Report from Deer Camp II

Well, that was a ride!

I had near constant deer activity from legal hunting +30 minutes to quitting at 1100. It was mostly all doe, with a couple of small bucks scattered here and there. One was a forker, the other an immature 8 pointer. If I had been looking for doe, I'd have filled a tag many times over. One even came and stood broadside to me and ate weeds at 10 yards.

Along about 1000, it was getting hot. I undid my bibs and jacket and tried to cool off. Just then a lone buck, out on the prowl came through, following the track left by a pair of feeding doe earlier in the morning. I got my Savage 99 ready and decided that this might be the best one I'd see all day. Frankly, I could have left him grow another year, but something inside of me decided to commit.

That is when things began to go wrong. I couldn't get the Savage situated on my shoulder. As I'd unzipped everything, all that fabric and Thinsulate had balled up on either side of my chest. He was going behind me. I grunted. He stopped about 30 yards behind the buddy stand. I thumbed the safety off, and was still trying to get a proper sight picture.

BLAM!

As best as I can tell, the shot went low. The buck stood there for a bit, and I got another racked in. Now I was all twisted around. The buck moved.

BLAM!

. . . The buck trotted off, got behind some cedars and tried to figure out what was going on. I kept angling for another shot. By this time, I'd had to come around the other side of the tree. Two years ago, with the stand situated 90 degrees counter clockwise around the tree, this would have been an easy shot, but now I was doing everything I could to get my eye on the scope. Eventually the buck decided enough was enough and cranked himself up and left the property.

I got my gear down and took off down the hill to investigate. I found tracks, but no blood. About 20 minutes later, as I was checking where he had crossed the neighbor's fence, I heard a shot from the direction the buck had gone. I hope the bloke had better luck than I did.

On the way to the pick-up point, I had two more encounters. A doe busted me and ran off, and then a whole herd of deer, spooked by my buddy's truck, came barreling down the valley 50 yards inside the treeline on the other side of the pasture.

My buddy? SuperCore made it to 0930 and came out. He'd had a couple of gear malfunctions that left him with freezing feet and hands. He didn't have as much as a hint of deer the whole time. He said he was going to drop home and refit. The boots he was wearing leaked and the HotHands he had were a couple of years old and useless. He's also brought some ski bibs that he hadn't checked before leaving home-- either they'd shrunk or he'd grown. Oh well, now that he's got an idea of what he's up against, he says he can grab some new gear and be back in 4 hours.

This was easily the most active Opener I've ever encountered-- over 2 shots/minute in the first hour and better than 1/minute in the second hour. However, all but a handful were distant. The word from the scanner is everyone is complaining they didn't see a thing. For all the shooting, the Orange Army was overall quite well behaved. I didn't hear any shots before legal hunting started. Nobody emptied any 20 round magazines. There were a lot fewer ATV's out this year too.

I'm switching rigs for the afternoon. I'm bringing out the Win Mod 70 in 30-06 that is better suited for working the food plots. Angus and I are going to Midway to see what comes out.

Report from Deer Camp I

The past few years, I've been putting out a sort-of diary from turkey camp and deer camp on this forum or that. I figured this would be as good a place as any.

I arrived yesterday afternoon and filled the fridge and freezer out in the shed. That's a donation from Cousin Tim, he was moving back home and didn't have room for the fridge in the new place. I then took on a bunch of last minute projects like re-mounting the mail box and putting out the jagende gewehrständer




Mooseboy made it in shop for my Christmas present a couple of years ago.

At 1700 I retired to the Thoughtful Spot overlooking Pooh Corner and glassed the ridges, looking for deer. Just after sundown a nice young buck came out at 200 yards and started grazing. The dogs barked, but he didn't pay us any mind. Later, a herd came up through Skunk Hollow. I saw one set of antlers-- I think he was chasing some doe, but it was all just at the edge of what I could see. For those of you following the thread about getting a new guy started in deer hunting, the ground blind I pictured, the one at Faulty Towers overlooks Skunk Hollow.

