That is what I was thinking. My land is about 120 acres. On my property I have a decent amount of red oaks with a smaller amount of whites.
This may be a stupid question, but do they eat the acorns until there are really none left OR do acorns start to rot/degrade after some time? I'm wondering if they will make their way back to the plots before the end of the season (our season ends early December).
I can't say how they will behave in your area. It depends on a lot of factors and probably the biggest is hunting pressure. Deer have an algorithm that runs in their brain that is constantly evaluating food, security, and sex. I have a wireless camera network that runs 24/7/365. For a few seasons, I charted deer pictures relative to shooting hours. Our archery season begins in early October but the day/night shift begins in September. Starting in early September we have a slow by steady decline in pictures during shooting hours and an increase outside shooting hours. This slow steady decline occurs through our entire archery season. As our muzzleloader season begins in November, the decline of shooting hour pictures slightly accelerates. When firearm season begins, the decline becomes dramatic and shooting hour pictures drop sharply.
There are several things that account for this trend. One is shifting food sources, but a large part is pressure. Hunters suddenly enter the woods to set or check deer stands and to scout in September. The numbers increase in October when Archery season begins. Muzzleloader season puts more hunters into the woods, but sex in now becoming a stronger factor in deer movement. When our general firearms season comes in, so does dog hunting for deer in our state. While we don't dog hunt on our property, dog's can't read no trespassing signs. Deer hunker down during the day.
These curves vary from year to year based on a number of factors including deer numbers and acorn crop. In heavy acorn crop years, deer still use our fields but only after dark. They don't eat only acorns, but they can bed in the hardwoods. When they get hungry during the day, they just stand up, walk a few yards, and scarf down acorns until they are full. When acorns first fall, they are a treat and they abandon the fields, but eventually they balance their diet and use the fields at night. In years when we have a mast crop failure or a poor mast crop, deer are forced to move to go from cover to the fields for quality food. They will tolerate more human pressure under these conditions. However, if there is a good mast crop, they will react to pressure much more and stay where they have food in cover.
Fairly new clear-cuts can have the same effect. Deer, for much of the hunting season here, can get good quality food while staying in cover. They again react much more to pressure.
So, deer will begin using your fields again. Whether they use them during shooting hours or not will depend largely on pressure and the availability of food in cover. Sex can trump everything else when the rut comes into play.
Thanks,
Jack
You know its acorns. 
