effects of cool weather and long rain durations??

[Mike_Parson]

OK, here we are just 8 days from the start of archery elk season here in NM. in the unit i am hunting it has already been a very wet summer. everything is green and tall and all the water holes have some water in them. That being said, it started to rain saturday evening and it is predicted to rain the next 8 days for a total of about 10 days of some kind of rain. that makes it a wet start to my h unt. no to my question.

how will this amount of rain and cooler weather affect the rut's oncoming and the bugleing? will the elk hold up a lot while raining and try to feed in the periods of no rain. making them bed and feed off and on all day? this last weekend we actually saw some elk while hiking in the middle of the day and they were traveling towards a canyon away from the aproaching storm, assumably to get there and bed before the rain hit.

[Pop-r]

While the elk may bed & feed off & on all day during rain It's not my belief that they mind it at all. In fact they love it if it's still warm. I've seen elk get up to feed in the rain when it started to rain alot more than I have them leave feed because of rain. I LOVE rain!! Altho it may suck in some aspects it's much more a positive than negative if cold temps aren't involved.

[redtop]

Only thing bad about rain is drying out your boots and the possibility of losing a blood trail if its too wet. Elk don't change a thing in their daily habits IMO.

[Fridaythe13th]

Can you get a big fan and blow some of the rain too Idaho

[Mike_Parson]

wish i could in some ways.... last saturday night it rained hard. i left my empty coffee cup on the camp table and when i got out of bed the next morning it had 2 inches of water in it and everythign was soaked....