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Summer is on its way out, and fall is fast approaching. As the seasons change, hunters are preparing for the arrival of deer season, setting up stands and sighting in their guns and bows. But no matter how prepared a hunter may be, there are countless factors at play that make hunts unpredictable and a kill uncertain, from the weather, to the moon phase, to the behavior of the deer themselves.

Jamie Bulger, president and CEO of Hunter’s Edge, aims to help hunters maximize their chances of success with his newest creation, the Whitetail Almanac app. “This copy written electronic app takes the place of our paper printed wall hanging calendars, and tri-fold pocket calendars, which were first produced in 1997,” Bulger said in a press release.

Available for Apple and Android, this application allows hunters to use their phone’s GPS to mark the vicinity of their stand, and the app will create a four-hour window of deer activity based on data taken from multiple sources, including independent studies, computerized radio telemetry studies and personal observations.

Bulger approached the Texas company TechnBrains to design the app, specifically choosing them for being an American company. “A lot of these app builders are foreign builders, and they don’t have an office in the United States,” he said. “So I actually flew to Dallas, to make sure the kind of money I was about to spend, I went to their office and saw that they had people working there, that it wasn’t a scam, they were gonna take my money, send it overseas and I would never hear from these guys again.” When asked what prompted him to move into the app market, he told the Post-Searchlight, “I’ve wanted to for a long time, because it’s kind of where we’re all going, now that we’re all taking our phones with us into the woods. Which, we thought that was sacred ground and nobody would ever do, but now all of us are.”

Hunters can use the GPS on their phone to mark their hunting area, and according to Bulger, the app’s algorithm “generates a daily 4-hour hunting window based on that location.” The Almanac app provides information such as what time major feeding periods occur, what kinds of areas deer will be in during those periods, the forecasted temperature, as well as both wind speed and direction, and a weather forecast and radar.

One of the main pieces of information used in determining areas deer can be expected to be is the moon’s position. “Other people have similar information, and other people also will tell you deer move, ungulates move, by the position of the moon,” Bulger said. “What they can’t tell you is where to hunt. My copyright information hinges around three different places, and that’s what I call a resting place, a travel route, or a food supply… at different times of the day, deer will be in those areas. Now, you have to know those on your own hunting property.” He continued, “Deer will only ever be those three places, besides the back of your truck; they’re going to be resting somewhere, they’re going to be feeding somewhere, or they’re travelling in-between those two places. If you can figure out where that is on your property, and I can tell you what time to be there, then man you’ve got a 70% chance of being in font of a deer.”

Additionally, the app will offer an electronic hunter’s journal, which will allow hunters to record things such as wind direction, rut activity and moon phase, as well as weights of deer bagged, etc.

Bulger has been showing off the app at various hunting shows, as well as purchasing ads in multiple hunting magazines, and has already gotten some feedback. “The people that have purchased it, love it, they love everything about it. They can’t wait to use it, but they’re just playing around with it right now, because it hasn’t gotten to the place where they can go hunting with it,” he said. “We’re not worried about that, we’ve got 25 years of watching this. We know what the end result is going to be, and we know they’re going to be excited about it once it gets there.”

In closing, Bulger said, “The Whitetail Almanac will help you be at the right place, at the right time.” The app is available for both Apple and Android; more information can be found at www.whitetailalmanac.com.