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Ran out after dinner to look for some mushrooms in the creekbottom. I didn't find any but I did get a special treat while I was there! My first fawn of the year!

Youth Hunter I was mentoring this morning.

Had a jake come in silent. Good thing my father was lying attention to the decoy while we were talking Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks again guys! I struck out on the mushrooms again today, but I bumped into my little buddy again on the other side of the creek! He's not one for posing just yet, but he's a natural when he's in front of the camera! Anyone know what that ground cover plant with the blue flowers is called? It grows like a carpet down here and really hides the fawns well.

I've decided her Indian name would be "Sleeps in woods"

At the Lilac Festival , drinking Genesee brew house IPA, and listening to The Fabulous Thunderbirds. The beer is better than the band .... I've seen them in concert in the '80's and got them on vinel , but this just isn't making it .

Yesterday was a crazy day at work visiting a few jobsites around Buffalo and the burbs...came home and mowed the lawn....then sat on the porch to reflect with a beer when the "no see ums" decided I was the ideal snack. Somewhere between lazy and determined I endured for a few minutes squashing them when they landed. Felt one on my arm, thumbed him and then noticed it was crawling. Instantly I knew it wasn't a fly after all and my fears were confirmed-- it was a tick. An adult black legged deer tick to be exact. Not engorged but creepy deal. I got nailed by one last fall that I think I picked up in the Alabama swamps (which is somewhat known for them).Not sure where this little bugger came from but be careful because I wasn't in any ideal tick habitat this week prior and every night has had a sudsy shower.

Wish i could comb the girls Wood chuck dinner

Where they're headed? Hell, THEY don't know where they're headed!

My big purge came after my house in Buffalo was broken into and ransacked/looted after I'd been there for 20 years. That was 10 years ago. Walking through my belongings strewn ankle deep throughout the house, I decided pretty quickly what really mattered to me and packed a few things that hadn't been stolen. Mostly books. The guy I sold the house to for pennies on the dollar said he would take care of the rest, so I didn't have a big bill for a dumpster. I try now to deal with potential accumulation before it becomes actual accumulation.

So there's a slug on the inside of our blind. Daughter named it Jerome. I thought Speedy. It took close to an hour for it to crawl a foot. I'm a mean bastid. I used a stick and started him back from where he started No birds talking

Thanks guys! Elmo, by the time I spotted the little rascal he was only 3 or 4 ft away. I knew he wasn't going anywhere so I looked around for momma and didn't see her, so I spun on my 18-55mm lens and got down to his level. By then I was more like 1.5-2ft away and that's why you only see 6 shots here. Mom would have had to clear a creek to put the hooves to my head but that thought was always on my mind. The doe leave their fawns here a lot during the day every year and are seldom ever around but she'll come back for him. The fawns I find here have a very good survival rate from what I've noticed compared to fawns further up the hill that have coyotes and other critters to contend with. This spot is relatively close to houses where predators don't hang around much day or night. Year after year they just love to hide their fawns here!

Great shows but Last Alaskens is my new favorite.

I'm gonna' get weird here: The things themselves aren't important. The memories represented by the things are what's important. Especially to the people who will eventually deal with your stuff. Write down those related memories and anecdotes because that's what your loved ones will keep. Toss the pile of antlers, but spend some time putting into words why you collected them in the first place. Down the road someone will find your little book of memories even though the antlers are gone, and understand why you collected them.

Yes they do, they always head the opposite direction you think they will go. Of course when you try to second guess them and go the other direction they go where you thought they would have gone in the first place. That makes perfect sense don't it?

Tries to stalk them they pushed into the thick swamp by the time I got there.... Oh well atleast I tried Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

First day out with the crossbow. Heard one far off, but trespasser on 4 wheeler went through neighbor's around 5. So loud. I can't believe anybody would ride a wheeler through the turkey woods. Birds that were here last week all silent. I'm sure he was in here during the week. I love the entitlement attitude of locals. He's parked now and "hunting". Maybe I'll get to bust him.

I would love to visit there, but don't know that I'm ready to start making a living of the land thereSent from my VS980 4G using Tapatalk

At Yelling Goat. Shipyard monkey fist IPA

I think I might have kissed "her" one lonely night, back in the day.

cute lil bugger. In HS my buddy had 2 little ones that their mama got hit by car. We stuffed them in our shirts while riding our bikes to go fishing. They loved going fishing with us. Really fun to watch. My dad and brothers also used to have pet ones. They all worked at a golf course, my brothers and dad , not the coons lol. They'd sit on the golf cart seat and ride around. Dad's would sit on the back of his truck seat. Dad always had starmints in his front shirt pocket. Coon would reach into his pocket and steal a piece, unwrap it and eat it.

I thought this was going to be a Woodstock flashback story when I opened this post! That one looks like a keeper to me. Go back and look for it again,lol

Great pictures!

Nice pics of some scraggly looking deer and buzzards. That's good looking country Ms Paula!

