Deer Season

When daylight creeps across the Pennsylvania landscape Monday morning the 2012 firearms deer season will open.  Hundreds of thousands of people will be out looking to hang their tag on a whitetail.  Some areas will be open for buck only while others will allow either antlered or antlerless.  In most areas for the average hunter a legal buck must have three points at least an inch long while in other areas a buck must have "three on top" disregarding the brow tine.  If the hunter is a youth or active duty military member; then a single spike of three inches or more will suffice.  If you are one of the thousands hitting deer country in the morning read the regulations carefully to make sure that no recent change catches you in an unanticipated violation.

Deer season is many things to many people; a time to get together with friends and family, a time to enjoy camp life, and a time to make memories.  For some, deer season is more about going to camp and enjoying camp life than the actual hunt; while for others the pursuit of the deer is first and foremost.

For me the deer season marks the end; the end of my whitetail rut photography for the year.  With hunters in the woods the deer's movement patterns change drastically.  Instead of the bucks spending their time in search of does they will be using every tool in their bag of tricks to save their skin.  And most of the bucks carrying legal antlers will be dead by the time the two week season ends. 

With a new crop of fawns already beginning to grow in their mothers bellies the cycle of life contines even as the season of the harvest begins.