Dinner was ribs from Corky's in Memphis . Krogers is now carrying frozen slabs.

This morning, I was back out at the Thoughtful Spot. It was colder than I expected-- about 31F. I went in to find another hat and when I got back, there were 3 doe out in the field. One was about 150 yards from where I was sitting. The dogs finally saw her and after some preliminary barking sent her and her buddies scurrying towards Skunk Hollow. I'm thawing some venison round steak. I'm going to grind it up this morning and then set to cooking some chili-- it'll be awesome by tomorrow Noon.

Maysville Walmart

I just want to put out a big howdy to all you guys that are planning on hitting the Walmart in Maysville Kentucky at 2130 EST this next Friday night. From what I understand from my correspondents, there are a bunch of you that are making this pilgrimage, to the point where there are now some dedicated deer hunting locals that are turning this into a spectator event.

The lines for licenses are supposedly long, despite being able to buy them online for years. The various gizmos are flying off the pegs-- Cough Silencer and the Butt-Out were big sellers last year. There is even a bustling demand for firearms. This latter item is now causing jeering by the spectators, because they can't figure out how y'all could be sighting in a deer rifle with less than 12 hours to go before the opening of season. Please, one of you guys needs to set them straight. There is a way, right?

I'm bringing this all up, because I didn't know if you all knew you were now being watched, and that they are now spreading stories about you on the Internet. I was tempted to come watch myself, but Maysville is a sizable drive and I'm usually already at camp and had dinner and in the rack by 2130 LIMA. In fact, I'm not really sure why anyone, having a choice in the matter, would want to be at Walmart at 2130 LIMA on the Eve of the Opener-- even if there were shimmy-shimmy girls and elephants and free candy for the kids.

But to each his own, right?

Crossbow Update-

I promised myself that I'd not shoot anything with the crossbow unless it was special. I've been watching does and such go buy since early October. Last weekend I nearly pushed the safety off when a nice little 8-pointer came by. I held up . Today was much different.

I had serious action from first light on. Deer were moving through while I was still trying to get my gear hoisted up. At 15 minutes before legal hunting I had a buck grunting in the dark. I had deer coming from every possible angle. Still, the safety staid on.

Right at 0800, a big set of hooves came crashing up on my 3 O'Clock. He got to about 1 O'Clock before I realized this was a shooter-- not the absolute biggest I'd seen, but it was a wickedly nice rack of probably 10 points or better-- would have at least made B&C. He was now coming into a shooting lane at 11 O'Clock.

I grunted. He stopped. I had a clear shot on his chest. The safety came off and THWANG! I vaguely remember some sprinkles or something falling through the sight picture of the scope. The deer walked off, stood for a bit and then slowly made his way all the way around to the 8 O'Clock position and stood there watching his back trail. After several minutes he wandered off. I did not see him favoring a leg. I saw no wound on his side. It must have been a miss.

I had a heck of a time finding out what happened-- no arrow, no blood, a few hoof prints. The one problem I had was figuring out exactly where I'd shot. An old dead limb about 10 yards out kept keeping me from seeing the shooting rail of the stand. . . Hey! Wait a minute! Sure enough, there was a fresh hunk of rot blasted out from the bottom of the branch.

Sigh!

Oh well. I may hang this crossbow up for the year. I was originally thinking that I would take a few days next week and hunt with it, but . . .
1) The weather is warm-- It'll hit 70 today.
2) Something has kept the bucks from moving on with the rut. Somebody forgot to tell them that they should be chasing by now. Bucks are still just ambling about-- not even seriously seeking.
3) I got what I needed-- some time up in the stand before the Rifle Opener. By next year, I'll have this crossbow figured out a lot better.

My guess is that the rifle season will be prime next weekend. There are certainly enough deer around for sure. There were a dozen out in the field last night. KYHillChick stayed back at the house and heard bucks fighting just a couple of hundred yards off.


Update on Midway-- the new shooting house.

