00:00:01 Speaker 1: What is going on? This is Jake Hofer and welcome to another week of Rut Fresh. It's October 14th and we're halfway. We're basically halfway through October now. And Cold Front, a really good looking Cold Front, is finally working through much of the country this week. And so before we kick off our guest for this week's episode of Rut Fresh, here is your Whitetail Weather Report for Wednesday, October 14th. After an unusually warm start to October across much of the Midwest, we're finally seeing a significant pattern change across the Whitetail Country. Rain and thunderstorms will be moving through portions of the plains and Midwest around midweek with barometric pressure generally falling ahead of these systems. As we get towards Friday and Saturday, a stronger fall system is expected to move through the Great Lakes and eventually further east. Ahead of that front, look for predominantly south and southwest winds, followed by a shift to west and northwest winds as colder and drier air moves in behind it. That system will also bring rain and potentially gusty winds, followed by some of the coolest air we've seen so far this season across portions of the Great Lakes and the northeast. Into Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, conditions look to moderate behind the system as it continues east. And finally, the moon is building this week. We're coming off the October 10th new moon. with a waxing crescent through the middle of the week and the first quarter moon arriving Sunday, October 18th. That's your Whitetail Brother report through next Wednesday. My general take on this is I think there's going to be some really good hunting opportunities on the backside of these fronts. Quite a bit of rain depending on where you're at. Just what we've been waiting for. This is what we've been waiting for so far. up to this point into October and I hope you guys get a chance to get out and enjoy it maybe your earlier October scouting is going to pay off with this next cold front or as we've been talking on back 40 and will continue to do so the shifts of mature bucks and what that may look like there's a lot of exciting things here so this week's episode of rut fresh presented by Moultrie we have Caitlin Moss covering much of the Midwest she's been hunting multiple states and is headed to Wisconsin We have Aaron Hepler from Pennsylvania and we have Dan Tudor who is hunting the ocean front of Maine. And so a lot of variety here this week. Hope you guys enjoy it. We're going to kick things off with Caitlin Moss. Here we go. All right. First up, we have Caitlin Moss. Caitlin, you've been hunting a bunch. Where all have you been hunting recently? 00:02:23 Speaker 2: Uh, Primarily just in the Midwest, but I've got like three tags that I've kind of been bouncing between. And then I'm also going to be going to Wisconsin this week. So I've got a lot going on, honestly. 00:02:37 Speaker 3: Okay. 00:02:38 Speaker 1: So most people are waiting for a cold front, myself included in this category. And I know you've been hunting very hard, which kind of makes me feel bad. Like, what am I missing here? So what have you been seeing? What's been the strategy? And just, I'm just curious. Yeah. 00:02:54 Speaker 4: Um, I don't know. Early season is like my jam. It's like my favorite. I know it's brutally hot most of the time, but I just love getting out in states that open in September. 00:03:03 Speaker 2: Um, I just feel like I have more flexibility if I get out sooner than later. Um, but yeah, I, uh, I had some close calls, I guess you could say, uh, kind of towards the end of September. 00:03:17 Speaker 4: Um, but lately it's been a. 00:03:23 Speaker 2: I'm not seeing as much activity at the moment, but I think the next couple of weeks, it's really going to ramp up. I'm seeing little bucks like kind of pushing does around, you know, harassing them as they do. So I think we're just kind of in that like transition of like pre-rut is really. 00:03:39 Speaker 4: Starting to kick off. 00:03:41 Speaker 1: So do you anticipate things just get incrementally better for the next like two or three weeks? 00:03:46 Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. 00:03:47 Speaker 2: I'd say they're, they're done with their summer routines and they're now starting. I mean, scrapes are opening up like crazy. I've been seeing a bunch of those. Um, I actually rattled and by rattled, I mean like lightly sparred a buck in over a scrape last week. So they're, they're curious and they're pushing each other around. 