In District IV, which is largely the steep mountains and narrow valleys of southern West Virginia, the total was 473, with Monroe tallying well over half of that figure. For perspective, Greenbrier County was next with just 76. Public-land opportunities for antlerless deer are scarce here, so hunters will have to look to private land. Look for hunting to be quite challenging come December.

CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE (CWD)
The West Virginia DNR continues to strive to communicate to the public the latest about CWD. Earlier this year, the DNR announced that that three more free-ranging deer in Hampshire County tested positive for CWD. These latest findings bring the total number of CWD-positive deer found in Hampshire County to 13. These most recent samples were collected from a total of 101 adult deer taken in March and April by DNR personnel as part of an ongoing and intensive CWD surveillance effort.

The three CWD-positive deer were collected within the CWD Containment Area located north of U.S. Route 50 in Hampshire County in a small geographic area situated near Slanesville. It is important to note that currently there is no evidence to suggest CWD poses a risk for humans or domestic animals.

Director Frank Jezioro emphasized that the DNR has "implemented appropriate management actions designed to control the spread of this disease, prevent further introduction of the disease and possibly eliminate the disease from the state."

More information on CWD can be found at the CWD Alliance Web site: www.cwd-info.org

How-To Tips
In numerous outdoor magazines, many if not most articles detail how hunters can kill big bucks. When late-season deer-hunting tactics are covered, once again the emphasis is on how to kill trophies. There is also quite a bit of information about how to hunt the second rut and the need to hold out for true trophy animals.

To put things bluntly, such information is largely useless for the majority of West Virginians who will be afield this December during the muzzleloader season. During some 15 years of hunting with a bow and muzzleloader in mid to late December, I have seen exactly one West Virginia buck chasing a doe. That buck was a massive 10-pointer.

Point of emphasis, that is one rutting buck in 15 years, so I might not be due to witness another such sighting until, say, 2020 or so. In the meantime, I believe that yours truly and you the reader would be better served by concentrating on how to tag an antlerless whitetail this December. I have little confidence that there is such a thing as the second rut (please don't write letters to the editor because of that statement) or that very many of this magazine's readers will see rutting deer in mid to late December. If you want to hold out for a large buck and a chance to smoke him, by all means do so. Again, most of us should target does in counties with an antlerless season.

That said, what should we base our hunting strategies on? The answer is simple -- food, but the implementation of that strategy is difficult. Mid to late December Mountain State whitetails are primarily driven (and I am including every animal from old trophy bucks to button bucks and does) to locate food sources.

The problem lies in determining just what those menu items will be at this time of year. When devising a strategy, a wise place for us to start is with the hard-mast situation. Perhaps two out of every five years will see much of the state experience a large or considerable crop of white acorns. The problem is, however, that by mid-December even in abundant white oak acorn years, these nuts have usually already been eaten.

Red oak trees, however, are much more consistent in their bearing, and the state contains quite a few species, among them Northern red, scarlet, black and blackjack, just to name a few. Last year in some places around the state, red oak acorns still lay on the ground in mid to late December. Hunters who were able to locate these spots were likely to have had more success than those of us who could not.

Many Decembers, though, even the red oak acorns will have been consumed. Smokepolers will then have two main strategies to choose between. The first gambit is to set up between a field and bedding area. When hard-mast foods are gone, deer are often forced to enter fields to find nourishment. Once there, they will browse on twigs and leaves around the field edges and gain what nourishment they can from the various kinds of grasses and weeds that grow in the openings. This is hardscrabble feeding for sure, but a deer that is successful at it will survive the winter.