deer movement

[white eagle]

curious
do you see more deer moving in the morning or in the evening in cold weather winter months?
lately I have not seen alot (any) deer in the morning however the general deer season has just ended.

[DougGuy]

In Virginia they will stand out in the fields all day on Sunday before opening day.. They get their "antlergram" from the state telling them when opening day is and you won't see them for 2 weeks. They seem to know every year when to lay low.

[NSB]

From my experience, deer movement becomes much more nocturnal as the days get shorter and shorter. Once you pressure them with hunting, it becomes mostly nocturnal. I've been putting game cameras up now for about ten years and from the thousands of pictures I've gotten off of my lease, this is proven to be the case. I only have four people hunting on my lease, and it's a pretty good sized lease, and we don't bother the deer much at all by walking or riding ATVs. Their habits simply change based on the concealment folaige, length of days, and pressure. Right now I'm seeing most of the deer right at dark and a few in the morning. Bucks can be seen at any time while they're still in the rut. Their hormones override their instincts.

[runfiverun]

it depends.
last Tuesday they were for sure moving in the morning.
I seen 4 170-180" class bucks, and a few other smaller but still decent bucks, each with a small harem of does moving across their migration path in s/w Wyoming.
the most I have seen in one day in this area.

here in s/e Idaho they have been moving around midnight and again right before dark.
the weather influences their movements some but I think the moon phase allows them enough light to move at night.
the three days before the full moon in mid-October generally means movement in the mid-day hours.
our rut runs from mid-November to early December in this area and that of course influences things too, which is why those big deer were moving in the early morning after daylight.

[44man]

General deer movement times will change day to day until you will see none in the day. I believe the brighter the moon the more they feed and lay up at night and can be bedded before light.
Doe season is the most crazy, seems to be timed wrong. Rut and food does change things.

[w5pv]

Dark nights they move early in the morning and just before dark.They will move better during the day if you have a day light moon other animaql will also move on this pattern.

[Jtarm]

Great question.

I'd say slightly more in the evening. As the season wears on, I think they get more nocturnal due to hunting pressure. As it gets colder and food dries up, they have to feed longer and I think get an earlier start.

During the rut, it's even money. I've shot some of my best bucks close to mid day.

[claude]

http://www.deerfeedingchart.com/

[DougGuy]

If you are hunting a front, like a really noticeable cold front coming in midday, get near water b/c they will know to go water up before it freezes. Been there done that a time or two..

[44man]

Archery hunting the PA forest long ago, I never ever seen a deer in the morning and that went on for years and years. I only seen them in late afternoon. It was because of the distance they moved to and from the apple trees I found.
We slept in and made a good breakfast, then went exploring and shooting chipmunks all morning. the rest of camp got up before light and left, none got deer.
But here where I live I see deer in the mornings all the time. They never are at the same time, varies day to day.
One place I hunted I had to go up a steep mountain with a light to see the tacks I put in trees. I would get on stand and watch a small herd at 10 one day, 9:30 the next and earlier and earlier each day until they were by my stand in the dark. They did not pay attention to me in the dark as I caught my breath at the tree before going up. I heard them less then 10 yards and a big buck also walked past, knew his trail and where he went, found his tracks later.
On days like that I never seen another deer all morning, they were bedded.
Is it moon position and phase, sure never figured it out.
I went by the charts a few times and it never was right. Had the moon charts sold long ago, never seen it work to get deer around me at that time. Distance from feed to bedding is not figured in. You don't know where you are for deer movement. The area I hunt is a transition point they move through.
Thanksgiving, had a friend out with me. I shot a doe and then a big 6 point early, done by 7:30. I gutted and walked a big circle out to get my Polaris to go home, left my friend alone. Picked him up at 10:30 and he had just shot a spike. You just don't know.

[MT Gianni]

Beginning in late August deer head for the hay fields near me about 1 hour before dark . In twilight you can see 250 or so from the road in the private fields 30 miles So of me most years. When the season starts in Oct they change to moving in and on the river bottoms after sundown. In winter they may stay in the river bottoms depending on feed or may move to the lower foothills during the day. Below zero temps cause them to herd up and not move as much. They will get in a bunch and rotate in an out to preserve body heat, keeping new animals on the edges moving from the center.

[quilbilly]

None of this applies to the coastal black-tail deer of the Pacific NW from Alaska south to the Columbia River. They have adopted different habits from all other deer to compensate for the violent coastal weather. Tagging studies about 15 years ago showed, in order to conserve energy, these coastal deer may be immobile for up to 10 days at a time laying under one small fir tree (one picture showed two eyes in the side of a snowbank in SE Alaska). When just the right climate conditions come by all the deer in an area will move at once feeding feverishly for a few hours then lay right back down again for another week. This behavior all starts with the annual "monsoon season" that begins in early November right after the rut and goes through March.
I have hunted the late muzzleloader seasons for decades and it can be amazing and frustrating. You can be in an area for several days and not see a single track then all of a sudden there are deer everywhere on the move. In the area I plan to hunt later this week, I expect Friday to be the magic day because violent storms will be hitting Monday through Thursday. Should be interesting since the season ends next Sunday.

