Alabama has an almost entirely man made deer herd situation. Deer were completely wiped out in all but a few counties in the SW part of the state less than a hundred years ago. I mean not one single deer in almost the entire state. A re-stocking effort brought in deer from all over the country, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, just to name a few. Those deer bred with deer re-located from SW Bama and now we have a genetic melting pot where the rut is jacked up in most areas of the state. I hunt Barbour County and there are 5 different ruts in that county alone. How in the heck you going to split a season for that? FWIW, on my place, they rutted the first week of January but it was mild. They rutted again the last weekend of the season and it was crazy the way they acted. I was unable to go but on Feb 8th, a neighboring landowner saw the two biggest bucks I commonly get pictures of. Both of them were with does and just standing on the side of the highway mid morning and didn't even run off. The biggest one stayed in a cotton field for over 2 hours. I just shook my head when I saw the pictures. I hope they both survived that unbelievable behavior. This guy was standing on the side of the highway and just posed for a picture like he was a pet. Some of you will recognize this buck from my posts in the pictures forum.

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Last edited by daylate; 02/18/20 11:19 AM.