The Summer Surge: Use Warm-Weather Intel for Fall Success

When we think of summer whitetails, we tend to always put our focus on inventory and antler growth. We watch bucks grow all summer, and we usually make our goals about harvesting the ones with the biggest headgear. The major challenge is that many of us plan for most of our hunts to occur in the rut, and knowing where a summer buck is going to spend his rutting days in late October and November can be near impossible to strategize months in advance.

However, through running trail cameras year-round for nearly a decade, I’ve come to learn that there is a small window of what I call “rutting movement” for most mature bucks during the late summer months. A pre-game rutting excursion, per say.

I leave most of my trail cameras on the same scrapes for 365 days a year. In fact, I have multiple cameras that have not left specific rutting scrapes for as long as five years. Other than replacing batteries and swapping SD cards, I have never disconnected the straps from the tree. The knowledge and intel I’ve gained through doing this has been astonishing. What I’ve learned is that when bucks start to develop testosterone during the latter summer months, they tend to leave their summer areas for a short period of time to go visit their rutting grounds. This usually lasts for about a week, then they return back to their summer homes.

SUMMER RUTTING SCRAPES

It’s no secret that most scrapes see deer activity year-round, but mature bucks will not visit these rutting scrapes much outside of the rut. What I’ve found is that somewhere between late July and late September, most older age class bucks will venture into their rutting areas and work these scrapes. The tricky part is that this scrape behavior is nowhere near as serious as what you’ll see come mid-October, when bucks are constantly in search of scrapes and marking their territory. You might know of a dozen scrapes in a traditional rutting area that see big-buck action every fall, but if a buck makes his way through that area during the summer, he will likely only work one or two of those scrapes.

Many hunters who run trail cameras during the summer argue with me about this theory being true. Many don’t believe the summer rut excursion is real. The truth is you have to run a lot of cameras to capture this movement and intel. If I know of a half-dozen rut scrapes in a small area, I will place cameras on every one of them before mid-July if I don’t already have cameras there. This way, when bucks make their journey through that area later in the summer, I’ll know what bucks will be in that area during the rut. By clustering those cameras, I will likely catch just about every buck that has plans to use that area for breeding in the fall.

You don’t need to use scent to entice bucks to these scrapes in the summer. Historical scrapes will be visited regardless of scent use. I swear a mature buck places his scent on a rutting scrape in the summer to tell deer in the area that he will be there in October and November.

Rarely will a buck actually paw the ground and urinate in the dirt during the summer months. The majority of the scent is pre-orbital, and it is placed on the licking branch part of the scrape. However, if a buck makes this excursion in late August or September, he will likely paw the scrape, urinate in it and also disperse scent on the licking branch. The reason behind this added scrape behavior is higher amounts of testosterone often make bucks more aggressive when working scrapes.

Testosterone is a “trickling time bomb” in the body of a male whitetail. Be sure to note that I said “trickling” and not “ticking.” This means that as the days pass and we get closer to fall, testosterone levels slowly increase each day. By the time the breeding season arrives, the bomb goes off due to maximum testosterone levels. So late August and September scrape behavior is more aggressive due to these higher testosterone levels.

I’ve also found that if one of these rutting scrapes is seeing a lot of attention from does during the summer, that’s likely the first scrape a buck is going to check when he makes his shift into that area during the fall. That’s why it is so important to take advantage of gathering this intel. If a scrape continues to see doe activity during the middle of October, you can bank on that big buck to come back and frequent that scrape when he seeks to breed in that area.

Most often, I’ll see bucks come back and check these scrapes during the first mid-October cold front. You can simply wait for a good front to arrive during the middle of October and plan to see bucks that hit these scrapes for a week in the summer without any recent intel; they just show up. One issue I do see a lot is that many mature bucks only work these scrapes at night until we get further into the rut, especially during warmer weather conditions. But those October cold fronts often entice bucks to break out of nocturnal patterns and work scrapes during daylight hours.

SIGN-POSTS AND TRAVEL CORRIDORS

I see a lot of this late-summer activity along travel corridors that have historical sign-post rubs. Bucks will take the same routes during the late summer in these areas that they plan to use in the rut. These are also great locations to set up a trail camera before bucks make their mini-rut excursions.

There is usually an active deer trail inside of these travel corridors that I tend to look for and place my camera on. Also, don’t overlook placing a camera on a sign-post rub before bucks shed their velvet and start to rub frequently. I’ve seen bucks smell and checkout sign-post rubs at all times of the year. I also see does check them nearly as much as bucks.

