Early Season vs Pre-Rut

[KRoss480]

If you had extra vacation days to burn for an out of state trip, would you opt for an opening weekend early season hunt or would you opt for an end of October pre-rut hunt?

Little backstory, I already take a week long trip around the 2nd week of November to spot A. If I opt for the early season hunt I would have to hunt a totally new area of the state due to spot A not being open to hunt yet. If I opt for the end of October, I can hunt spot A and possibly get intel for when I come back the 2nd week of November. I live 9 hours away from these areas so these will be a show up and hunt situation, there won’t be any pre-season scouting done.

[Evanszach7]

I'd do an early September opener hunt or prerut. Early October opener, like Ohio, wouldn't do it unless I'd been glassing or had history in the area for that time of year.

[G-Patt]

Pre-rut for sure. If I were to go with the early season season option, I'd want intel on the bed to food pattern. Seeing that pre-season scouting is not an option, you might find yourself spending all of your time trying to figure it out. Lastly, it's been my experience that the evenings are your higher odds of seeing something, and legal-light morning opportunities are pretty slim. Conversely, in pre-rut, both mornings and evenings are great times to hunt, and you'll see more daylight activity in general; the bucks are more susceptible to calling and rattling; there's more buck sign in the woods; and glassing becomes easier with less foliage. The odds in pre-rut are greater in my opinion.

[Lockdown]

That depends what your goal is. If learning is a priority, go early and try something new. If tag soup doesn’t sit well with you, then go pre-rut because your chances of killing are higher.

If it’s me, I would probably go early and see what you find. It could be awesome and you can’t wait to do it again. Or it might suck and you’ll say never again.

Regardless of which scenario played out, you’d have your answer.

[Ryan549]

If I was going out of state to a spot I’m not familiar with, I’d choose pre rut. You can sit those funnels and saddles and catch something moving. Early season, I think needs to be more intimate encounters.

[may21581]

Thats a very situational question you have. Don't get me wrong I like the rut and I hunt the rut, especially prerut. This period can be one of the best times to kill your target buck or any good buck for that matter.
However the older I get the more I realize the two best times to kill a giant and are very predictable are early and late season. If a property holds mature bucks for the opener and nothing late season or rut then I would focus there early season. If a property has good late season food, bedding, and security I focus there. Some spots are only good at certain times and they can only be learned from scouting and experience. If you are going to take the time to hunt a spot then you need to do your homework and see if and when it needs hunted. Timing is very important. Mistime it and you burn the property out. Time it right and your in the game. Good luck.

[570Beast]

I went on my first out of state opening week hunt last year and it was a blast. I ended up killing a mature buck at 8AM on the last day of my hunt. It was September 30th and the 5th day of hunting. It was certainly challenging and to be honest, I wasn’t even in the game until day 4. I put on a lot of miles and had to throw my plans I gathered from aerial scouting right out the window. My advice is to cover ground until you find exactly what you are looking for. Don’t settle for a spot just because you are limited on time. I wouldn’t worry one bit about bumping deer on a week long hunt. Once I found the “spot”, I knew I had a great chance even with only a day and a half of my trip left. I had a 140 to 150 incher at 70 yards at 3pm on the 29th. He was feeding under a white oak about 20 yards from his bed. I ended up getting busted by him when the wind calmed down and my thermals rose up to him. I was set up for the encounter to happen at closing time. I also ended up seeing 2 basket racks feed under the same tree an hour or 2 later. When i went back to hunt the same bedding area on the last morning, I didn’t see any deer other than the buck I shot. I’m not positive, but I think he was just shifting his bedding to account for the thermals rising. I learned a lot from the trip and one of the things was that it can happen at odd hours when you are tight to bedding. I would highly recommend an early season hunt. If you are planning on hunting public land, it is really nice to hunt the deer before they get pressured. By the time prerut rolls around they know the game is on. Another advantage to early season is that its fun to start your season off with hunt you’ve really been looking forward to.

[<DK>]

If you already hunted Spot A once then do it again. With a chance to hunt it twice this next season, your odds have went up tremendously. Usually years 2-3 are the best to be the most successful on a new property.

Early season is tough. Many variables come into play and knowing the area is important. Also hunting early season cuts your hunts in half bc of mornings. Only certain variables would push me to try mornings in Sept.

[Ghost Hunter]

I hunt 3rd week of October and second week of November every year. Anywhere from last of October to Thanksgiving is nice around here. That is only vacation time I use each year. Hunt most nearly every weekend that I'm not at work.