Im afraid its gonna be a tough juvi….

[tree_ghost]

Just one of my traditional community scrapes is getting hit hard. The rest are dead as hammers.

What's your hunch as to why it's like that this year? No water plus poor mast crop equaling no extra energy to be spent on laying down sign?

 

[redblood]

Didnt see a single deer and with our deer density that is almost impossible

 

[THE DUKE]

So far nothing, Wilson co

 

[tree_ghost]

We saw one doe at daybreak but nothing else. Thank the lord the rain has set in now for almost an hour and the temps are falling!

 

[BSK]

What's your hunch as to why it's like that this year? No water plus poor mast crop equaling no extra energy to be spent on laying down sign?

This is the classic pattern of a severe drought and acorn-failure year. As you suggested, not enough extra energy to do much rut preparation activity (rub, scrape, chase). The deer are conserving energy.

Actually, let me take that back. This year seems to be an odd mix of an OK acorn year and an acorn failure year. In the severest drought acorn failure years, there is virtually no rubbing or scraping. I'm seeing more than that. I'm hoping the year ends up a little more "normal" than a severe drought year. In severe drought acorn failure years, our rut is delayed about 10 days and is very muted - just a brief period of chasing with nothing before or after. I'm hoping we get to see some actual buck cruising, scraping and chasing before peak breeding. Also hope peak breeding falls on the normal dates.