Yep grandparents..Aunt...inlaws. Their place, 3800sq feet not including a 13 course block basement and she was a collector/ family historian...I believe it was 3 dumpsters all told and the historical society had 2 trucks....it took 4mos

If there not responding to calls personally if you know the area use the contour of the land and try to position your self where there headed use rises and the terrian to set yourself up in known strut zones and call from there softly and get more aggressive one you get a response

Found my first one today too while out turkey hunting Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Wow...reading that was akin to ....an exhausting prolonged game of hopscotch!...158 posts and I found maybe ten tuly rational ones.

Ended up having a great hunt this morning, even though it got off to a rough start. I was supposed to take a guy from work who is just starting hunting, this would have been his first time out. He wasn't where we were supposed to meet at 4:00, I gave him 10 minutes but after getting no response when I called and texted I decided he must have overslept so I headed out. I found out later he was running 15 minutes behind and had left his phone at home... oh well, that was lesson one I guess. Since I didn't have anyone with me I decided to go back after a bird I've been on several times this season, but when I got near his roost it was dead silence. No amount of hooting could draw a response so I decided to walk back to the car and go where I was planning to take the other guy after all. When I got over there it was already shooting light, and I still needed to cross about half a mile of open fields to get to the woods. By the time I got out there I was pretty sure the birds would be on the ground, and at first I wasn't getting any response to any of my calling. I entered the block of woods from the north along a woods road that divides the block into an east and west side. The west side is bordered on the north by a beaver swamp that runs right up to the woods road I was walking on. I was alternating between crow calls and yelps on my trumpet and when I got roughly 100 yards past the back side of the swamp a bird gobbled from the west half of the block on my right. I quickly scrambled up the slope to get on the ridge he was on and gave another series of yelps. He hammered back immediately and had already begun closing the distance. I looked around and found a good tree, I was about 25 yards south of an east/west ridgeline and could see roughly 35 yards out toward the west in the direction the gobbler was coming from, it was a perfect setup. Approximately 5 minutes went by and I was starting to worry he might stay below the ridgeline and get too far to my right where I wouldn't be able to swing for a shot, so I carefully gave a couple of soft clucks on the trumpet. The response was instantaneous, he was no more than 50 yards straight in front of me and I could hear his gobble trail off into a low rattling rumble. I spent the next 15 minutes not moving a muscle, safety off, gun trained at the group of trees where I expected him to step out on one side or the other... but nothing happened. I waited another 10 minutes and tried lightly scratching in the leaves. Nothing. A few soft yelps, and again, nothing. 10 more minutes ticked by and I pulled out my crow call, and again I was met with silence. My best guess is that when he gobbled from so close he expected the hen to come right to him at that point, and when no hen showed he bugged out. If it wasn't for that last series of clucks he may have walked right into my lap. I was a little mad at myself for messing up on a bird that was coming in on a string but it was still early so I backed out and went over to the eastern half of the block. I made a loop around the perimeter and on the far east side I ran into 4 hens by themselves in a field. I got them going with some aggressive cutting and they came in to about 5 steps of where I was leaned against a maple before they finally spooked. Despite all of the back and forth calling no gobblers were heard from. I continued my loop and wound up back at the woods road near where I had struck the gobbler earlier. As I was considering my next move I thought I heard him sound off a bit farther out than he had been earlier and closer to the swamp. Rather than trying to call him back to the same spot I decided to swing to his south to try and come at him from a new angle. When I got to the southern edge of the block I switched to a glass pot call and tried a few calling sequences but got no answer. I continued to circle around toward the last place I had hear him, calling every few minutes as I went. Eventually I made it all the way up to where I could see the edge of the swamp and still hadn't made contact with him. I slowly worked my way along the swamp back toward the woods road and was thinking about what area I should head to for the second half of the morning. I picked up the woods road and began walking it toward the fields, there is a small clearing along the road about 60 yards before you get to the fields and I stopped at the edge to call one last time. I got a gobble in response, he was out in the fields and had probably walked up the road that I was now standing on just minutes before. I quickly found a spot to sit in a small stand of hemlocks that borders the road and provided deep shade. With the swamp on one side and thick brush on the other he was going to have to walk up the road if he wanted to come find me. I called again once I was in position and he sounded a bit closer when he answered. Several minutes later he gobbled one last time where the woods road enters the field and I knew he was coming. Thirty seconds later and I could see his red head bobbing down the road, at 26 yards he stepped into enough of an opening that I could see his beard and a load of Federal HW 7's dropped him in his tracks. My NY tags are filled but I may try to hit PA, VT or ME for a few days before the end of the month. Hopefully I'm not quite done yet.

Great pics. You always stumble across the neatest stuff !

Great shots! Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Tab S2

Shoot again, for some reason we are taught 1 shot only.. if you would of shot when you saw him again you may of had them.. even a 1 winged bird will out run you, and most likely 1 1 legged turkey could as well.. I tipped a big gobbler on film for a call company with black powder ( double barrel) rolled him right over looking at camera and he gets up and runs ,I thought my chest would explode from the downhill race I did several hundred yards.. was close a couple of times and never thought to use second shot.. never got him and I collapsed winded... with camera man laughing his head off .. I still have the unaired vhs tape someplace...