00:04:07 Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, uh, every day gets a little better. That's the good news. Like every time like a new buck may show up, there's a lot of excitement. So Packing bags and headed to Wisconsin. Looking at the weather here. Looks like we're going to get a cold front. Like here where I'm at, it's 89 of a high today. And then by Wednesday and Thursday, like upper 60s. And then Friday, upper 50s. Like the big first cold front. Yeah, so what with knowing the weather is going to be cooperating, we have this massive cold front rolling in. And then are you hunting a completely new area of Wisconsin? Or have you pre-scouted this? Or I'm just curious if you're going in blind or if you have somewhat of a game plan. 00:04:44 Speaker 4: Yeah. 00:04:45 Speaker 2: So I'm hunting public everywhere except Wisconsin this year. I have a friend who was willing to let me kind of get in on their lease. So I've never deer hunted Wisconsin before. So that aspect is new. It's very hilly, rolling hills terrain. So that part will be interesting. But there are brassica plots in and kind of your standard setup. So I'm just kind of having fun with it. I don't really have like a target buck per se, but there's a few that are mature. So I think that's the goal. But yeah, kind of just going to go see how it is. Because I mean, I love kind of jumping around and trying new states. 00:05:26 Speaker 4: So we'll just we'll see. 00:05:28 Speaker 2: But I have a few cameras out and it seems like bucks are kind of moving in again. Like I said, scrapes are opening up. So I have a lot of cameras over scrapes and they're hammering them every night. 00:05:37 Speaker 4: So we'll see. 00:05:38 Speaker 1: Are you getting them? are you getting much daylight activity of mature bucks on scrapes yet? Cause I'll project I'm not getting a ton quite yet. 00:05:46 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:05:47 Speaker 4: So most of. 00:05:48 Speaker 2: The scrapes that I have cameras on are like on a field edge. So no, um, the buck that I kind of rattled in over a scrape was not on a field edge, obviously different state, but like way kind of close to bedding is like where I was. So that was, I mean, he came out, I don't know, 40 minutes before legal light. So like, If you're in the woods and as close to them as you can be for bedding, you can probably get some daylight activity, but field edges, no, not a ton. 00:06:17 Speaker 1: Okay, so what does the first set look like in Wisconsin in the back of your head already after the first cold front? So I know you're headed up today, but let's say Friday looks really good. It looks like we might even get the first frost of the year. But what does Friday's set look like from the time you wake up to the time– you know, the end of shooting light at the end of the day, like from morning to afternoon hunts? 00:06:41 Speaker 4: Um, that's a great question. 00:06:42 Speaker 2: I think like I'm, I'm getting in there today, so I'm gonna mostly use today and maybe even tomorrow as like observation sits. 00:06:50 Speaker 4: I'm really big on those. 00:06:51 Speaker 2: Um, so I'm going to kind of like hang back and just get to a point where I can just see as much of the food plot as I can and just see where they're coming out, if they're coming out, um, and then kind of like adjust from there if I have to. 00:07:04 Speaker 4: So mornings have been like 50-50 for me. 00:07:07 Speaker 2: I'm not hunting every morning yet. Come Friday, I might be. So if it's that drop in temp, they're probably going to be on their feet. So again, like I said, it's super hilly where we are. So truthfully, I'm not even fully sure where the bedding is. So yeah, that's kind of like my process is like observation set, see where they're coming out or see where like the most activity seems to be and then kind of work my way closer from there. 00:07:34 Speaker 1: So will these be the most aggressive whitetail thermals you've had a battle like knowing it's really hilly and used to more like rolling terrain? 00:07:41 Speaker 4: Yes, for sure. So that'll be interesting. 00:07:46 Speaker 1: Do you have a game plan with that? I mean, everyone talks about thermals and I feel like it's some people understand them really well and it's like their second language. And there's other people that are like, I kind of have an idea what they're doing and I'm going to probably get, you know, busted or screw up. What camp do you, Do you feel like a thermal savant or still like this could be the hard knocks of bluff country of Wisconsin? 00:08:07 Speaker 4: Yeah, I, I think I kind of fall in the middle. 00:08:10 Speaker 2: Like I definitely understand them, but there's some locations like, um, there's a spot that I just have in mind from a place that I hunted before. And it did not matter what wind direction you had in there. It was just enough of a bowl that it always pulled East. I mean, like without fail. So like, it was interesting hunting that because it's like, well, that's not really the wind direction I want. 00:08:33 Speaker 4: And the thermals are just stuck in that way. 00:08:35 Speaker 2: So, um, those types of like, like specific scenarios are interesting to me. And I'm always like trying to like pay attention to those. I don't know if I necessarily have them fully figured out. I guess we'll find out, but yeah, I do pay attention pretty heavy though. 00:08:51 Speaker 1: So for someone listening to this on Wednesday, there, there may be, they can get out of work early on, you know, Thursday afternoon, Friday afternoon, and then have the ability to hunt a little bit over the weekend. What is, as a generalized approach, what is your advice for anyone that is excited for this first cold front, like major cold front of October? They want to capitalize on it. What type of terrain should they be paying attention to? What type of food sources? Like any sort of loose game plan, you can just jot down on a sticky note and pass it off to them and say, good luck. This should be a fun couple days. What would you say to them? 00:09:25 Speaker 4: Oh, um, truthfully, I am in the camp of like early rattling. 