Hey guys and gals,

As many of you know Scott and I started filming our hunts for an outdoor program this year. It is called Midwest Whitetail and all of our episodes can be viewed online at www.midwestwhitetail.com. I encourage all of you to watch the show because it can be really entertaining and informative. The best thing about it is that almost all of the prostaff are hardworking weekend warriors. We all have jobs and none of us are paid to be on the show. We just do it because we love it and, for the most part, we're out hunting private farms and not with outfitters. Serious deer hunters will enjoy it because we often have a lot of history with the deer we are hunting (see my hunt for a buck called "Potato Digger" here http://midwestwhitetail.com/gallery/87/media/2428/gp1010-kansas-legend.html ).

In the past, the show was always online in a "semi-live" format. Generally, hunts would air on the show within a week of the actual hunt occuring. There is nowhere else where you can see that type of turnaround time. It's pretty remarkable what our producers are able to accomplish in a very short period of time.

Recently, Midwest Whitetail began airing on the Sportsmans Channel. The Sportsmans Channel is available through many satellite and cable television providers and is dedicated to only outdoor programming. Each year, the Sportsmans Channel has fan voting and awards are given out. Midwest Whitetail was nominated for best new series. It's important to show sponsors that we're a popular show so that we can continue to be on TV. Regardless, we will continue to be online too. Please take a minute and vote for us as the "Best New Series" by clicking on this link http://www.votesportsman.com/ . It requires that you vote in other categories too, but you can simply vote "No Choice" if you don't have a favorite.

Thanks, y'all!

I never thought we would say that we are glad November is over and December is here, but we sure are this year. During the past five weeks, we have experienced some of the worst "rut" hunting and movement that we have ever seen. There are many theories out there, but Bo and I have noticed three primary "irregularities" this year.

The first was the extremely early crop harvest and massive acorn crop. The corn harvest started in early to mid September and was for the most part complete by the end of October. The soybean harvest fell right in line with the corn as well. The acorn crop was one of the best in recent memory. However even with the mast crop slowing down and the fresh harvested fields, we still did not see much chasing in the open fields and one would believe that open fields only allow you to see more activity and movement. Most of the fields that we were hunting were not tilled under either and had relatively significant spillage. But with the large expanses of available grain spillage and the remaining mast crop, did this spread the herd out a little more and cause the does to be a little less congregated?

The second variable this year was the rutting moon occured in late November. Two full moons occurred during the prime time this year......one around the 25th of October and another around the 22nd of November. Many people are saying that this years rut was simply a drawn out, extended version. We had does coming into estrus from the first couple days of November through this past week. We noticed very little crusing and very little mid day activity. We did have one good morning where we had a hot doe being pursued by two shooters (which never came into range unfortunately). But it seemed that if you had a hot doe in the area, you'd see mature bucks, but if you did not have a hot doe in the area, you would see very little movement.

The last oddity that we've noticed this year is the large number of fawns still still tagging along with their moms. We are getting dozens of pictures of does with single fawns and twins right by her side. Many of these fawns are still extremely undersized for this time of year. Last year we had a very strong second rut, did that produce more fawns to be born later in the spring, hence causing there to be less does coming into estrus during early to mid November?

Many questions have come up during the last five weeks of hunting, but cold weather is finally here. As we've come to the last month of the 2010 season, we have many unfilled buck tags that need to be attached to some bone. We will be targetting food plots and cut corn and bean fields as the temps continue to drop.

You may remember back to June when we posted up our first velvet trail cam pic of First Pull.  He was the very first deer we got on trail camera this year.  After that first picture, we got numerous velvet pictures of him up until mid July and then he seemed to turn into a ghost - something that those elusive mature bucks do year after year.  Due to standing crops we decided to back off of the property during the latter part of the summer, just to let things settle down, knowing that we'd be hitting the property hard once the harvest began. 

As the crops started to come out, we increased our hunting pressure on the property, but just could not find First Pull again.  Had he all ready been harvested, had he moved to another area on the property, was he even living on the property were all questions we started to ask our selves.  We had been running a couple different cameras on different part of the property and on active scrapes and just could not find this buck.  However, with one card pull in early November, First Pull finally showed up.

It was very reassuring knowing that FP is still running the property.  But since these latest pictures, FP has actually been spotted in an open field during daylight and multiple large rubs have been found in the area he was seen entering the field. 

Last year this buck was seen a couple of times during late season and we hope that he will be letting his guard down some this season as well!

During the opening weekend of Missouri's rifle season, a good friend of ours was fortunate enough to shoot a buck of a lifetime during the first five minutes of the 2010 season!  From what we've heard, this HUGE nontypical will score right around 190 inches gross, with 20 scoreable points.  This buck has to have between 40 and 50 inches of mass alone!  We haven't had a chance to see it personally yet, but cannot wait to see this Missouri Monarch come back from the taxidermist and we can put our hands around those enormous bases!

Lee is one of the nicest guys you could ever have the pleasure of meeting and becoming friends with.  The generosity that he has shown towards Bo and I is simply indescribable and we cannot thank him enough for everything he has done for us!  We know that Lee is extremely humbled to have harvested such a magnificent animal and this couldn't have happened to a better person.  Congratulations Lee on one amazing buck!!!

Temperatures are finally starting too look like fall!  Highs in the 50s and lows in the 20s have definitely sparked an increase in deer movement. Based upon what we've been seeing from the stand during the past three or four days, it seems that the rut in our area is still a week or so away. All of the does that we have seen have not had a buck trailing, chasing, or scent checking them. The bucks that we have been seeing have not been cruising yet either. This past weekend, we finally got the cool temperatures we've been anticipating, and were able to rattle and grunt in 8 different bucks. The movement seemed pretty equal in the afternoons and mornings, but the majority of the afternoon movement happened right before dark. However, it seems that more of our fellow hunters were seeing much more activity in the mornings than the evenings and little to no daytime activity. The cool temps and new moon made for perfect daytime movement conditions, but it seems the bucks just aren't at that stage of the rut yet. During the following week, we will be dedicating four days to catching up with Crab Claw 9. November 11th - 20th has been historically the best 10 day period for deer movement that we've seen on our properties. This weekend we will definitely be packing lunches and will plan on all day sits.
Also, in the past week we have seen a large increase in buck sign on all of our properties. Scrapes and rubs are popping up everywhere. Community scrapes are getting hit hard. Sign post rubs are getting worked. New shooter bucks are showing up on cameras. We're not sure why our buck sign was so delayed this year, but things are starting to turn around for us. Hopefully during the next two weeks, a few tags will be attached to a couple hit listers!
 
Good luck to everyone in the woods!