Having trouble finding a specific herd or animal? There is a bit more to where they go. All animals have a life cycle, most go from eating to drinking to rest and repeat, but encyclopedia gives specifics. All herds have two of each need zone type, an often used and a rarely used. They will use both. They can show up early or late. They can leave early or late. Between zones I have seen them graze and rest but not for long. The pattern for zones around the herd marker can vary widely. Each zone is not the zone marker on the map or the glowing spot that you find on the ground. It is likely more of an area including them. This area can be pretty big; I have seen predators up to a couple hundred yards from the marker location. Drinking zones tend to keep them at least close to water. When a herd leaves a zone, they can go to either of the zones of the next on their life cycle. This is a map of the options for a single herd/group.
When I was watching mule deer grow, I used feeding zones of a herd and checked all 5 males each day of a 32 period. They showed up to often zone about 85% of the time. To the rare zone about 10 % of the time. And on day 27, they weren’t at either, so I think maybe no zone like 5% unless it was a glitch that I did not see 31 other days. By day 27, I feel like I knew that specific herd’s feed zones pretty well. When I was doing the caribou herd management test, I did sometimes have trouble finding a herd occasionally, so I chalked it up to this.