00:09:29 Speaker 2: Like that is like my, if, if you have like the right setup, I would say like where I'm going to be hunting is like, at least to start, I'm going to be over a field. 00:09:38 Speaker 4: So it might not be. 00:09:38 Speaker 2: As effective for me because obviously they kind of want that visual. Um, but if you can get into some thick, nasty stuff and find a scrape, like that's hot, I would not be scared to do some rattling because I was raking the trees, just making some. 00:09:54 Speaker 1: Fuss, really. 00:09:56 Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they're just frisky right now, and they're one. to kind of push each other around. And if you can find a hot scrape, that's where. 00:10:04 Speaker 4: I would focus. 00:10:05 Speaker 3: Okay. 00:10:06 Speaker 1: And so primarily a scrape outside of thick bedding. Don't be afraid to make a little bit of noise to try to get them to come in and check out what's going on. And then on a scale of aggression, like 1 to 10, like how big of a swing– would you suggest someone to take over this first cold front? 10 being like, this is do or die. This could be one of the best opportunities of the year. 00:10:30 Speaker 4: Gosh, I don't know. I would say I really do love early October. 00:10:35 Speaker 2: I think that's when mature bucks are still not heavily pressured and they're kind. 00:10:39 Speaker 4: Of cocky because they're like, well, I rule this area. 00:10:43 Speaker 2: So I wouldn't be afraid to be like, aggressive so i would say maybe like a five or six i wouldn't say it's like knock down drag out rut action but like the big ones are pretty cocky right now so. 00:10:55 Speaker 1: Don't be scared okay and then last question here um it'll feel a little bit redundant but on um the activity level scale one to ten this ten being this is the best week of the entire year given the conditions that are getting laid out right now and one being one of the worst weeks of the year one to ten where do you put it. 00:11:12 Speaker 4: Um I'll say a five. We're in the middle. Good week, first cold front. 00:11:22 Speaker 2: It's always a good thing, but it's not going to be like, oh my gosh, best week of my life. 00:11:28 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fair. 00:11:30 Speaker 4: It could be. If you get one, it could be. 00:11:32 Speaker 1: It definitely could be if you're in the right spot. Well, Caitlin, where can people follow along with the rest of your season and everything else that you have going on? 00:11:41 Speaker 2: Yeah, so my YouTube channel is like the main platform thing that I kind of focus on and I've been trying to do like weekly updates like even if I'm not shooting something it's like this is how my season's going so if you want to follow along it's just my name Caitlin Moss Outdoors and then I have a Facebook and an Instagram again just my name Caitlin Moss so those are the main. 00:12:04 Speaker 1: One yeah well good luck in Wisconsin and good luck the rest of the year and I hope Um, this first cold front is great for everyone. Cause we've been, we've been waiting for a long time for this. 00:12:14 Speaker 4: Yeah. Are you going out? 00:12:16 Speaker 1: Yeah, I will be. I'll be going out Wednesday, Thursday. I have not hunted much this year. I'm embarrassed to say so far I've been busy working, but it's time. So I, I'm ready to go. 00:12:26 Speaker 4: Yep. Well, good luck to you. 00:12:29 Speaker 1: Thank you. All right. Next up we have Aaron Hepler with the in-camp podcast. How you doing? 00:12:34 Speaker 3: Good, buddy. 00:12:35 Speaker 5: It's good to see your face. 00:12:36 Speaker 1: Likewise. Likewise. So we're hailing in Aaron from Pennsylvania. You've been doing some hunting here recently, haven't you? 00:12:45 Speaker 6: Yeah, I've got like seven or eight sits under my belt this week. 00:12:49 Speaker 5: So it's been a good week. 00:12:51 Speaker 1: And so what, you know, kind of hot weather, I would assume, more stagnant. But what's the activity been like here, like in the last couple of days specifically? 00:13:00 Speaker 6: Well, you know, last year we talked about a lot of the drought that was happening and there was no acorns. And like this year is the complete opposite. Like we've had plenty of rain. There's lots of water. Um, there's acorns everywhere. Um, but there is, uh, there's like preferred patches. So the food's a lot better, but this week for the opener NPA, it's act, the weather's actually been pretty fantastic. Like we've had a handful of warm days, but a lot of the, a lot of the ups and downs that we all really like is bow hunters, especially if you're off on the down part, you know? 00:13:30 Speaker 4: Yeah. 00:13:31 Speaker 6: So the temperatures have been good. No frost yet, so there's none of that real classic whitetail feel. But some of the mornings have really felt good. And it's kind of strange to say that because the October mornings have been actually pretty good. It seems the deer are kind of like they're out feeding before they're getting back to bed. They're back to bed a little bit later than normal. 