By Nick Simonson

As the North Dakota firearms deer season gets underway, a decreased presence of hunters in the field may be noticeable from the past several years, however a rebuilding population of healthy animals coming off a mild winter in 2023-24, a nearly completed corn harvest, and heightened pre-rut activity may provide those with a gun tag a great opportunity to finish their fall with success, according to Ben Matykiewicz, Big Game Biologist with the North Dakota Game & Fish Department (NDG&F).

“Our deer herd is down. It’s still recovering from the winter we had two years ago, but as of now we expect to see fairly healthy animals. We had a really nice, mild winter last year which means that those deer came out of winter in healthier condition,” says Matykiewicz, adding, “you can see a little bit better fawn production with healthier fawns on the landscape. We have had some anecdotal reports of good fawn production and even some twinning in some areas,” he concludes.

This year’s corn harvest across North Dakota has been hastened by nearly ideal weather, and nearly 90 percent of the crop has come down ahead of the firearms opener on Nov. 8.  While a wet spring and early summer set the stage for solid growth, a dry spell in August, September and October has helped dry the crops out and allowed for weeks with six or even all seven days ideal for farmers to combine their corn, according to Alicia Harstad, Interim Director of the North Dakota State University (NDSU) Agriculture Extension office in Barnes County.

“Back in August, I would have never thought we’d be this far along in corn harvest, but we had a nice warm September, and that really helped push the corn along and it finished and then was able to dry down as well too.  In a week or two, especially in two weeks, there’s probably not going to be any corn harvest left to do,” Harstad details of the process as it wraps up.

As the crops come down, the activity and the bare landscape will in turn will push deer from field cover, where they can easily eat and loaf without detection, into habitat which will hold them during the hunting season, and provide thermal cover throughout the colder months following this year’s firearms season.

“With the corn coming off you can expect deer to seek out thicker areas of cover during the day, your more traditional plum thickets, CRP, tree rows, they’ll be using these to a higher degree.  They’ll still feed on spent grain in the cornfields, but I’d expect them to come out a little later in the day, once it starts getting darker,” Matykiewicz explains.

The seasonal urges to mate will likely pull bucks from that cover over the next couple of weeks as the rut ramps up and pre-rutting activity grows as the days get shorter.  The lowered level of daylight triggers the reproductive urge in male deer and brings does into estrous, which bucks check through their sense of smell on rub and scrape lines left as signs for the does, and when cruising bedding areas of the female deer in their area.

“Right now we’re in the pre-rut, so you’ll see increasing buck activity; a lot of rubbing, scraping, some sparring, potentially some fighting but maybe not a lot, cruising doe bedding areas, bucks are checking for does coming into estrous,” Matykiewicz details, , “particularly in the next seven to 14 days, then you should see more bucks chasing does, does coming into estrous, and potentially more daytime activity and possible fighting,” he concludes.

The 16.5-day North Dakota firearms deer season runs from noon on Friday Nov. 8 through Sun. Nov. 24. This year 50,100 tags were issued to hunters in the state, down 3,300 from the year before.

Simonson is the lead writer and editor of Dakota Edge Outdoors.

Featured Photo: Expect deer – especially bucks – to become less nocturnal as the rut kicks in. A solid corn harvest will likely force them into nearby habitat and the urge to mate will draw them out into daylight, and the open, giving hunters a good chance at tagging out. Simonson Photo.