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Considering the whitetail rut: Looking at day length and temperature

The author writes that the consensus seems to be that the environmental trigger that sets the breeding behavior in motion is a result of a consistent, predictable shortening of day length, and perhaps some weather events might alter it a few days one way or another.

I split my time between northern Minnesota and east-central Nebraska. I recently was asked when the whitetail rut occurs in Nebraska, and I guessed it would be later than it occurs in northern Minnesota, because it would be colder sooner in Minnesota than in Nebraska.
I decided that guessing was lame, and so I did some digging. My idea was to consider temperature, day length, and timing of the rut along a south-north transect from Louisiana to Manitoba.

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