00:13:53 Speaker 7: Yeah. 00:13:54 Speaker 6: Um, I don't know if that has to do with the, with the better food and the, you know, kind of early cold conditions, but it's been, been pretty good as far as conditions ago. 00:14:02 Speaker 7: Yeah. 00:14:03 Speaker 1: Well, I think they're, they're only going to get better here looking at the extended forecast. So, um, you know, like the here in Illinois, like we got some rain coming and then we got a massive from, you know, Tuesday. So the day before this goes live to Tuesday. Friday. So I know that's a little bit drug out, but I mean, it goes from 84 to high of 57, uh, like on the tail end of some rain. And if that doesn't get anyone excited, I don't know what will. What, um, what are you seeing in Pennsylvania as far as weather conditions and, um, and what you think it may or may not mean for, for guys who are ready to go out and do some, some hunting? 00:14:41 Speaker 6: So I guess we got that hurricane this week, uh, this weekend, like it started raining. It's been raining since yesterday. It's, just kind of slowing down right now um it's monday the 12th and uh looks like we're probably going to get some rain a little bit tomorrow intermittently tomorrow and wednesday two real warm days um today is kind of a warm-up wednesday tuesday and wednesday are going to be pretty hot um almost almost 80 tomorrow but as we get into thursday the temps are going to start falling and friday uh I would say Friday is really the front of that cold front. So this weekend should be really good. Lows in the 40s in the morning and highs of like 60s. So it's happening. It's getting on the colder side. I'm seeing bucks like kind of hitting some scrapes and seeing a lot more scrape activity. Um, not, not your classic like scrape week stuff, but it's, it's kind of ramping up to there. They're creating scrape lines, seeing more rubs popping up, that kind of thing. Um, in the beginning, like right before the season, I, we had, we had talked about this. I was seeing bucks fighting like every day for almost the entire month of September. And that's kind of like tapered off. Um, they're not usually together anymore. They're, uh, you know, one will show up and another one will show up an hour or two later. 00:16:01 Speaker 1: So. 00:16:02 Speaker 6: It seems to be like they're kind of splitting up and doing their own searching, so that's kind of cool, too, to see that start happening. 00:16:09 Speaker 1: Yeah. As far as knowing that everyone's going to look at the weather and everyone's going to just feel it outside, like, oh my gosh, it officially feels like deer season. That's what's likely going to be happening later this week across the bulk of the country. Um, so it's one thing to say, man, it feels like it's deer season. I'm ready to go. But the next, the next phase of that is like, okay, well it's, it's mid October. We have this massive cold front. Um, how are you specifically going to be approaching your hunts? Are you going to be trying to find, you know, where there's still some acorns laying around? Are you going to be setting up on scrapes outside of bedding? Like what is the actual Rubik's cube that you have to solve here for everyone? 00:16:56 Speaker 3: Yeah. 00:16:56 Speaker 5: I don't think sitting over a specific scrape is sometimes. 00:16:59 Speaker 3: All right. 00:17:00 Speaker 5: But I think the better. 00:17:01 Speaker 6: The better thing is to find those scrape lines that are popping open and kind of sitting along those roots. 00:17:07 Speaker 5: And I think it's, you know, it depends on how long that root is. 00:17:10 Speaker 6: Like if you're, you know, the bucks that I've been hunting aren't, they're not bedding very far from their food, maybe only about 400, 450 yards. So it's, you know, getting in between that is important. But being on the tail end of which side is going to be better for the light and your wind at the same time. So we just talked about, My opener was pretty good. I saw a bunch of bucks and the wind was predicted to be like 10 to 14 miles an hour throughout the evening. And I should have been a little smarter and knew that it was going to die off right before last light. And of course, it was like, well, do I do I pay attention to what I think is going to happen or pay attention to what the weatherman says? And usually if you know what your area does, like you should pay attention to that first. 00:18:01 Speaker 5: So the wind. 00:18:01 Speaker 6: Died off like 35, 35 minutes to an hour before last light. And my thermal started to shift downhill and that's where the bucks were traveling. Had they been half hour earlier, I probably would have been okay, but they all kind of like got a sense that something wasn't right. Didn't necessarily, it wasn't the classic wind and bust, right? They just kind of didn't come up to the area that I was hoping they would. And they just kept moving on towards the food, um, in a, in a orderly fashion. 