Last night I decided to stay out of the stand, because we were still catching 35 MPH gusts when I was set to leave at 1500. Instead, I went out to Midway, the new shooting house and stayed there until dark. It was quite pleasant. Sundown was at 1730, and the temperature was still about 70F when the deer started pouring into the adjoining food plot.

First it was 3-- the same trio Angus had for Yute Season-- a mother and twins. It was getting dark enough that I thought I might be able to slip out on them when a large dominant doe showed up and chased the three over to the other side of the plot. Then a pair, then a single, then. . .
. . . Holy cow! The plot was filling up now and the deer were all moving towards me. There I was, with the big Meade astronomical binos in the window with deer less than 20 yards away. So much for camo-- I was in a white T-Shirt, with red suspenders on my jeans. So much for scent control-- I was 12 hours gone from a shower, and even I could tell. Plus, I was hunting on carpet that had recently come out of my folk's family room. These deer just didn't care. I could have had any of about 3-4 doe, but the crossbow staid propped in the corner.

Now I was facing a situation: How do I get out? I checked out the back: nothing. I still had to close up shop. I finally decided that bringing down the shutter would probably not honk the deer off that much. I went for it-- I heard a few deer run a few yards, but when I finally got everything buttoned up, they were all still in the field a few yards further out. I walked out quietly and lit the flashlight when I was about 100 yards away.

One last piece of data for the flashlight/no flashlight argument: I was heading back . It was now 45 minutes after sundown. I had my cheap little 2AA cell flashlight pointed out ahead of my feet. I was walking down the 2-track, headed for the pasture that leads to the house and-

Mrrrrrrt! Trundle trundle! Gallumph Gallumph!

A doe had broken cover just ten feet from me as I was walking in. She'd been trying to cross the fence line to my right and must have had a clear shot of me and the flashlight.

To All You Hunters. . .

I don't think I need to explain this one. Let me know if there are any questions.

I'm still trying to find out out the source. Somebody sent this to me. If you are the author, I'd love to hear from you.

Donate your deer carcass to Wolfrun.org!

Here's a plea from Wolf Run Wildlife Refuge in Nicholasville, KY:

Donate your deer carcass to Wolfrun.org!

---

Hey guys I think since we are all conservationist in a sense I though you all might be interested. Feed something other than your local coyote's.


We cannot use the organs but all the rest! Thanks so much. You wouldn't believe how this helps us. Not only financially but the deer is so good for the big cats and the wolves love to play and chew on the bones! Its a win, win situation for everyone out here! Let me know if you need me to answer anything other questions. We are open from 12-5 each Saturday if the weather permits. Blessings, Mare

Wolf Run Wildlife Refuge
Mary Kindred CEO

Call a day ahead to meet with Mary to donate your deer.859-881-3449 or email wrwrhope@gmail.com

Happy Saint Hubert's Day

Over on 24hourcampfire.com we all got together back in 2005 and decide that Christmas on Dec 25 was just not cutting it for us hunters and that we'd all move our serious gift giving to The Feast of Saint Hubert on 11/3. It really bites if you're getting a rifle or a shotgun and you have to wait almost a whole year to use it. Moving the gift giving to November 3 cleans that all up nicely.


I just got back from the pagent. KYHillChick, Angus, and I just finished parading up and down the driveway. I was in my lederhosen, 'HillChick was in her peasant dress, and Lil Angus played the Duddlesack (German bagpipe). I had my boar spear decorated with a garland of flowers.

All the other hunters and I are now going to swill beer until we can't stand, and then go out to have a traditional Black Forest Schutzenfest-- on second thought. . .

Since I'm out of work, we kept the gift giving to a minimum this year. I loaded twenty rounds of 30-06 for all the people on my list. KYHillChick gave me a fresh pile of hunting socks all washed and ready for hunting. KYHillChick says she'll buy me a new deer rifle if I land a job that pays more than the last one.

Happy Saint Hubert's Day Y'all.