Tarsal staining

I have noticed on the bucks we have harvested(3) and on my trail cams that the bucks have almost zero tarsal staining. Normally by now the mature bucks tarsal gland is black. Is anyone else noticing this? Is that a sign of a weak rut? Maybe too many does so no need to work scrapes? I did notice that very few of the scrapes were opened up last weekend after the dusting of snow on Wednesday night. Maybe it means nothing…

Same on our 3 bucks harvested. Hunted hard for 5 days and did not see 1 fresh worked scrapes. Only 1 buck was shot chasing a doe. All bucks had necks like they were in full rut. Saw a fair amount of doe’s and only 1 with a buck trailing. Not sure if it was the front or back end of the rut we were seeing.

We saw plenty of both sexes and saw bucks hot on does. I shot a doe and the buck wouldn’t leave her after she was dead on the ground and stayed right there until I was within 40 or 50 feet of him and then he only walked off to the crest of a small knoll and hung around as I dressed her out.

I saw bucks with all degrees of tarsal staining. The q0 point I shot had fairly clean hind legs and had none of the tarsal stink while the other ten taken in the group was much larger bodied deer, heavier in the head gear [smaller spread though] and stunk to high heaven. He was soaked with urine. I would not have allowed that deer to hang in my garage, it was that bad.