When do your deer stop hitting the white oaks? Rut timing question

[philsanchez76]

The public around me has plenty of red oaks which are good for later in the season usually. I just found 2 hot white oaks which we dont have a lot of around here and there is an amazing amount of deer activity here. it's pulling every deer in the area it seems. question is: how late do these trees drop? I still see plenty of acorns in the trees. could this be a hot spot for the rut or are these trees done by then and it'll be a ghost town? These 2 trees are pretty mature if that makes a difference (trunks are 2.5-3 feet diameter or so).

 

[BSK]

The last two big acorn crops in my area (2021 and this year), we saw a strange acorn drop, and in both years it was due to dry conditions in September. When the trees are stressed by late drought, they will dump all of the nuts/fruit they cannot carry to maturity. For White Oaks, this drop occurs very late September into early October. This is what has the ground cover in acorns now. But if you cut some of these acorns open, many aren't fully developed inside. The drop of all the acorns the trees could carry to maturity usually occurs las week of October and first week of November.

In 2021, we saw a huge dump of under-developed acorns the first week of October. Yet the trees were still loaded with acorns. The final drop of good acorns occurred first week of November, right at opening of MZ. We nearly had to wear hardhats in stand we were getting bonked in the head so often. I expect to see the same thing this year.

 

[philsanchez76]

The last two big acorn crops in my area (2021 and this year), we saw a strange acorn drop, and in both years it was due to dry conditions in September. When the trees are stressed by late drought, they will dump all of the nuts/fruit they cannot carry to maturity. For White Oaks, this drop occurs very late September into early October. This is what has the ground cover in acorns now. But if you cut some of these acorns open, many aren't fully developed inside. The drop of all the acorns the trees could carry to maturity usually occurs las week of October and first week of November.

In 2021, we saw a huge dump of under-developed acorns the first week of October. Yet the trees were still loaded with acorns. The final drop of good acorns occurred first week of November, right at opening of MZ. We nearly had to wear hardhats in stand we were getting bonked in the head so often. I expect to see the same thing this year.

Thx for the acorn wisdom! Watch now Bass Pro will start selling camo hard hats next year.

 

[BSK]

The ground at my place is absolutely covered in acorns. But if you look up in the trees, there are still so many acorns (many still green), that the branches are hanging low. These acorns will fall the last days of October and the first days of November.

 

[Wrangler95]

I sure know the feeling of getting hit on the top of the head from a acorn!

 

[Ski]

In my experience they don't stop eating white oak acorns until they're gone. I've read they lose their taste for them once the nuts begin to sprout and that may be true but some of my favorite post rut spots are shallow drainages under white oaks where the nuts all gather up & then get covered by falling leaves. There won't be any noticeable nuts on the ground but you'll see where deer root around in the leaf litter in those narrow high slope drainages looking for acorns. I've killed some bruisers like that in spots that otherwise wouldn't look like there's any reason for a deer to be there. When you see a grove of white oaks up high on a slope and there's a small drain coming through them, look for any level spots in that drain where nuts can pool up. That'll be the spot.

 

[timberjack86]

When we get a good rain and they start sprouting they turn on the reds. That's been my experience anyway.

 

[BSK]

When we get a good rain and they start sprouting they turn on the reds. That's been my experience anyway.

This correct. When white oaks acorns sprout is based on how much rain we get. In a very wet year, I've seen them start to sprout in mid-November. In a very dry year, not until mid-December.

And for all those hunters who question how acorns could change taste once they sprout, have you ever tasted malt? Yes, the powdered product used to make beer and the frozen concoction that is similar to a shake. Malt is nothing more than barley that has been allowed to germinate and then dried and ground. Malt tastes NOTHING like barley, yet that's all it is - germinated barley.

 

[Dumbluck]

When the trees are stressed by late drought, they will dump all of the nuts/fruit they cannot carry to maturity.

This is what I was seeing with reds in my area but after the last rain we had they completely quit dropping and are holding their crops now. I was actually hoping for an early drop so late season the deer would be in the open hammering my food plots, but I don't think that's going to happen like I originally thought.