I always thought when they made scrapes and rubs was more of a pre-rut behavior. I know many people believe this year was a trickle rut. I found this guy on the 19th making a scrape in front of my camera. Then the next 3 nights I had 8 different bucks visit the scrape, all noncturnal of course. Is it late for this? I just figured things were winding down.
Scrapes can be used year round, usually those ones are a lot bigger than the average oct/nov scrape, often referred to as a community scrape. Can be 10-15 feet in diameter, but a lot of the smaller ones are more of a rut based scrape, like scrape lines etc. Rubs are always going to be the same times each year just due to shedding and only having hard antler for a few months out of the year.
Pre rut and Rut, marking his territory. Then all the other bucks visit to deposit their sent as well, also marking. All in the hunt and domination of does.
