Why do deer go into fields and sand pits at night? It’s a deer nightclub in October! A place to be seen and smelled. Putting face to inter-digital gland cent and track size is a tell-all about prep for mating come the end of October. The inter-digital gland is located between the hooves of deer.

Sandpit or gravel like open areas are places I can go in early October to see who is in the neighborhood for bucks and does. Which doe still has yearlings still tagging along can be discerned. And just how big and wide is that track, how rounded or not can tell me that a big buck is hanging around. I am no great whitetail hunter who gets a deer in NH every year but when can, I try to put 2 and 2 together.

My twin brother at left and I did just that  a while back! He was shooting a 300 Win Mag and I was shooting a .338 Win Mag, my African Safari Rifle back then. Needless to say both deer fell right there! My nephew swears that the .338 hit the deer so hard that some of its hair stuck in the tree…on end.  Maybe so!  I shoot big guns very well, besides, no one wants to borrow the .338 so I don’t have to worry about abuse. When I go north I like the hand-loaded .375 Ruger slowed down. Big 230 grain bullets in heavy brush! In open areas the 6.5 Creedmoor, or .270 works fabulous.

Last year my buck was arriving at 2 AM so that didn’t work well. And there were too many hunters pushing the deer to new areas, like behind homes.

I believe whitetail deer use these open sandy areas to leave track size/shape and an inter-digital scent to say who they are to the does and to the potential bucks competing for mating rights.

Check those sandy areas out!

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