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A good old fashioned winter, incessant snow and cold every day it seems, a lot of shoveling, blowing and plowing, I am getting worn out! Al

A for sure way to blow up a rifle! LOL

I’d like it a lot better if my Farmall Cub plow tractor hadn’t broken down on the last snowstorm. That thing is a real joy to plow snow with, and it’s so small, that I can really “stretch” the fun time with it. This has been a real old fashioned winter, like we haven’t seen in these parts (north western NY), since the early 1980’s. Unfortunately, that Farmall Cub breaking down has also shut down what I was hoping would be a little winter firewood processing. My splitter shed was open and ready for business, but I had to push the dead Farmall into that space, with my larger 4wd John Deere turbocharged diesel loader tractor. Thankfully, the plow was up on the Cub, when it quit running due to an unknown electrical issue. Now, I don’t have any inside space available to haul wood into for splitting. Frozen ground time of winter, had been my favorite time to make firewood, back in the good old “pre global warming” days. I was going to take the rear snowplow off of the John Deere, put the forks on the bucket, and start hauling up logs from the woods and hedgerows. Now, with the busted Farmall Cub and Ford 8n (also has an unknown “no spark electrical issue), there will be no time for that until summer, as has been the case most of the last 40 years. Mt “lowest ground in the area” is usually way to muddy to drag and move logs on, outside of mid to late summer. The very best thing about owning a Farmall and a Ford Tractor, is the appreciation that they give me for having a few John Deere’s around, to get the actual work done. They also provide good entertainment in the shop, trying to keep them running. I cleared our two driveways and my aunts next door, with my John Deere this morning, before church. It cleared up pretty good for that, but now snow is coming down good again with low visibility. If it clears up before dark, I’ll head over to my parents, about 29 miles away, and clear there driveways with one of dad’s John Deere’s (a compact “Yanmar powered” version). That had an issue with a chain rubbing on the rear fender, but I added some wheel spacers and got it working wonderfully, a couple weeks ago. It’s about the same size as my Farnall Cub but no where near as fun to plow snow with (I get a bit of a stiff neck with the rear plow compared to the front one on my Farmall), and the operators platform is sized more for smaller Asian folks. That little Yanmar diesel sure does run like a watch though. They have a gas well on the property over there, so they've always got free natural gas and dad keeps the tractors in a shop heated to 60 degrees all winter. That makes for real easy starting in the winter. At home, I keep my John Deere diesel plugged into an electric block heater and run that at least a half hour prior to any cold starts. I’m holed up in the house now, enjoying a good book in front of the wood stove, where it’s 75 degrees and very pleasant: I’ll warm up some leftover chicken pot pie for lunch shortly, and maybe head over to ma and pa’s for some more snow plowing, if it clears up before dark. My wife made the pot pie for dinner last night, and she headed down to her brothers place in VA for the week, before church this morning. She left plenty of leftovers for me and our daughter, but we’ll be making something on our own, by weeks end, I would guess.

I certainly did mess up there, on a big doe last Holliday season. If only I had used my laser range finder, I wouldn’t have taken the 200 yard shot, that I thought was 150. My bigger mistake on her though, was trying to save some meat, on a neck shot vs a center of mass finishing shot, when we tracked her into her bedroom, after wounding her in the leg with my initial shot. Talking to my neighbor at church this morning, it sounds like she’s healed up pretty good from the leg wound that I inflicted on her last December. I had a feeling she’d be ok, based on the 5 miles or so of terrain that she covered, as we tracked her after I “clean missed” that follow-up shot. He was in the cabin back in his woods yesterday, when he got an alert on his cell phone. One of his cameras picked her and her grown fawns up. She was doing well, completely recovered. She will be tougher to kill now for sure. Maybe I can get her this September, with the new Savage 220 that I hope to pick up. That should give me a legit 200 yard effective range. I’d definitely put that at about 150 with my Omega 50. It certainly had no trouble double lunging this guy at 125 yards last December, landing the bullet right where I wanted it: (32) Old does are much smarter though. It ain’t going to be easy, getting the best of that old battle worn one. Edit, I certainly wouldn’t have taken that ill-fated 200 yard shot with my Omega, were there not still way too many deer around here and had I not struck my first with my suv, getting its first dent, just a week prior. I’m down to shooting at any legal deer, if I think I have a 75 % chance of a clean kill since that, where I needed about 90 % certainty prior. I definitely owe that fine photogenic 3.6 year old 8-point buck to the new deer shoulder sized body line on the passenger side fender of my suv though. Without that, I never would have rushed home from work and got up in my stand on that last Tuesday of regular ML season.

