The longer I hunt, the more I realize that mature bucks are only vulnerable at a few distinct times of the hunting season. These “days” are the ones every hunter needs to know, and key in on to increase their success on these bucks. Other days are pretty much time-wasters, and low-odds days where you mostly educate and pressure the resident deer population. Let’s look at these three, very high-odds days that every hunter should focus on.
1. The First Day of Season.
If you’ve been glassing, running trail cams, and observing summer deer, the first day or even first few days of archery season are an incredible time to catch a good buck before he knows hunting season has started. Day one is typically the best, if I had to choose just one. At this time a buck is still on summer patterns and it’s easy to predict his movements in daylight, when you can shoot him. Depending on the pressure in your area, and if you’re hunting private or public land, this could last up to possibly a week in my experience. Try not to be the one adding the pressure and you can extend this “first day” golden opportunity. This year (2023) I was able to do this on public land by finding a target buck that was unpressured, and sealed the deal in early October – 8 days into the season. Two days later, another hunter showed up in the area and deer movement ground to a halt, closing this first high-odds window.
2. The Last Days of October (Pre-Rut)
The first time bucks in your area become active in daylight beyond day #1 is the pre-rut. In the MidWest I’d say this is October 25-31. Hunting before this many times just educates other deer and pressures your area, so once that first day or days period ends, waiting until this time is your next high odds chance. I know a lot of very successful hunters who don’t even hunt until this time. Bucks are still home bodies and fairly patternable, but are making appearances during daylight which is a great combination.
The major factor messing this up is … you most of the time. Hunting your best spots during the “lull,” or between the first days and the pre-rut actually hurts your chances, so it’s best to lay off or hunt elsewhere. If you keep track of trail camera photos, it starts to become clear that this is a key time of year for big buck daylight activity to begin. Although factors like weather come into play, if I had to pick just one of these days, it would be Halloween.
3. An Extreme Cold Day – Post Rut
Bucks lose around 25% of their body mass during the rut, not eating and constantly on the move chasing estrous does. Once the rut ends, they absolutely have to replace this lost energy and recover before winter (in the north). It’s a matter of survival. This greatly plays to your benefit, as this is when he is most vulnerable, driven by his stomach. If you have a good food source (leftover acorns, standing or cut corn fields, standing beans, and late-season food plots like clover and turnips), this will draw deer from far and wide.
There are two things you need to make this gamble an almost sure deal: an extremely cold day, and a rock solid entry. Since deer can hit these food sources at night, a very cold day will get deer up early since their bodies are burning calories more quickly. This is when you need to strike, but beware, deer may be bedded close, so a silent entry and visual barrier is essential,. Plan out your strike very strategically and be ready early for this top day to catch a good buck on his feet (To see more about this, check out our related video and article 3 Keys for the Post-Rut).
But what about the rut? The rut is tricky and many times results in long sits with no movement. It just depends on many factors, and bucks are moving in a very large range searching for estrous does. So, the rut can work well for lots of action in general, but harder for specific deer as they are very unpredictable. It’s kind of the buck lottery – it may work in your favor, maybe not, and is a less sure bet than the top 3, but obviously gets bucks moving and very vulnerable, as well.
So, if you don’t have all season to hunt, and want to have the highest odds sits – these 3 days are your best bet.
HIGH IQ Takeaways and Challenges:
- Think about days you hunt, and how much of your efforts are around these 3 days.
- How can you reprioritize your hunting strategy around these high-odds days?
- UP your Deer IQ by following the Deer IQ podcast, available HERE on YouTube and where you listen to podcasts!
