Mild temperatures and minimal snow dominated the Northwest’s 2025 hunting season. That changed during Thanksgiving. The season’s first major snowstorm pummeled the region, bringing several inches of snow, thousands of migrating waterfowl and disruptions to holiday traffic before and after turkey day.

The snow arrived just in time for the final days of Montana’s general hunting season. But for most elk hunters, it was too little, too late. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks reported that elk harvest is down across most regions of the state, largely because of the lack of snow, which kept herds in difficult terrain. Meanwhile, deer harvest reports leading into the final week of hunting season were average or better than average in most regions for whitetails and mule deer.

However, many mule deer hunters believe the lack of snow kept larger mountain bucks at high elevations. Although Montana’s mule deer rut reached its peak in mid-November, hunters from across the state reported seeing a lack of above-average-sized bucks. From the northwestern part of the state to the southeastern corner, I spoke with hunters who ran into plenty of average-sized mule deer bucks during the season but never saw the big buck they were looking for — me included.

Don’t Miss: A 2-Stage Plan for Big December Bucks

Mule deer rut activity peaked mid-November, but it seemed to taper off in the last few days of the season. Early in the week, bucks were chasing does in daylight on public and private land. On Tuesday, I was almost late to school pickup after I pulled over to watch a tall 3-by-4 chasing a doe on a neighbor’s property. The buck was the largest I’d seen in our area during the season. As I watched the buck push the doe into some timber, I caught movement nearby. It was another animal in rut, but not one for which I’m lucky enough to hold a tag. Just a few yards from where the buck disappeared, I watched a bighorn ram push a group of ewes over a ridge. It’s the kind of afternoon you’ll only have in November — a mature mule deer buck and a bighorn ram, both rutting.

That afternoon, I spotted several other bucks and spoke with a nearby property owner who shot a buck that morning. He was trying to hold out for a larger buck but decided to pull the trigger before family arrived for the holiday. He told me it has been a “weird” rut at his place. He’d spotted more bucks than normal, but they were much smaller than in previous years. It might have been good that he filled his tag, because by Saturday, mule deer bucks seemed to vanish. During the final two days of the season, I glassed multiple herds of mule deer but not one buck.

It was a different story with whitetails. The biggest bucks of the season seemed to throw caution to the wind during the final two days of Montana’s general season. A friend in central Montana spent the season hunting a large whitetail buck that routinely showed up on trail camera photos at night. That was until the final Saturday of the season, when the deer made the mistake of showing up midday while my friend sat. She tagged out with a day to spare.

Although most hunting opportunities in the Northwest are finished for the year, Washington hunters are entering late-season archery for blacktails, whitetails and mule deer in certain units. Montana hunters will also have another shot during Montana’s muzzleloader heritage season, which opens in mid-December.