WHERE BUCKS GO DURING THE RUT
Cameras Don't Lie
 Editor’s
Note: Mark Drury of Columbia, Missouri, founder of MAD
Calls and Drury Outdoor Productions videos and TV show,
has spent time and money over the past few years studying
buck-movement patterns with trail-monitor cameras.
"I've learned that young bucks, 1-1/2 to 3-years
old, travel often and will move a long way from their
core areas during the rut," Drury reports. "With
trail-monitor cameras, I consistently can get pictures
of these young bucks on trails around their core areas
throughout most of the year. Then when the  rut
kicks in, I'll begin to see these same bucks on numbers
of different trails, often a mile or two from their
core areas. However, the older bucks will begin to move
out of their core areas to look for does later than
the younger bucks do. I've noticed that the big bucks
during the rut won't move as far from their core areas
as the younger bucks do. Perhaps an older-age-class
buck knows that when a doe is in estrus in his core
area that he'll be the buck that breeds her. So, possibly
this is why an older-age-class buck, 4- to 7-1/2-years
old, doesn't go as far outside of his core region as
young bucks do to find does to breed. I think that during
the rut is when the most dispersal takes place in the
buck population. I've also noticed that the older the
buck is, the fewer pictures I'll get of him on my trail
camera during the rut. The younger the buck, the more
pictures I'll get of him from different cameras. I've
gotten pictures of one older-age-class buck 10 times
on one camera, but I've never made his picture on any
of the other cameras that I've strategically placed
around his core area. I really believe that older-age-class
bucks know that the further they move from their core
area in the rut, the more likely they are to encounter
a hunter."
Bucks In Odd Places:
Mark Drury also has a theory about why you'll often
see really-big dominant bucks out in the middle of a
cleared pasture during the peak of the rut. "I
think that one of the reasons bigger bucks sometimes
appear in weird spots like in the middle of a wide-open
pasture is because the does force them to come there.
When a doe comes into estrus, anywhere she goes, she'll
have young bucks trying to breed her. I'm sure you've
seen does running though the woods with their tongues
hanging out because they've been chased so hard. I think
that older does know they'll be chased hard during the
breeding season. So, rather than having to run all day
and all night, they'll simply walk out into the middle
of a cleared pasture where they know a big buck can
see and smell them. Little bucks know that if they come
out into that pasture that a bigger buck will whip them.
So, I think that explains why you see big bucks out
in pastures during the peak of a rut." 
Here's
what we've learned about bucks in the rut...
* they don't change their home ranges, even if they
don't find as many does in that area as other places
have,
* they’ll possibly change their core areas within
their home ranges if a dominant buck wages war with
them but generally have great loyalty to their home
ranges,
* they leave information for other deer at scrapes and
rubs but won't defend these rubs and scrapes as their
territory,
* they become unpredictable,
* they like apple trees in thick cover,
* they'll frequent funnel areas,
* young bucks will move more and show up more often
on motion-sensor cameras than older bucks do, and
* they'll often stay in odd places like the middle of
a pasture if they locate does there.
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