Month by month. Rut, casting, velvet, fawning, and what each means for you.
Antlers regrown and hardening. Bucks still in bachelor mobs. Heat pushes everything to water and shade through the middle of the day.
Velvet is rubbed off against saplings, leaving frayed, stripped bark. These fray trees are one of the clearest signs deer are using a patch of country.
Necks begin to thicken. Bachelor groups start breaking up as testosterone climbs. Bucks become less tolerant of each other and start moving.
Peaks early to mid April and only runs two to three weeks. Bucks hold rutting stands, thrash scrub, and groan. The best and most predictable window of the year.
The last of it. Bucks are visibly wrecked, ribs showing, coats poor, having burned through their fat reserves. Old or weak animals sometimes don't recover.
Bucks feeding hard to rebuild condition before the cold bites. Mobs reforming. Frost in the high country pushes animals down to lower, warmer ground.
Bucks group up together again away from the does. Where you find one, expect several. Coats are at their thickest and dullest.
Bachelor mobs settled, antlers still hard and carried. Cold nights, long spotlighting windows, and animals feeding on open ground for longer.
New growth pulls deer onto fresh feed and up into higher country. Does heavily pregnant and moving less.
Bucks start dropping their antlers, usually October into November. Older animals often cast earlier than younger ones. New growth begins almost immediately.
Does drop a single fawn, twins are rare. Fawns are hiders, left concealed in cover while the doe feeds, which is why they're found alone and look abandoned. They are not. Leave them.
Antlers in velvet, blood-rich and sensitive. Bucks avoid contact and behave defensively. Fawns are mobile and following the mob.