (first weekend of MN firearms season) I started to see a few fawns on their own, so things are getting started.

But there were still doe/fawn groups everywhere in my food plots. One younger buck was chasing one particular doe, but she was having none of it. My read was that some does are just starting to come into heat, but the majority are 1-2 weeks off and are not interested at this point.

Here’s hoping Mr. Big shows up to get to work and drives off the pretender this weekend.

Grouse

Last weekend in west central MN the little 1.5 year olds wee trying to chase, but the does wanted nothing to do with it. Some of the 2.
5 and 3.5 year olds were sniffing around, but not chasing at all. The buck my son shot(5 or better year old) was following a doe, but not chasing her. Scrapes were not immediately tended after snow falls on 3 different days, but were within 24 hours.

I am guessing this weekend will be quite a bit more active.

Couple forks and spikes have been coming thru the office sanctuary in Eden Prairie…hoping to see the 12 pt bruiser again this year but heard he may have been hit crossing hwy 5 trying to go to Super America.

Public land appears dead in west wi. Haven’t seen a buck in over a week aside from a lone spike, and the does that do show up are alone and not being followed. All the private ag fields around in the area have deer though.

Polk CO WI. hunted Friday thru Tuesday morning. Little dinks are still on the move but the handful of doe’s I’ve seen aren’t ready and the only shooter buck I saw was as I was parking in a bean field at 6:00am.
seems strange? The sign is incredible but the sightings sure isn’t

In SE MN things are looking up! The farmers are frantically picking corn around me tonight, and the deer were on their feet. There were a lot of gun shots tonight as well. I had a small 5 pointer chasing a doe hard not long after I got settled in. Later on a really nice 8 came in tending a doe. I pulled him away with some grunting, but he hung up about 50 yards away on a small bench that runs just above the one I set up on. He looked the draw over good for about 5 mins, and then went back up top were the doe he was with was digging around for acorns. He definitely wasn’t going to let her out of his sight.

Nights like tonight kind of make me wish I was gun hunter! My season probably would have been over if I was slinging lead! I cant go out tomorrow night, but I should be out again all weekend.

Full Swing here in South Central MN
Mid Morning seeing lots of activity in picked corn fields.
Unfortunately seeing dead road kills daily of both Bucks and Does.
They are in the Rut and on the run for sure.

I took my dog for a walk this afternoon in Blaine (north metro). Found a scrape that wasn’t there yesterday. 10 minutes later saw a 6 pointer chasing 3 does. I’d say the rut is kicking in.

Good to know we aren’t the only ones seeing slowness. Can’t wait to sit Friday and Saturday to hopefully trick one.