The guys were on me a bit, back in October, just before Halloween.
Even interrupted their card game.
“So, where’s the rut?”
“Stinks out there.”
“Ain’t no deer no-how.”
“Might as well play golf.”
“What’s trump?”
“Spent two days earlier this week in a tree … Nothing!”
“Hearts.”
“They just ain’t moving!”
“Are we gonna play cards or not?”
And so on.
I couldn’t help but smile to myself, knowing the whitetail rut was still not due.
Not ripe enough to pop.
Still a few days until the full moon.
Actually, I had expected to see more pre-rut action, if the truth be known. But I had complete faith that the rut was ready to send off its fireworks under the full moon on Nov. 8.
Either you believe in the full moon as a photoperiodic timing mechanism driver on wildlife, or you don’t.
In these partially enlightened days, many hunters still stick by the old myth that the whitetail rut occurs at exactly the same time every year.
Don’t try to sell anyone on it.
Minds are made up.
And besides, the moon is kind of spooky.
So I just say, “Ya gotta be patient. And don’t stink up that rut stand too early.”
Arguing about the moon is a lot like yakking about politics or religion.
No place for any of them at a deer camp.
But that was back in the fall of 2022, just before Halloween. Bucks were festering and cranky, but not running doe or each other off yet.
Then as the moon approached its full phase, hanging in the late afternoon sky just prior to Nov. 8, the deer woods began rocking like the Rolling Stone’s opening set!
“Start me up!”
The woodland’s quiet fired up after Halloween … all hell broke loose.
That’s just the way it was.
But this year, in the fall of 2023 things will be different.
More:How the 2022 whitetail rut threw some curves at deer hunters
Predicting the 2023 whitetail rut based on the moon
The full moon will be different this year.
And so will the whitetail rut’s timing.
The moon repeats itself every 19 years.
It’s called the Metonic…
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