A post on the National Deer Association website starts out like this: One thing researchers have deciphered in recent years using GPS technology is a somewhat new behavior that white-tailed deer do called an excursion, which is a brief trip or trips outside their established home range. This behavior especially occurs during the rut, and I have a personal story from the 2018 season to prove it. We have been running 2 dozen trail cameras for a decade on a 1,000-acre farm in the Virginia Piedmont where I hunt. Imagine our shock and excitement when we checked a card and saw one image of this awesome buck from November 18, obviously an older deer with a ton of character. We had never seen [...]

My buddy Frankie just shot this 9-point buck in Fauquier County with a muzzleloader, deer "had a swollen neck and started to stink," he said. Frankie saw several little bucks pushing does earlier in the morning. Getting multiple reports of small and medium-size bucks pushing/chasing, which indicates the peak chase for mature bucks is 7-10 days away. Trail cameras were slow until yesterday, when bigger bucks started showing up at scrapes (night mostly). Five shooter bucks showed up this week on one farm I hunt, and I expect more. Scraping phase in full swing now.