Rut Research

Target areas and doe groups, not specific bucks, for better success.

The pictures on the trail camera were more than just encouraging. To bass pro and hunting guide Matt Arey of Shelby, they were a reward for several years of dedicated work in trophy deer management.

In the fall of 2008, Arey and his long-time friend, bass pro Andy Montgomery of Grover, combined their love for both fishing and hunting into a guide service, Rack and Reel Outfitters, in their home county of Cleveland and neighboring Rutherford Co., both an hour or so southwest of Charlotte.

Arey and Montgomery have won more than a half-million dollars fishing bass tournaments, but they recognized that a burgeoning deer herd and several pieces of property under their control made putting deer hunting in their guide portfolio a no-lose situation.

“Matt and I are both tournament bass anglers and love to fish all over the country,” said Montgomery, “but with the rut coming on strong in North Carolina during November, we sometimes have a hard time tearing ourselves away from the deer to get back on the water.”

“We have some underrated deer hunting in this part of the state,” said Arey, who took up bowhunting at the age of 16, once he earned his driver’s license. “We also have a long bow season, which allows us to hunt from Sept. 13 to Oct. 2 and again from Oct. 18 until Nov. 20 during the Western Deer Season.”

One challenge for Arey and Montgomery in operating a outfitting business catering to bowhunters is the rut arriving at roughly the same time as gun season: Nov. 22. Arey said he starts seeing bucks chasing does on his properties in late October but defines the peak as centering on Nov. 20, the last day or archery season. Still, he and Montgomery prefer to continue to hunt with archery equipment.

“Our properties are all set up for archery hunting, and that’s what we choose to do,” said Arey. “We trophy-manage by encouraging our customers to try to wait for at least an 8-point buck, and preferably something outside the ears, but we get a lot of inexperienced bowhunters and kids who have never killed a deer with a bow. I really believe a trophy is in the eye of the beholder so that standard often varies with the hunter.”

The tracts that Arey and Montgomery manage vary from 100 to 250 acres. In order to key on rutting bucks, Arey realizes that some of the bucks he hunted early in the season may have moved off of his property, but he also understands that his places get visited by many other bucks from surrounding properties.

“Our tracts are surrounded by rural lands along the Green River,” he said. “Before the rut, I can target specific bachelor groups that I’m familiar with by either seeing them from stands or (showing) up on our trail cams. By Halloween, however, our dominant bucks are running other bucks off the property, and bucks from surrounding lands are slipping in to get to our does, so we have better luck hunting based on the terrain and the location of core doe areas rather than by trying to target specific bucks.”

Arey said the key to getting a good deer in range is to learn to hunt pinch points, corners and funnels. He has maximized the potential of these areas by creating food plots and arranging his stands along travel routs between the plots, baited areas and oak flats on one side and the thicker areas that provide bucks with a measure of safety on the other. His experience shows that during the rut, bucks travel the perimeters of the core doe areas and try to wind them from a distance. By staying out of the core areas and hiding along the perimeters, he and his clients often come face to face with rutting bucks.

“You have to know your doe core areas and stay out of them,” he said. “We locate our stands to take advantage of corridors and pinch points. Does are much more important to rutting bucks than food. You have to understand a buck’s travel routes. An older, mature buck will slip along these and sniff out does from a distance. If you’re set up on the food plots, you’ll likely never see him or he’ll wind you before you get a shot.”

Arey and Montgomery have sectioned off their deer lands according to terrain and placed stands to maximize their hunting potential. Their repertoire includes several stands that are constant producers every year, while other stands are set up and left vacant until the rut comes in.

“I don’t like moving stands during the season,” said Arey. “We have plenty of stands in storage that we use if one area gets hot. We can put a new stand on it or use a climber to get in there if the customer is comfortable with climbing. Others will have been in place for several weeks before the season opened. We do this to take advantage of our food plots without spooking deer by banging around in there when the plot becomes attractive to deer.”

One thing they don’t have to worry about is a shortage of deer. Making up the southern range of the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission’s District 8, both Rutherford and Cleveland Counties have been upgraded from conservative to moderate seasons in terms of doe days. Danny Ray of Morganton, the Commission’s district wildlife biologist, confirms this trend.

“We’re starting to increase the recommended number of does harvested in this area, mostly on a locality-specific basis,” said Ray. “In my discussions with local deer clubs, many are reporting seeing higher deer densities on their lands. With the buck and doe densities expanding at the same rate, it’s important to control the doe rates with harvest. That’s an important part of quality deer management.”

According to Ray, reducing the doe herd induces more-pronounced rutting activity among the buck population. This results is bucks having to cover more ground to locate willing does, which increases the number of buck sightings by hunters in the woods.

“Last year, we had a reported harvest of 1.88 antlered bucks per square mile in Rutherford County and 2.23 antlered bucks in Cleveland,” he said. “Hopefully, things will only improve from here.”