00:18:30 Speaker 5: So Um, so pay, I think paying attention to. 00:18:36 Speaker 6: If I, if I had been maybe 50 yards closer to the bedding, they would have been out in the 50 yard zone a little bit faster. Maybe that would have kind of saved me for the, the die off in the wind and the shift. So paying attention to what the timing of your wind and the timing of when they're going to be where you want them to be. 00:19:06 Speaker 1: For someone that says, you know, hey, okay, Aaron, I hear you loud and clear. I need to find ideally a scrape line and set up, you know, strategically with wind and thermals and all the pillars of, you know, a good hunting strategy. But I don't know where there's a scrape line at right now. Or I don't, you know, like whatever the case may be. So I feel like, you know, there might be a couple days here, literally maybe 24 hours or so, Before this front really hits in Pennsylvania, call it 48 hours. Would it be worthwhile or advantageous for someone listening to this right now to go and do a speed scout and try to get squared away for this front? Or do you kind of go in blind and... hope for not, you know, lack of better words, luck, but like go off instinct of like, no, this is where it's typically been. I haven't been in there. I've been really busy. But in the past, it's been good. I'm just going to ride with that. Like where do you verify or do you go with your intuition in this scenario? 00:20:05 Speaker 6: Well, last year was so different than this year. So I think it's made like... the vegetation has changed so much compared to last year because there's a lot more growth this year than last year. So the deer are, are different this year than they were in other years. But if you have something that's kind of similar and you don't have time to get out, I'd, I'd say kind of like go off your gut and hunt your history, but it is going to be, it is going to be different whether it's, you know, the problem now is you're hunting with a bow and you're not hunting with a gun. So you can't be, you can't be 50 yards off. So I think a speed scout, if you have the time, would be very worth it. And if you know at least an idea of where the budding cover is and where to stay away from it, you could do a speed scout without being too intrusive, especially the next two days because it's going to be hot. So you can kind of guess that probably midday, they're kind of just they're chilling out in their bedding areas. And if you stay far enough away from them with a good wind, you could get away with finding a good scrape area and putting yourself, you know, more on the X than rather than, you know, be too far off to get a real good shot. 00:21:11 Speaker 1: What, what do you think is gonna be the biggest change when this, whenever the first frost hits, like I, I, parts of the country, their first frost will hit this week. Um, and so like, and, and your experience in the past, like once that first frost hits, um, what changes over the next seven days? 00:21:31 Speaker 6: So usually on our very first cold front where we get that, that frost, sometimes it's happened already. Like I've had it happen as early as the 9th of October. And, um, then it kind of, it tapers off for a lot longer when it's early like that. But I feel like these, um, when you get that first frost early and it's really cold, you get a real big spurt of, actually we've had some pretty mature bucks show up on camera. 00:21:56 Speaker 5: On that, on that, even on the ninth. 00:21:58 Speaker 6: Um, but usually when it's this close to the end of October, you see a lot more intensity. So your buck movement for me, um, and for the people that I hunt with usually is more intense, faster, and doesn't kind of like stagger throughout the entire month. Usually it stays kind of stacked and you get more, um, mature buck sightings, you know, every day to every other day, rather than just like maybe once a week until the end of October. So usually that's what I see happen after that first frost is a little bit more intense and, uh, faster activity. And sometimes that that's led to like harder rut luck down towards that end of the first. 00:22:38 Speaker 3: Week of November. 00:22:39 Speaker 6: It's not as good as it usually is through that whole first week, but that's just, that's just from my perspective. 00:22:45 Speaker 1: So. Yeah. Well, I think, yeah, that's definitely one thing. I feel like a lot of signs going to get laid down. I think, um, a lot of the habitat changes after we start getting some hard frost, where a lot of leaves start falling off the trees, a lot of the grass, and general lower-level habitat just changes so dramatically so quickly, and it's just a reshuffling of the deck, which if you're on the good end of getting a new good hand, it's pretty exciting. 