Hunted a new property a buddy and myself got permission to hunt on Saturday for the PA opener. Hopes were high, as the birds were right on the ridge of this small property and shown to be roosted in a great spot for us to get setup when we scouted it out 2 Saturdays before. We got set up and unfortunately, all the birds we heard were across the road and sounded like they were a longggg ways off. We repositioned about 6:30 to try and project our calls across the road. After a long morning of distant answers we gave some calls and I about jumped off my seat when we heard a gobble that sounded like it was right in front of us. a couple soft yelps and we heard him close the distance. We catch a glimpse about 80 yards out and he was headed right up the logging road like we planned. He got about 40 yards out and we confirmed it was a jake. He came up on the left (my buddy's shot opportunity) and he goes "you'll have to kill him, I cant get my gun up". lol.... so it was up to me to decide whether or not I wanted to take a jake. I let him come to about 25 yards and was really weighing the options and decided a bird in the hand was worth it, especially with 2 NY tags in my pocket. Took him right there, just off the logging road, 9:00am. We sat there for about 35 minutes and then started with a couple more calls since we knew there were more birds across the road, and we were convinced that is where the jake came from. At one point, I thought I heard a gobble on our side of the road but couldn't be sure and he didn't answer again....for a little while anyway. He finally gobbled again and although he sounded like he was ways off, he was on our side of the road. So we beat feet across the small property to at least close the distance. We got moved, sat down, and as soon as we called, he gobbled just over the knoll in front of us, probably 80 yards away. we got quiet and sure enough, he popped out above some car-sized boulders, in half strut. a couple purrs and he hopped down on a boulder and worked his way to another logging road. He popped out at 45 and my buddy drilled him right there, 10:35am. What a morning! We started the day off feeling like not much was going to happen, to both getting a bird and filling our PA tags.

have a bunch of friends out west and morels are taken with more seriousness than sheds. I bought the wife some spores off ebay for Christmas (as the odd ball gift) and haven't seen anything come up yet- figured it was the only way I could get into them around here. There are a number of threads on other forums giving tips where to find them but (again) I don't think theyre are many around here. Hen of the Woods is one we do have though. Best of luck- hoping you find more and post some pics of them fried up as well

nice shots!

I find this little guy on my deck railing today. At first glance I thought it was a rock or a piece of cement.

I listen to the Meateater podcast and Randy Newbergs. It's was cool in the beginning but there only so much about hunting one can talk about. They seem to be running out of subjects to talk about. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Lick it's back . That one will give you an awesome buzz.

My dad just brought me back a #7 inox (stainless) Opinel knife he got at the factory. When you first get it you don't think it's going to be as nice as it is. I can strop it back to razor sharp in a few minutes. If it stays this nice, it will be my favorite pocket knife to keep your pocket (at around 1.5oz I think read) even though it's not a multi-tool.

love podcasts and bunch of good hunting ones out there.... though the right is more my side I cant believe anyone could wholefuly agree with any political group....issue by issues makes the most sense

no. he blew up that building. Reno on the pretext of owning an illegal firearm raided a religious building with tanks tear gas and flash bangs that burned the build to the ground with women and children in it. On Ruby Ridge while serving a warrent they were under orders to shoot on site. the agents first shot a dog in front of one of the young sons then shot the mother while holding her baby. the Reno should of been indited. she was praised by the husband of the front runner of the Democrats party... see how everything keeps circling around? Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

I should add, the trumpet in the photos above was made by Billy McCallister. He and Del are business partners and run Natural Addiction Custom Calls together. https://m.facebook.com/macdaddycustomcalls/ Their trumpets placed first and third at this year's NWTF Grand Nationals. They make a nasty glass pot too.

Here's a good place to start, my buddy Del in GA put these videos together to help people get started. I was also going to link you to John Dangerfield's site because he used to have a clip on there that included him doing purrs on a trumpet which was amazing, but sadly I don't see the clip anymore. Del's videos will get you started though. I mostly cluck and yelp on mine with some cutts and kee-kee's mixed in (yes I mix in kee-kee notes even in spring).

As you can see , boxes, catalog , engine, tender, cars . Was my Grandfathers , as is. wheels turn works as far as I know , but not tested . $175 Webster NY

I just put this on my Bird gun. I love how it fits, and it feels like it will take some abuse. Much better than Tru Glo front sights. Thanks again for the recommendation!

I hope they order restitution to the people who paid for him to process their venison, which he stole and sold to others.

I like all these kinds of programs and try to catch them all. Yes, I understand that there I a strong likelihood that there is some contrived drama provided for interest. For example, more than once the trail that they drive their snowmobiles way out in the deserted wilds of Alaska sometimes looks like a snowmobile race had just taken place. And then there is always the broken down snowmobile and the long 10 mile walk back to the cabin in the dangerous cold...... Why not catch a ride with the cameraman .... lol. But the fact remains that these people all have a desire to be self reliant to one extent or another. And I admire people who want to live like that and then actually go out and do it.

Or just don't smoke ?

I once fell asleep under a car, while doing an oil change…No porcupines involved, but I think alcohol was...

I don't agree. I believe their intention was to have it in better weather and in a setting where the deer were more calm.