[Charlie U.]

I have come to the realization that storm fronts have some bearing on deer movement. It's like they can sense when conditions are about to take a turn for the worse and get more active in the time leading up to it. Getting out and hitting the feeding areas and socialize.

Also a break in the weather just after a tough storm front has passed can spell a boost in activity.

Of course, you also have to take into account changes in movement due to the rut, hunting pressure, and changes in seasonal food availability and other factors.

[44man]

Weather is so important as well as all other stuff. got rained on bad for a week, never seen a deer. when it quit, deer moved all day to catch up with food.

[MT Gianni]

Quillbilly, in the mid 80's Idaho F&G had a collared Cow Elk that had not moved in 10 days since the start of the season. Her movements were monitored live. A tech went to retrieve the collar as she was only 50 yards from a major road. She jumped up and ran off on being approached. The bed was normal, no signs of injury, she just decided the safest spot in season was not to move at all during the light.

[TXGunNut]

I've come to the conclusion that the deer I hunt move when they want to and there's no substitute for time spent in the field. Some theories seem to be true but I truly don't know. Most movement is indeed early and late but deer generally get up and move around a bit during the day as well. The rut (going on now in S TX) affects the bucks in that they will likely move at most times during the day and quite often cover a lot of ground all day.
When pressured they will indeed change their patterns of movement and are very observant of changes in our patterns and may very well know our patterns better than we know theirs.

[44man]

We had acorns good one season and deer came out of the woods, heading for bed. I sat tight and soon they came back for more goodies.
Seen the same at a persimmon tree. Deer ate and left, I watched them for a long time get farther away to see them all turn and come back for more fruit.
Heard crunching once and spotted two bucks near some trees, after they left I went to the trees, darn things were eating hickory nuts.

[nagantguy]

I have come to the realization that storm fronts have some bearing on deer movement. It's like they can sense when conditions are about to take a turn for the worse and get more active in the time leading up to it. Getting out and hitting the feeding areas and socialize.

Also a break in the weather just after a tough storm front has passed can spell a boost in activity.

Of course, you also have to take into account changes in movement due to the rut, hunting pressure, and changes in seasonal food availability and other factors.
I have also found the highest amount a deer movement just before or just after a front, drastic shifts in barometric pressure really seems to drive them to feed since I've been keying in on this the two biggest bucks I've shot have been in the rain, late morning to early afternoon.

[44man]

Best thing is to go hunting. I will not come up with a better solution.

[white eagle]

Best thing is to go hunting. I will not come up with a better solution.
no truer words have been spoken
I was trying to figure out the cold temps if it were better to hunt a.m or p.m
in my thinking deer would not move very much when its cold in the early a.m but shift more towards the warmer parts of the day

[44man]

Carol complained that something was getting all the bird seed, we thought a coon or possum so I set a camera. Found a nice doe and two fawns were eating the birdseed. I wonder if they learned to tweet!

[quilbilly]

We just brought up our trail cams from the trails we built in our woods. They were down there for 10 days. Before the snow then before the below-freezing-weather-all-day hit, it was a constant parade of does and fawns. When the freeze hit and lasted six days, nothing moved. No deer at all - even no tracks. As soon add the weather warmed the deer parade started again. Those deer were bedded on our property but never moved a muscle all six days of sub freezing weather. I know where they bed in the thick old growth forest so I leave them alone.

[waksupi]

We just brought up our trail cams from the trails we built in our woods. They were down there for 10 days. Before the snow then before the below-freezing-weather-all-day hit, it was a constant parade of does and fawns. When the freeze hit and lasted six days, nothing moved. No deer at all - even no tracks. As soon add the weather warmed the deer parade started again. Those deer were bedded on our property but never moved a muscle all six days of sub freezing weather. I know where they bed in the thick old growth forest so I leave them alone.

I've killed some nice bucks in those conditions. Killed seven in their beds over the years. I hunt real slow anyway, but when they bed tight, I slow down even more, and use the binoculars a LOT!

[white eagle]

that has been my observation as well
deer seem to slow way down in very cold temps.

[daniel lawecki]

Barometric pressure has a lot to do with hunting & fishing read the barometro and moon phases.

[44man]

Deer do not get cold but hate to get wet. So a storm coming does affect them. Rain the worst.
Even when bedded a long time, they get up and feed close to the bed. They eat what they can reach without getting up.

[quilbilly]

I have a muzzleloader tag and our neighborhood is not open for muzzleloaders, only archers or modern firearms so the season is over in our woods. When we started clearing parts of our property for eventually building the house and barn, I knew there were a couple pockets of old growth timber (150 feet tall and 4 foot+ diameter at the base) vital for shelter from rain and gales to the deer wintering in our neighborhood coming down from the high Olympic Mtns. I didn't sell that timber and try to stay out this time of year. A year and a half ago we had a mama cougar have a litter of kittens in that old growth so the deer are just getting over that paranoia. This has been fun to observe on the cams.