Hunters who get into the woods for early archery season will need to contend with hot days and insects, but just might be rewarded with deer still in their summer routines.. Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press

The last few – and often the most important – minutes of daylight were ticking away when I heard a commotion in the dense honeysuckle thicket below me. I’d been listening to and occasionally catching glimpses of birds flitting through the greenery all afternoon and this was clearly something larger. A flash of reddish-brown revealed it was indeed a deer, then a hint of antler confirmed it was a buck. My pulse pounded and my muscles tensed as I carefully lifted my bow off its hanger and prepared to shoot.

Maine’s expanded archery season for deer kicks off on Sept. 7 this year. Less than a week after Labor Day, the temperatures are warm, the bugs thick and the foliage dense, hardly the conditions one normally associates with deer hunting. Some hunters opt to wait until temperatures moderate and the first frosts kill off the clouds of stinging insects, but getting an early start does offer some distinct advantages.

One is what trout fishermen call “first water.” The first hunters in the woods get a crack at deer that have been relatively undisturbed. Being in the expanded zone, which includes more-populated areas, the deer are accustomed to people, but not in the woods. Every encounter makes them more skittish and reclusive, moving less during daylight and more in thick cover, so the early days offer better odds of catching deer in more casual composure.

Another is behavior. At no other time during the hunting season will daylight deer movement be more routine. They don’t wear watches or follow schedules so it’s far from a guarantee, but they do tend to follow somewhat regular patterns this time of year, bedding, feeding and traveling through more or less the same areas. With each passing day they become less predictable.

Bucks especially are also more social. In late summer, local bucks sometimes gather into loose social assemblages called bachelor groups. If you see one buck, there’s a reasonably good chance there are more nearby. Younger bucks are more often the first to venture out into a field or an opening in the forest, so patience and restraint are advised for those seeker older, bigger bucks.

The first few days of the expanded archery season also offer at least the potential for bagging a buck with antlers still in velvet. It can vary with age, health and other factors but sometime around late August or early September the bucks go through a physiological change. Waning daylight triggers an increase in testosterone, which in turn, causes blood flow to the antlers to cease, but not before antlers go through a process called mineralization. Then the velvety covering dies and peels, or is rubbed off, leaving behind hardened, dead bone.

Getting an early start also provides a means to put fresh protein on your plates and in your freezer. That alone may be reward enough but it also boosts your confidence and takes the pressure off for the rest of the season. If you can stand the bugs and the heat, early season can’t be beat.

Bob Humphrey is a freelance writer and Registered Maine Guide who lives in Pownal. He can be reached at: bob@bobhumphrey.com