Independent Study

DoubleRidge said:
For our area of northern middle TN historically I take vacation days to hunt as hard as possible the first three weeks in November....may shift this plan into the last week of November based off drought, weather forecast or lack of acorns...but for the most part Nov 15 to 17 is the peak of the rut bell curve in my area....so I'm hunting the days going up the curve and the days going down the curve as much as possible...now if I only had a couple of vacation days set aside for the rut...I'd pick my days off during this same time period when there was a front or significant temp drop forecasted.
Moon phase or any app doesnt factor into choosing which days to be in the woods. I want to hunt the rut when the most mature bucks are the most vulnerable.
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Thank you for your input. I agree with the first few weeks of November. This also coincides with muzzleloader season and my favorite time of the season.🦌
 
Snake said:
I've always heard if cows are laying then deer ain't moving. Told my cousin once after he'd told me that ...I said those cows will get up when they get hungry and so will deer and they got to eat every day . May be at night mostly but they are going to eat ...with that said I hate hunting during a full moon . It does kinda make sense that animals could feed during the night at a full moon .
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I helped out a little when the TWRA was doing night-time thermal imaging deer censuses years ago. We drove around at night, sitting in a high perch mounted in a truck bed, and counted deer in open areas (usually ag fields) with thermal imagers. Later, we went back and looked at the data collected on full moon nights versus new moon nights. No difference existed between the two (same number of deer out feeding). I think the lack of difference is because their night vision is so good they only need starlight to navigate at night. We humans place a lot of emphasis on full moons because it helps US see at night. Deer don't need moonlight to see at night.
 
tree_ghost said:
In my experience the moon doesn't have any major effect on deer movement. Now if your trying to dial in to the minute details of a hunt then maybe you would consider it as a small factor for deer movement.

Weather patterns + time of the year + strategy = dead deer IMO
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Thank you for your in put.🦌
 
DoubleRidge said:
For our area of northern middle TN historically I take vacation days to hunt as hard as possible the first three weeks in November....may shift this plan into the last week of November based off drought, weather forecast or lack of acorns...but for the most part Nov 15 to 17 is the peak of the rut bell curve in my area....
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Our local timing exactly. In a decent acorn crop year, you better be hunting the first three weeks of November. In an acorn failure year, shift your hunting to the last three weeks of November.
 
I don't use apps, and I certainly haven't studied moon phase hunting that much. What I have noticed during October is very late morning movement during a full moon, almost to the point that I don't care if I get in a stand within the first hour of daylight.

I've also enjoyed many a moonlit evening from a treestand as the sound of approaching deer kept me pinned down right at last light in my tree, hoping I wouldn't educate them by climbing down.

I hate hunting in October during a full moon.
 
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I love talking about this stuff. There is always something to learn and I try to keep an open mind. I also did my own super limited trail cam study 2 seasons ago. And the only 2 factors that I could see had any real sway (outside the rut) were temperature and wind direction. Temperature drops usually brought more overall deer on the cameras and certain wind directions seemed to bring more bucks on the cameras. those are the only 2 correlations that presented some kind of pattern. I could not find any useful pattern out of moon phases/positions. These are just my super basic observations.
 
BSK said:
I helped out a little when the TWRA was doing night-time thermal imaging deer censuses years ago. We drove around at night, sitting in a high perch mounted in a truck bed, and counted deer in open areas (usually ag fields) with thermal imagers. Later, we went back and looked at the data collected on full moon nights versus new moon nights. No difference existed between the two (same number of deer out feeding). I think the lack of difference is because their night vision is so good they only need starlight to navigate at night. We humans place a lot of emphasis on full moons because it helps US see at night. Deer don't need moonlight to see at night.
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I understand but I definitely have seen less deer during a full moon than other times . Could have been coincidence but I've noticed it during my hunting career. Didn't keep me from hunting but sightings were almost non existence but have killed deer during a full moon . I just hated driving to a hunting area and see deer in the fields ...knowing they'd be heading to bed soon .
 
