Unless you are lucky enough to have hunting grounds in the states urban zones the deer season is now over. And if you are one of those lucky hunters the season is open until the end of January.
I ended the year with a hunt on the last day of the season. Despite the gusting winds (sometimes over thirty miles per hour) I saw deer. I hunkered down in a patch of briers watching over a river bottom trail. As I carelessly ate a granola bar a doe walked up on me offering a clear shot at fifteen yards, unfortunately my bow was on the ground in front of me, and she didn't stick around long enough for me to pick it up. I saw five other does that day, but they stayed just out of range.
When these pictures were taken most deer hunters had either tagged out or given up on the season. But, it's pictures like these that give me that little bit of encouragement to keep hunting, and shows me bucks are still exhibiting rut like behavior late into the season.
For the past week I have ran a small trapline covering parts of the Hoosier National Forest. Believe it or not the secondary rut is still in swing, or at least there are bucks still trying to find receptive does. Monday, January 09, and again on Wednesday, January 11, I found freshly opened scrapes.
This is a great time to be in the field scouting for next year, too. With all the vegetation gone the woods are an open book just waiting to be read. All the sign from this fall is there to decipher -- rub lines, scrape lines, bedding areas, trails -- are all just waiting to be found. Now is a perfect time to learn more about your hunting area or a new area you would like to hunt next year without worrying about pressuring deer on your hunting grounds.
Some bucks will have begun to drop their antlers, too, though I suppose prime shed hunting is still months away. Several years ago, in late December, my brother walked my trapline with me. He watched me walk right past two sheds from a big ten-pointer and then he casually strolled over and picked them up. They are now his rattling antlers.
This week I have also picked up several cameras I put out after the end of muzzleloader season, so I am anxious to have the film developed to see what may be roaming my hunting grounds next year.
Pictures are still coming in of the bucks in these pictures. Somebody is going to have a long wait until October rolls around again.