00:23:13 Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 00:23:16 Speaker 1: So with all that being said and considered, not a drought this year in Pennsylvania where you're at, looking at the conditions, looking at the calendar on the next seven days on a scale one to 10, 10 being the best week of the year, one being one of the worst weeks of the year, where do you rank the next seven days for anyone listening? Um, you know, in your general neck of the. 00:23:37 Speaker 6: Woods, if barring the fact that we have this weekend coming up, I would probably put it at a, I would probably put it at about a six just because we have these hot three days in a row. Um, and yeah, I don't think the rain that's going to– it's not going to be like heavy rains, so they'll probably be moving before and after these light rainstorms. They're not the type that kind of hold them up. The earlier rains in October I find kind of like if it's heavy, they kind of just kind of shut off a little bit. If it's later, it's not the same, but right now it's kind of like they shut off a little bit. But I would put it at about a 6. If we had more days like Saturday this week, I'd probably put it at a 7 or an 8. 00:24:17 Speaker 4: Mm-hmm. 00:24:18 Speaker 5: This weekend going into this weekend is going to be very good. 00:24:22 Speaker 1: I like it. I like it. Well, good luck to you. Where can people follow along with everything that you have going on? The podcast, you talk about a lot of things. 00:24:31 Speaker 2: Yeah, I do. 00:24:32 Speaker 6: And so where can people find it? So it's InCamp Podcast. You can find it on Instagram. It's on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, all those things. But I do kind of like a full-length podcast where I just really get the story of my guests and what they really like. and I really try to draw from their experience and their stories rather than just all strategy-type talk. But if you like the strategy-type talk, I do short episodes for whitetails and for uplands and bird dogs and that kind of thing too. 00:25:02 Speaker 3: Awesome. 00:25:02 Speaker 1: They're all there on the same channel. Thank you so much, and good luck this weekend, and good luck the rest of the season. 00:25:09 Speaker 3: Thanks, buddy. 00:25:10 Speaker 5: Appreciate it. 00:25:10 Speaker 1: All right, we got Dan Tudor from Maine. How's it going? 00:25:15 Speaker 3: Good, good. It's going well. 00:25:17 Speaker 1: So there was a comment last week on YouTube. I do look at those every now and then. And someone said, we need someone in the Northeast. And we had already scheduled this. And I was like, we got a treat coming. So where about are you in Maine? Because that's obviously a very large state. 00:25:31 Speaker 3: Yeah. 00:25:32 Speaker 7: So we're in what's known as the Midcoast. So it's about halfway up the coast. You know, about two hours from Portland. 00:25:43 Speaker 1: Yeah. 00:25:45 Speaker 3: It's not quite all the way to Bar Harbor. 00:25:48 Speaker 1: And what I found really interesting when you reached out was you're, you're hunting a lot of islands. And so when I, when I hear island, I often think of small islands, but I know big islands also exist. So what, what are some of these islands, uh, like in terms of like, are they huge? Are they small? I know that's a relative answer and question there, but what, what are you, what are you hunting out there? 00:26:09 Speaker 3: Sure. Yeah. Um, the biggest island I hunt. 00:26:11 Speaker 7: Is about 7,000 acres. Um, but that's, that's a populated Island. And then I hunt a lot of smaller Islands that are in the 20 acre to a hundred acre range. 00:26:27 Speaker 3: Um, those are fun. Those are sort of more of an adventure. 00:26:30 Speaker 7: They're usually unpopulated or, or have a, you know, a few seasonal houses. 00:26:36 Speaker 1: Okay. And so looking at, you know, there's a hurricane, uh, obviously you're hunting Island. So you're surrounded by water, all these different things. What does the weather look like? Um, you know, from Wednesday to Wednesday, the 14th or the 21st in your neck of the woods? 00:26:51 Speaker 7: Yeah, it's looking, I mean, it's going to be wet and windy, which means I won't be venturing off the island that I live on since I'm doing a lot of my hunting out of a, like a canoe or a dinghy. 00:27:06 Speaker 3: And yeah, I mean, not great, not great hunting weather. 00:27:08 Speaker 7: Looks like it's going to be blowing 20 with gusts up to 30. Uh, we are getting some colder temperatures. 00:27:17 Speaker 1: Yeah. 00:27:17 Speaker 3: Especially a little bit later in the week, which will be nice. 00:27:21 Speaker 7: Um, yeah, but, but the, the deer activity has been pretty, pretty good even with, um, more stable temperatures. 00:27:32 Speaker 1: What, how often are these deer swimming from island to island? Like I picture like a 40 to or 20 to a hundred acre island. Um, I, I would imagine there's not enough habitat to support them. throughout the whole entire season or them not getting adventurous how how challenging is that to factor like is this deer on this island or that island or do they typically stay put. 00:27:54 Speaker 7: It depends um they definitely swim swim island to island um be hard for me to give you a real definite kind of number on that we we opening day i went out with some buddies to a very small Island. Um, and we hunted it pretty hard, um, shot four deer in, uh, in 24 hours. And then, um, we paddled over to a neighboring Island and, um, I think, I think a lot of the deer from, from the first Island had swam over there. I know that there was an eight pointer we had on camera on the first Island and it ended up on the second Island. 