Well I have a problem that I have never experienced before in the 49 years that I have lived here. The snow has come in such small but frequent amounts that I just kept driving over it. No need to plow out an inch or two. Well, what happens when you do that week after week, and the temperatures stay cold is that there gets to be a build-up of ice. I would say that there is about 4 or 5 inches of nice shiny ice. Unfortunately the driveway is about 1000' long so the amount of salt required to melt that much ice is way out of my budget. And you cant plow ice. I'm hoping for more snow on top of the ice so I can drive in and out. It's an interesting problem with no significant melting in sight.

I can’t imagine dealing with what you guys are this winter. North of Watertown is even way above what we have seen the last few years. lol. And here we are again today getting another 8-10 inches. Were shouting for freezing rain but looks like it will stay cold enough to keep it white.

Even though we seldom seen eye to eye, I’ve always appreciated your insights. One of these days, we’ll have to meet up at the Brewer Union Cafe or someplace else in the neighborhood. Too bad it looks like the Longway diner shut down. I always wanted to check that out.

Is that what BMG means? Blew-up My Gun! lol

Exactly!! This board gets a ton of readers and views.

Look at the guest visits. Thirteen pages (30 guest per page) on a Sunday morning listed. Checking back on old threads and posts. Yes some are spammers and hackers, but I bet you their are a lot of old members visiting the site without logging in. That's nothing to shake a stick at. Yes a few old members came back to make a comment on this thread. What I read was bitterness, anger and reality. Carries a long ways sometimes. We've done excellent here for years; with an owner that just may be one of those visitors, from time to time.

The whole “challenge yourself” deal seems counterintuitive to me. I think we owe it to the deer to kill it as humanely and quickly as possible and that sometimes means minimizing the personal challenge to ourselves. I will always choose the most lethal, reasonably cost, legal weapon available, in a given season. That said, there is no doubt that sound is one of the primary concerns when hunting and that creates a space for archery equipment for deer hunting. In that area (archery season), I will always choose the most lethal, legal combo available (a crossbow with mechanical broadheads) even though it is currently legal only during the peak two weeks of the rut in NY’s southern zone and (3) earlier days in the northern zone, for most able bodied hunters. Several years ago, a former site member posted the results of non-biased study, based on archery deer hunting on a private vast expanse of military property, which clearly showed evidence of the “clean kill and recovery” superiority of the crossbow / mechanical broadhead combination compared to other combinations, including vertical compound bows and fixed blade broadheads. I’ll admit that I often fight a personal desire to bring out my old open sighted sidelock muzzleloader, with which I’ve never been able to harvest a deer, and use it during our current ML seasons. So far, I’ve been able to successfully fight off that urge, since obtaining my scoped inline. One of these days, If my meat supply is good and I still have an unpunched dmp tag or two by January 1. I just might not be able to resist the temptation of giving it a try. Until then, I’ll stick with my fully legal in all current ML seasons in NY, in-line 50 cal TC Omega with 2-7x Redfield scope. (31) I do appreciate the fact that NY does allow an early antlerless gun, early archery, early ML (in some areas) middle gun, and late ML season. I think the long run and “breaks” in between allow for a greater overall deer harvest which helps both the deer themselves, as well as the deer hunters, and even more importantly, others including motorists, homeowners, and farmers. Personal challenge is best left for sporting events that don’t involve God’s living creatures.

I’ve caught a few bass with jigs made from coyote tail hair but it seems like those made from buck or doe tail hair always work better.

He did real well and nice size dogs!

Not sure . I use to use some Deer attractant scents.but haven't done so in the past 10 years . It might be the reason why I haven't scored more but that's a matter of opinion .

I'm hoping you have many more healthy, happy deer seasons ahead of you. And, I don’t think you will be alone here.

Any means necessary, your boys are lucky to have you.

I hope you have many years ahead of you Eddie! You are one of the great guy's I miss the most! We all have our own reasons for staying here, or sharing another site. We can do both!!! That's the way it should be!! No argument from me there! I never saw anything as a competition!! There isn't any hard feelings either!! Except for burmjohn, but that has no bearing on all but 'one blowhard', who have decided to ride it out here. I also have learned so much from airdale over the years, and will always value his opinion! I still read his posts here! Again, I never have bashed this site! I don't come here trying to "steal" members either! Both places will be what they are!! And we can all make our own choices. We don't have to discredit anyone for choosing where they want to spend their time!! It's ALL good!

God bless Eddie, I envy your desire to get out there at your young age. Thats awesome. BTW great buck you took this year, your boys must be proud!!!!