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Whats your preference (if you have one) for Bowhunting Whitetails.....full moon period or new moon period and why?
Full Moon vs. New Moon Hunting Preference
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This is also what Ive noticed except there seems to be more midday movement during a full moon period...especially during the rut.
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Full....mid day activity is great in the rut
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Its not about which phase, it is about when the moon is straight up. The moon is straight up approx 55 minutes later each day. Anytime the moon is straight up in daylight hours, which is the quarter moon, there is a big movement.
This thread will set a new page record. There will be studies posted that try to refute this. I followed this since the 80’s, and conducted a 2 year study on private land. It was 85% effective. Jeff Murray caught on to this in the 80’s.
Hunting pressure and hot weather effect it’s accuracy. The days that the moon is straight up in the evening, around 2 to 5 pm will be your best window of the month. Evening hunts.
The website www.usprimetimes.com follows Murray’s theory to an extent, though i disagree some with their suggested Best times.
I have seen it far far too many times very Accurate to ever be convinced that it is not. Especially the morning & eve hunts.
This thread will set a new page record. There will be studies posted that try to refute this. I followed this since the 80’s, and conducted a 2 year study on private land. It was 85% effective. Jeff Murray caught on to this in the 80’s.
Hunting pressure and hot weather effect it’s accuracy. The days that the moon is straight up in the evening, around 2 to 5 pm will be your best window of the month. Evening hunts.
The website www.usprimetimes.com follows Murray’s theory to an extent, though i disagree some with their suggested Best times.
I have seen it far far too many times very Accurate to ever be convinced that it is not. Especially the morning & eve hunts.
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I base all my times in the field around usprimetime. If I do hunt during a poor time - like opening day of firearms - I don’t see squat. I might not see deer on a good day but that doesn’t mean they’re up and about somewhere else out of sight from my stand.
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This is exactly what I was going to write as a response.
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I will not debate that the moon and other environmental factors affect deer movement, because they do, but, many other factors trump the moon, like how many people have shot at them that day (hunting pressure), but researching things like this can be fun and rewarding, and adds another challenge to a sport we all love. I do consider certain factors when hunting, but the bottom line is, hunt when you can, I don't care if it's full, new, overhead, or under foot, I'm getting in a tree if I can, the one thing I have figured out about deer is I can't figure them out, enjoy your time out, it's a great place.
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This is my perspective as well......after reading Jeff Murray's 'Moonstruck' back in the 1990's. We have lived in rural areas since 1991 and I began to carefully observe when I saw deer just going about their lives. I had the opportunity to co-lease some really good property in the late 90's, without the heavy human pressure of public land. This was a real eye-opener in regards to deer reacting to changing food sources and such in the fall, while also shifting feeding times as the moon position changed every day by nearly an hour. During the half moon phases of the waxing and waning moon, the position is overhead or underfoot at prime times for bowhunting.....deer got on their feet to eat acorns and out in the alfalfa. The full moon and the new moon are virtually identical phases.....just one shows the moon against the evening sky and the other is underfoot at midnight. On those days, I would see far less during typical prime time, but had some good hunts mid-day....11am to 2pm.
Some contend that deer move better during a full moon because it is lighter out.....but deer are crepuscular by nature....operating in low light conditions....precisely why your vehicle headlights produce the "deer in the headlight" reaction and glow of their eyes. If their feeding was light dependent, they would not feed on a cloudy night or during a new moon....which makes no sense. Plus during a full moon, deer are on their feet during mid-day as well as the new moon. Since human observation and deer activity are not a 1 to 1 correspondence, might you still see some deer that are out early on a full/new moon evening......certainly....might is the operative word. But you typically don't see as many.....and moon position/phase is only one piece of the bigger puzzle. During the rut, their hormones supersede their interest in feeding....buck especially. That is why wildlife biologists relate that bucks can lose a significant percentage of their body weight from late October to early December in northern climates. Some don't survive winter because they did all that chasing and running during the rut.
Exactly!
Question/clarification. Are you saying that movement is good during the mornings and evenings of days for which the moon is straight up, or that movement is good during the specific time window coinciding with the moon being straight up? Or both? Thanks.
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How many days on either side of a full moon are we calling "full" and seeing midday movement? Making vacation plans.
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With the straight up time. Somedays peak time is middle of day
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