00:28:37 Speaker 3: So They move. 00:28:40 Speaker 7: That was about, oh, maybe 300 yards, maybe a quarter mile between islands. So not very far. And there was a smaller island in between that they could have stopped at. But they're really comfortable swimming. 00:28:57 Speaker 3: You wouldn't really expect it from the way their bodies are shaped, but they do it. 00:29:02 Speaker 1: It's pretty remarkable that they are able to swim when you look at how small their legs are in proportion to their actual like torso. And I mean, a lot of them are 180, 220, like they're big animals and they don't have, they have not been designed to swim, but they can swim, which is crazy. Yeah. 00:29:20 Speaker 3: They don't have much in the way of paddles, but, um, they can do it pretty fast. 00:29:24 Speaker 7: I mean, I watched my dog swim after one, one time. Um, and you know, it was at least as fast as the dog, if not faster. 00:29:34 Speaker 3: So they can move. 00:29:36 Speaker 1: What, uh, as far as jumping into the mindset of a deer in your neck of the woods for the next seven days, what, what would you anticipate? And, and you can, you're welcome to overgeneralize for, you know, the general Northeast region, but, um, are they going to be, in your opinion, laying down a bunch of sign? Um, like what, what do you anticipate deer to be doing over the next seven days? 00:29:58 Speaker 3: Yeah. 00:29:58 Speaker 7: So the scrapes are, getting hit more and more often right now. Um, more daylight action. Uh, I actually had a spot last year where I caught a full on buck fight, um, on the 13th. Um, so I don't know if there was, you know, I have a little bit of a theory about October, October does October does that go into estrus in October. Um, I don't think it's, it's many, I think it's a, you know, very small, portion of the bell curve but um that i'd never gotten a fight like that on camera. 00:30:36 Speaker 3: Before and i mean it was two mature bucks. 00:30:41 Speaker 7: It was i wish i had it on video but uh you can kind of see them start to face off. 00:30:45 Speaker 2: And then um. 00:30:47 Speaker 7: You know they came at each other hard um one threw the other one onto the ground and then it got purchased and pushed back um that's that i got you know three three to five frames or something. 00:31:01 Speaker 3: But, um, yeah, I think it happens. 00:31:04 Speaker 7: We've had good luck, um, around the, around this time now to. 00:31:09 Speaker 3: Like the, we, we, uh, we did a little hunting weekend. 00:31:17 Speaker 7: Two years ago and my brother and a good friend both connected on mature bucks on the 17th. 00:31:24 Speaker 1: Um, what were they doing? What were they doing two years ago on the 17th? Were they, Cruising around, I'm just curious how they found success at typically a somewhat more challenging time of the year. Obviously, there's big deer that die everywhere across the country every day, but very relevant to people listening right now. 00:31:45 Speaker 3: Yeah, they were both cruising. I had no food, but heading out early. 00:31:50 Speaker 7: Yeah, you definitely get some more cruising action. 00:31:56 Speaker 3: Actually, I shot one on. 00:32:00 Speaker 7: Friday morning uh returning to bed at about seven um which. 00:32:05 Speaker 3: Which i was a little surprised about i don't think i've shot a buck. 00:32:08 Speaker 7: In the in the morning um especially that early in the season and um yeah i i knew i knew there was some good deer in there and i i cut a track the night two nights before it looked like it was going back to bed and um yeah i just got lucky. 00:32:27 Speaker 1: Luck is always a good thing, whether people want to admit it or not. I wouldn't call it purely luck if you cut the track and made a guess, but there's always an element of luck, whether we want to admit it or not. I wish we could all say we knew, oh, I knew that was going to happen. We hoped that was going to happen. What are deer eating in that type of terrain this time of year? 00:32:51 Speaker 7: Yeah, we get a lot of apple trees, a lot of oak trees. So they're hitting acorns pretty good right now. Um, they usually, you know, they start the season on apples, early apples, they shift to acorns when they first start to drop and then they'll kind of return back to apples. Um, a little bit later in the year when they've kind of gotten all the easy acorns and there's some late dropping apples. 00:33:15 Speaker 3: And then there's all the, all the, you know, a million. 00:33:17 Speaker 7: Different kinds of Forbes, but, um, we're focused mostly on, on acorns right now. 00:33:24 Speaker 1: Okay. And then. You know, looking at the weather with, you know, some strong winds and then some cooler temperatures on a scale one to 10, 10 being the best week of the year, one being one of the worst weeks of the year. So, you know, the 14th to the 21st, what is Dan's stamp of approval for the next seven days in terms of expectations and anticipation for, you're speaking for all of the Northeast right now, so no pressure. 