I'm pretty sure I've seen a link on here before that shows the breakdown of the individual does that were shot at each site for the fetal study......Does anyone have a link to that data?

I have the study you are referring to in a PDF file. PM me your email and I will send it to you.

Got it....Thanks!

No problem. If anybody else wants it, PM me your email and I will send it to you when I get a chance. Would love to hear some feedback on how accurate you think it is. For my hunting area in South Henry County, it is spot on. Of course, it helps that they actually took the sample does from our hunting property, but they average conception date of December 20 is right on they money.

I hunted some of the land the does were taken from in Barbour Co......


I think the data is very accurate. It's from real does that they sampled and said "This is when she was bred"........However, just looking at the data we have available to us doesnt tell the whole story......You need to be able to look at the number of does being bred each day to really accurately see what is happening......They may show the earliest doe being bred on Dec 30 but it may be an extreme outlier......then again it may not......You cant tell that without looking at a bunch of samples to see how things group up.....Also, something to consider is take for example the dates being shown for Wyncreek in Macon Co.....The latest date is showing something like March 3.......That doe was very likely bred on the second estrous cycle......That skews things a little for what we are trying to look at.....There will likely be some does bred on the second go around in all populations but buck to doe ratio will weigh heavily on that from place to place....One other thing to look at with that data is that many places only had a few deer sampled.....You really need to take a lot of samples to get good data. If you only pull one or two sample then you dont know if you have an accurate representation of the whole group or not

One thing I was wanting to check out is if you take a look at most all of the southern counties.....they show they same general dates for the earliest and latest ......The vast majority show the earliest sampled being around Dec 30 timeframe.......and the latest being around Feb 10.........That is the same general time frame I see here too......My guess is that MOST of us see a pretty similar 4 week time frame for the rut in the southern half of the state except for a few places like along the state line with GA, etc.....

This is just opinion but I tend to think that estrous timing is something being passed on from mother to daughter…..the timing is genetic…..Triggered by photoperiod, yes…….but when exactly it gets triggered is being passed on from doe to doe…..

Now, with that being said…….over the long haul the driver for which does pass on their genes and which ones don’t is dictated by the timing of fawn drop and the survival rates…..This will be determined by environmental factors…..Doe fawns that are born at the best time for fawn survival will be the most likely ones to make it and pass on the trait..... In our case, the most likely environmental factor playing a role in fawn survival will be the impact of the coyote……In which case, the most likely fawns to survive would be the one who are born during the biggest wave of fawns being dropped.....That becomes the best time to be born and likely make it…..Outliers being born when only a few fawns are on the ground would be more likely to be taken out by the yotes…..This then could lead you to make the case that yotes help to keep a tighter rut over time by taking out the outliers…..A plausible theory anyways…..

I agree, all your points are well taken, especially the one about the buck/doe ratio. Areas with a well-balanced herd tend to have a more compact, more intense breeding season while those areas that have a buck/doe ratio that is heavily skewed toward the does will have a longer, more drawn out and less intense breeding period, which could definitely affect the average conception date, especially with the limited number of samples taken.

The info on Dale County has been accurate for as long as we have had enough deer to know what a rut was.