Doc

As bad as these incidents are, they will be dwarfed by the almost inevitable 911 style of terrorism that will begin with some of the bad-actors that Biden has turned loose in our country

This certainly would not be the first store to slide into the woke thinking in terms of their merchandise would it? When I look at stores like Runnings, it is obvious that there are some people who can still make profit on hunting equipment, if they want to.

Is there any proof that that was their motivation.

The issue of illegal invaders of our border and the burgeoning results on our safety and economy are just one aspect of the treason being committed by this administration since its inception. There has to be more to the current downward slide of our position in the world than just coincidence. Biden or whoever is pulling his strings keep edging us closer to world war. His financial and policy gifts to Iran are now undoing everything that Trump had in place to keep Iran under control with no ability to financially get into the adventures that they are now involved with. Biden financed their war on Israel and on us right from the beginning with the billions given to Iran. He also destroyed Trump initiated policies to keep Iran in an impoverished condition where waging and financing wars was virtually impossible. Budget cuts on the military have now left us in a condition of shortages. The destruction of our fuel industry is crippling our economy along with the foolish mad expenditures of their so-called green energy policies. The Democrats are doing everything they can to bankrupt this nation and its citizenry. His wholesale voter bribery with free this and free that is running amok in our economy. The absolute acts of irresponsibility regarding the trashing of our legal system has us in fear of using the subways and even the streets. Come-on, all these things and more are not simply coincidental. It has to be an orchestrated plan of chaos, being perpetrated by some external force and influence (Think China). I think the crooked shenanigans that the entire Biden family have been implicated in, kind of makes one wonder where his allegiances really are. I know that we always hesitate to use the word treason when talking about the highest office in our country, but at some point, you have to say, "If it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck, and looks like a duck, it probably is actually a duck.

I was a bit put out to see an ad for the ASPCA pop up on the screen of this hunting forum. Are we supporting anti-hunting organizations now? The ASPCA proudly boasts of their opposition to the hunting of animals for any reason.

You know, a lot of these corporate moves against hunting would never happen if sportsmen would simply stop going to them completely. I know that we are not in any kind of majority or anything, but we still are a large enough block of customers so that if we all decided not to patronize their store for anything anymore, I believe that the impact would be felt and noted by other stores that might be considering similar moves. I have not gone to Dicks for anything other than to use their restroom at Eastview.....lol. I go to Runnings in Canandaigua who has maintained their stock in hunting, fishing, and even trapping. I prefer to patronize stores that have not chosen to snub a whole segment of their customers. By the way, I don't believe that they made their choices based on a shrinking number of hunters. It really looks and smells like an anti-hunting statement aimed squarely at hunters personally. I refuse to reward any of that kind of thinking with my business. And you know what?......They don't have a thing that I cannot find elsewhere and usually at a better price.

Was there some reason why they thought that you might be capable of careless hunting practices? I find their comment to be strange since you did nothing to provoke it. Was there some reason why he thought that you might shoot the horses? It certainly was a strange remark to come from a friend. Or perhaps he made the comment with a big smile on his face and meant it to be a joke.

So as I was feeling sorry for the ice fishermen who have had so little ice this year, it occurred to me that there has to have been some bonus open water fishing available for those hearty souls who have dressed up warm and got out into the lakes and streams. Has anyone here taken advantage of the mild winter this year? Any luck with the winter fishing opportunities?

By the way, did you know that animal skulls that are in good shape are a saleable item. I saw on Google that racoon skulls can go from $22 to $90. I never knew that before.

Damn!.....Somebody had a lot of fun.

I have noticed a lot of "one-time" pictures of deer. You fool them once but never again. Big bucks and older does seem to be in that category. Yes, there are some that seem to ignore cameras time after time, but the older deer do seem to avoid the cameras eventually. Has anyone else made that kind of observation?

I am impressed by the picture quality.

I was talking about the total experience of deer hunting, not just the harvest. There is more to hunting than just numbers and meat. I believe that the whole idea of a scoring system for antlers was devised to put hunters competing against hunters. It is really for the benefit of hunters impressing other hunters with their accomplishments and a numerical method of pitting one hunters harvest against others. One of my best hunts was down in PA., where I came home with a small doe. She didn't score very good, but we all had a great bow-hunt. Another great hunt was my first bow killed deer. Talk about a score .....Lol....He had two 5" spikes and his antlers have a prominent place on the wall and is the one mount that brings back the best memories of all the other mounts. What I am trying to say is that there is a whole lot more to hunting than simply numbers and scores. I have known the people that go at their hunting like their life depended on it. I guess if they want to go at it like that, that's their business and that's okay as long as they don't start with the preaching and trying to make it my business.

I have witnessed a lot of deer reactions that can only be explained as being "curiosity". A lot of that has to do with ATVs. Sometimes they will just stand there and stare at you.....as long as you don't get too close. Sometimes they just act like a farmer's goats. Maybe they just feel that anything making that much noise cannot be a threat.....lol.

It's pretty obvious that we all have different ideas as to what we need to get out of our hunting experiences. If a hunter needs to hunt for numbers, measurements and other such contrived ways of impressing others, it is entirely possible that they are the ones missing out on the real pleasures of hunting.

Beware of the evil black flies. They have been known to drive people mad. I experienced the black fly torture up in Canada, and can say that if it weren't for the constant cloud of smoke from cigars, I probably would have become a victim of black fly insanity. Today with the advance of repellant, perhaps it isn't so bad, I don't know. But I would suggest that you take the black-fly warnings very, very seriously and take whatever precautions you can find. Perhaps a head net might add some protection, but those critters can find ways inside your clothing. I had bites on my chest and I kept my shirt on and buttoned up.

I have heard that in some cases, lumber companies like to dig up the roots of large walnut trees for the crazy grain structure underground.

One important criteria that I applied when I bought my .270 was recoil. I wanted a deer rifle that I could shoot for long periods of time without being punished for it.

Spreadsheets were made for this kind of application. The sorting abilities and the ease of storage and back-up make the data easy to keep track of. It's also easy to transfer existing pencil and paper data into the more formal electronic database.

Is there any off-shore fishing by Cross Lake?

I was wondering about the Seneca river, but I read about some pollution issues in the fish there in certain areas. Any truth to that? Where on the Seneca River are you finding the catfishing the best?

There you go. If you go to all the trouble of testing, write it down (or type it into record somewhere. Knowledge gained quickly becomes knowledge lost if it is not recorded in some orderly fashion.

Don't you all think that first you have to have a discussion about what features make any of the calibers better for taking deer? Then the discussion about what caliber satisfies those features. Such things as trajectories for the distance shooters. Terminal energy, meat damage, etc., etc. might be part of that discussion and probably a whole lot of other features that I'm not thinking of right now.

The internet is full of catfish bait recipes. I just took a look.

What a great Father and son adventure. That is a trip that he will remember all of his life. Wherever you decide to go, take plenty of pictures and be sure to share them with us here. I would love to see pictures of that trip. Even if you don't get a single fish, the hiking and camping will be a fantastic thing to experience.