The way they have the schedule set up now is just a joke. You basically have no chance to catch a buck before they get spooked by all the gunfire. Move it back or just combine it with the late muzzleloader days.

Nothing will effect the rut. It's the added hunting pressure in the woods. There are more people out than normal in bow season. Forcing the big bucks nocturnal sooner.

Quit your whining. A couple of smoke poles in the woods does not effect the rut. I would like to see shot gun season at peak rut. Now that would effect bow hunters.

Your right it does not effect the rut. What it does effect is the hunting in the middle of October. The fact that I don't live in my fantasy world where I can hunt everyday and most of us are limited to the weekends to hunt. That they are just gonna take one of our weekends away at a chance to bag a buck. Am in suppose to pass up the buck of a lifetime after all the time I've put in scouting being away from my kids and family putting blood sweat and tears intone of my greatest passions? Just so some nimrod that walks out in the woods for the first time with a shotgun can blast him because I had to pass him up during early muzzleloader? I would prefer to see the early muzzleloader season gone or made into a youth muzzleloader season where either sex can be harvested. Or bring back the extended shotgun season which I thought was great.

I say get rid of early mL season and bring back extended gun season.