00:33:54 Speaker 3: I like this time of year. 00:33:56 Speaker 7: Um, I, I might prefer this time of year over, over any other, at least, you know, up to, up to, um, Halloween, but, uh, I, I find the rut kind of frustrating and this is a good time. I think the butts of bucks are, you know, out in daylight in the morning and, and often going to food a little earlier. So, oh, I mean, you're not going to get full rut action. 00:34:21 Speaker 3: I'd give it a seven. I mean, maybe a little less with the weather because the weather's not great. But, yeah, call it a 6-7. 00:34:30 Speaker 1: 6-7. All righty. I like it. Anything else? Any other words of advice for anyone that is making a game plan for the next seven days that might be helpful other than trying to set up on potentially apple trees, acorns, scrape, a little bit of cruising? What else is top of mind that might be helpful to someone out there? 00:34:53 Speaker 7: Yeah, I'd say in the morning, travel corridors closer to bedding, as you'd imagine. And then if you have food in the evenings or if you wanted to hit more of a transition zone. 00:35:06 Speaker 3: And yeah, I believe in. 00:35:09 Speaker 7: This little theory about trying to find some month early does. 00:35:13 Speaker 3: It's rare and. 00:35:21 Speaker 7: It's hard to find and it's really, I think it's just pretty mature bucks who have figured this out. So it's, it's not like the kind of rut action you would expect, but you know, if you can, if you can find a, um, you know, if you can find some early fawns in the spring and, and date those back or, you know, just go off of, off of any Intel you've found, but that, that buck fight especially was an eye opener for me. I'd had a bit of a theory on this, but seeing, seeing them, you know, basically trying to kill each other on the 13th, um, kind of convinced me a little more. 00:36:02 Speaker 1: I think, I think that's a great piece of advice that, that, uh, had not been brought up here yet for this week's episode of rough fresh. And you're exactly right. I think if you pay attention to it, um, you might key in on that. And, uh, it seems like year over year, there's some, some level of consistency. And if, if you can remember to your point, like, wow, I can't believe there's already been a fawn, uh, you know, this, this past spring, like that is a clear tip. And so I think that's a great, great piece of advice. Dan, where, where's the best place for people to track you down? Uh, if actually I have one other question, uh, out of curiosity, what is the deer density like in your region? I'm just curious. 00:36:41 Speaker 3: It's high. 00:36:43 Speaker 1: Really? 00:36:44 Speaker 3: Yeah, it depends on what island you're on. 00:36:48 Speaker 7: Some of the islands that I hunt, somewhere between 50 and 70 deer per square mile. The smaller islands, a little harder to say, especially if they're moving around. But on the bigger islands around me, it's high. It might be the highest in the state. 00:37:05 Speaker 3: To be honest. 00:37:07 Speaker 1: Interesting. 00:37:07 Speaker 3: Okay. 00:37:08 Speaker 1: I was dying to ask that. Yeah, they're, they're heavily pressured. 00:37:14 Speaker 7: Um, especially the, you know, the, the larger inhabited islands. So I think people, I tell that to people and they're like, Oh, I'm going to, I'm going to come out and, you know, shoot all the deer. 00:37:25 Speaker 3: And it's like, well, they, you know, they know what's up. 00:37:28 Speaker 7: Um, I've shot two bucks that were, had old wounds on them. I think most bucks have been shot at or wounded, uh, by the time they're, four. So there's, there's some challenge to it, but there's a lot of deer. 00:37:43 Speaker 1: That's cool. And then, so if people want to track you down, uh, follow along, uh, what, what is the best place to do that? I give everyone this opportunity. 00:37:51 Speaker 4: Yeah. 00:37:52 Speaker 3: Thanks. Um, Island bucks on Instagram. That's, that's, that's really it. 00:37:57 Speaker 7: Um, yeah, I haven't updated that as much as I used to. I have, I had a toddler and a new job and, um, haven't been after it as much, but I, Leading up to this, I tried to get some new photos up there and reconnect with people who were sending me messages. 00:38:15 Speaker 3: So that's the spot. 00:38:18 Speaker 1: Well, appreciate it. Good luck to you and the rest of the crew the rest of the year. And I hope everything cooperates with the weather. And this is an exciting time of year. And so we have a game plan to try to capitalize on it. 00:38:34 Speaker 3: Yep, yep. I'll be out there. 00:38:36 Speaker 1: All right, folks, there you guys have it. I hope this episode gave you a sense of direction between early fawns dropping, between maximizing this first cold front. And like I said, there's going to be some states that have their first hard frost. Obviously, the weather can change a little bit here throughout all these different fronts and with the hurricane. A lot of variable weather likely to come over the next seven days. So hopefully that helps everyone out. And once again, we're trying to get a lot of different representation here on Rut Fresh this year. So if you'd like to be on the show, shoot me a message at Jake Hofer on Instagram. Would love to try to get you on here. So that is it. Good luck. And we'll see you next week.

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