I’ve had great luck placing clients that I guide along these travel corridors during the rut that showed signs of buck activity for a short period at the end of the summer. This past archery season, one of the largest bucks that one of my clients harvested was along a creek bottom that the buck passed through during early August. My client hunted that travel corridor on Nov. 5 and harvested that same buck cruising through during late morning.

I had no recent intel of the buck using that travel route. That was all based on what I knew he did during his summer rutting excursion. I certainly can’t say we had the buck pegged; we were getting a lot of other bucks on trail camera in that location the week prior. Nevertheless, I had a good hunch he was going to take that route again at some point during the rut, and that’s exactly what happened.

Creek bottom travel corridors can also show you loads of rutting information in the summer. Bucks love to cruise creek bottoms during the rut, and when they do make a pass through their rut zones in the summer, they spend quite a bit of time in creek bottoms due to the abundance of water and cooler air.

Some of the most tremendous buck sign I’ve ever laid eyes on has been in creek bottoms. You can always find scrapes in creek bottoms. I get giant bucks on trail camera every summer in these bottoms, particularly through the month of August. Bucks seek out creek bottoms during the rut when there’s warm temperatures, so they repeat that same behavior in the summer when they go on their rut excursions.

FINDING SUMMER RUT AREAS

Locating rutting areas is not as easy as it sounds, especially if you are planning to hunt some new ground this fall. Sometimes rutting areas can also change from year to year. One thing I really pay attention to in the summer is mast crop availability; where there’s food there will be does. Or, if you are hunting agricultural land, you can bank on where the crops will be in the fall.

This might sound crazy, but I swear that deer know where the food will be well before mast crops like acorns and apples start to drop to the ground. I’ve often wondered if they can smell them in the trees, or does Mother Nature have a way of communicating with bucks to where they need to go in advance? I believe this because I often see mature bucks making their summer rutting excursions in areas where good mast crops were still holding onto the tree limbs.

This past season we had a tremendous white oak acorn crop in parts of Pennsylvania, and I had several mature bucks suddenly show up into these areas that were loaded with acorns a month or two before the acorns ever dropped. These bucks didn’t stick around for long, either. They simply made their rutting excursion and never returned until the fall months arrived.

When I locate food sources in the summer, I keep an eye out for scrapes in those areas; not freshly used ones either. I try to look for overhanging limbs and search for vertical licking branches. Since scrapes are rarely pawed up in the summer, they are not easy to see. The vertical branch is the telling clue that there is a scrape there.

I’ve seen scrapes in the fall and winter that were ripped up as wide as a car hood, and then by summer they were filled back in with weeds and grass. You would never notice them without identifying the licking branch. I usually zip-tie a new licking branch to these scrapes to make sure it holds through the fall months, but these scrapes are where you’ll want to place cameras to catch bucks on their summer rut excursions.

HISTORIC ENCOUNTERS

A lot of the big bucks I have located through trail cameras have been during the late summer when they go into their rut areas. In the big woods, it can be hard to locate mature bucks with trail cameras during the summertime. The woods are full of green browse, and it’s extremely hard to narrow down a pattern at that time of year. Since I primarily focus on placing trail cameras on scrapes, my best intel usually comes later in the summer.

One of the biggest deer I’ve ever hunted was one that really taught me a lot about the summer rut excursion. He lived in a young clear-cut most of the summer, and I noticed he would leave for a short period of time, usually at the beginning of August. Once October arrived, he would vanish. After the first year he disappeared on me, I started placing trail cameras on scrapes in other areas that were within one or two miles from his summer range.

With a little luck, I got him on a trail camera in early August about a half-mile away from the clear-cut he lived in all summer. Unfortunately, neither me nor my clients ever shot the buck, but we had several close encounters in his rut area each season. I once had him in front of me at 20 yards trailing a hot doe after I walked a client to his stand location. If I hadn’t already filled my buck tag two days prior, that buck would likely be on my wall today.

A lot of the bucks we fail to harvest are the ones that educate and allow us to kill bucks in the future. Getting that one early-August trail camera photo was all it took for me to locate his breeding grounds. That experience also taught me how to use that same trail camera strategy on learning where other bucks will seek out rut areas in the summer.

Every summer, I seem to get one step closer to big, mature bucks by taking advantage of every bit of intel I can gather when bucks go on their summer rut excursion. By far, it’s the most exciting time of the summer for me, as I get to see what bucks will be using certain areas for the upcoming rut. The history you build with hunting individual bucks shouldn’t be done solely during hunting season, it should be done during the summer rut excursion.

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