Deer migration

[snoodafruff]

I'm just wondering what everyone is observing....what elevation the deer are at. Are you still seeing them high (above 9000 feet), mid-mountain, or are you seeing them start to head down to winter range? I'm trying to determine what elevation I should focus on this weekend. The area I archery hunt is high summer range. I took my son muzzy hunting to the same place & he tagged out, but we didn't see much up high.....and we covered a lot of ground. Last years rifle hunt we hunted mostly winter range & we saw a lot of deer, but only one buck. Our camp filled 1 out of 4 tags last year on a 3 year old deer, but between the 3 dads (our kids had the tags) we only saw maybe 6 bucks opening weekend. Since I archery hunt every year, we always hunt high, but this is a transitional time of year so trying to find where the deer/bucks are at on the mountain is definitely trickier. Any advice would be great. Thanks

 

[mmwb]

Except where they got majorly dumped on last week in Montana, I expect there's been little to no migration across most of the west.

 

[BrianID]

Every area is different. You probably have a better idea about migration for your area than anyone on here. Since I don't know the area you are hunting, I can only speculate. I'm guessing most of the older buck that were in high country during archery season are in the same general area but spending less time out in the open. They could be starting to migrate but in general I don't expect bucks to migrate and catch up to does until the rut starts. They could have dropped 1000 feet in elevation in favor of better food or cover.

 

[PokinHoles]

When does the rut typically start in Utah? Specifically high uintahs?

 

[headshot05]

There won't be any deer in the ?high uintahs? once it's time for them to rut. Regardless of snow or not.

 

[mtnrunner260]

My observations in the unitas is that the deer begin moving down in elevation around the last week of September. likely due to frost affecting the forbs/shrubs they prefer to browse.
In G&H in Wyo deer seem to remain high much later.
My assumption being that different species of browse up there remain beneficial after frost.
-just my assumption and could easily be full of crap as well.

 

[Comules]

>My observations in the unitas is
>that the deer begin moving
>down in elevation around the
>last week of September. likely
>due to frost affecting the
>forbs/shrubs they prefer to browse.
>
>In G&H in Wyo deer seem
>to remain high much later.
>
>My assumption being that different species
>of browse up there remain
>beneficial after frost.
>-just my assumption and could easily
>be full of crap as
>well.

That makes a lot of sense to me