Snake said:
I understand but I definitely have seen less deer during a full moon than other times . Could have been coincidence but I've noticed it during my hunting career. Didn't keep me from hunting but sightings were almost non existence but have killed deer during a full moon . I just hated driving to a hunting area and see deer in the fields ...knowing they'd be heading to bed soon .
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I definitely see variations in the amount of night-time feeding, but for the life of me I can't link it to any particular natural occurrence/inlfuence. I'm sure there is a reason, I just haven't figured out what it is yet.

Before I ran the numbers, one thing I was positive was going to play a role was whether the moon was waxing or waning. When the moon is waxing (getting more full), the moon is up as we leave our stands at nightfall. When the moon is waning (getting less full), the moon is up when we walk to our stands in the morning. I was positive that morning versus evening deer activity would be different based on whether the moon was already up at sunrise or sunset. So I ran the numbers. Nothing...
 
BSK said:
I definitely see variations in the amount of night-time feeding, but for the life of me I can't link it to any particular natural occurrence/inlfuence. I'm sure there is a reason, I just haven't figured out what it is yet.

Before I ran the numbers, one thing I was positive was going to play a role was whether the moon was waxing or waning. When the moon is waxing (getting more full), the moon is up as we leave our stands at nightfall. When the moon is waning (getting less full), the moon is up when we walk to our stands in the morning. I was positive that morning versus evening deer activity would be different based on whether the moon was already up at sunrise or sunset. So I ran the numbers. Nothing...
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Your doing these numbers on your cams on your property..right ? What about property with totally different terrain than yours like mostly fields ? Does any of you track your deer like Brian ? He's good at what he does no doubt ...but other properties could be totally different..right ?
 
philsanchez76 said:
I love talking about this stuff. There is always something to learn and I try to keep an open mind. I also did my own super limited trail cam study 2 seasons ago. And the only 2 factors that I could see had any real sway (outside the rut) were temperature and wind direction. Temperature drops usually brought more overall deer on the cameras and certain wind directions seemed to bring more bucks on the cameras. those are the only 2 correlations that presented some kind of pattern. I could not find any useful pattern out of moon phases/positions. These are just my super basic observations.
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That is interesting. I know I could put all kinds of factors in this study but I'm going to try to keep it simple.🦌
 
If some say it has nothing to do with moon phase. Could it be possible that during a full moon. Some flowers or greenery of some kind. Will actually flower or possibly sprout. Bringing the deer to feed just because of what's sprouting or flowering. And that doesn't happen outside the brightness of a full moon. And it not actually being about the moon phase.even though it kind of is. But it gives an appearance of it being. Just thinking outside the box. I have no idea.
 
Food for thought? I'm going to compare moon phase to prime and minor times by the trail camera pictures I've collected from September to January. This is on the farm I hunt, all three seasons Monday through Friday some Saturdays. Half day hunts.
? is when are my deer moving the most during hunting hours.🦌
 
I'm like most and just hunt when I can. I do look at the solunar tables, but don't really hunt by them. I will say that deer do change movement times. As said, in most cases deer move at dawn/dusk, but I see times when deer deviate from that, and when they do, its no just one place (based on observations of deer driving to/and from the club.
 
BigAl said:
I'm like most and just hunt when I can. I do look at the solunar tables, but don't really hunt by them. I will say that deer do change movement times. As said, in most cases deer move at dawn/dusk, but I see times when deer deviate from that, and when they do, its no just one place (based on observations of deer driving to/and from the club.
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BigAl, I will probably come up with the conclusion but just because I'm retired and I want something to do. This is like I said an Independent study. 🦌
 
TNRifleman said:
Listen to episode 81 of Deer University done by Miss. State.

80,000 foot view of the podcast is that moon phase doesn't affect movement almost at all. It is basically dawn and dusk and the rut that increase movement. All backed with a ton of tracking data.
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this! also...the first hour of the podcast reviews the study design with the second half being results. i went into this assuming that the moon had statistically significant impact on deer movement, and i was wrong.
 

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