Doc

Probably the best Foreman fight that I ever saw happened in 1976 when he fought Ron Lyle. It was not marked with outstanding defense as they took turns knocking each other down several times. It was just a battle of raw power between two outstanding punchers and a great display of courage and toughness. It only lasted 5 rounds, but finally after both fighters were up and down, and almost out many times, Foreman put Lyle away.

We sure do have some nasty weather, but when I compare it to hurricanes, tornadoes and such, I think I will take what Mother Nature hands us here in NYS.

So I guess the new rules of conduct that the Dems have set up over the past two years, when elections don't go the way you expected is to cry and weep and give out your best primal scream at the sky, and throw things through store fronts and beat up opposition voters, and stand outside opposition households chanting offensive slogans at the spouses and children of opposition candidates and supporters, and refuse to consider the leftist winners as legitimate election winners. Is that how we are supposed to react now?

Drones. We will be hearing a lot more about those as prices come down and people start using them more. The potential for abuse is huge and I suspect it is human nature for people to push the envelope as far as they can. I don't even think we can imagine the extent of how these things will be used for terror activities in the future, and the invasion of privacy, and other offensive uses. I have no idea how extensive the regulations go right now, but I do hope that somebody is thinking real hard how to safeguard individuals from the potential abuses that will arise in the future. I understand that they probably are fun to operate, but knowing how people like to push things, I suspect we are in for some interesting events that involve this new challenging technology.

What sort of peer pressure do we have today that causes people to resort to such things. Are we saying that baiting is really the only way that we can be successful? I look at all the things that people go through just to get a deer, and I have to wonder just what is it that drives us to believe that we have to resort to these activities.

Just about all of the herd management solutions that people come up with these days seems to involve eliminating the choices and options for hunters. You know, such things as EAB (earn a buck), AR's, and a whole string of other limiting suggestions. At the same time, we have a shrinking participation in hunting. Perhaps we have to factor in some form of hunter encouragement as a means of maintaining and growing our numbers. If all we can come up with is to confound hunter success, perhaps we are working contrary to our own purposes. What do you think?

That is a plausible alternate explanation.

That is another good reason to tip off the DEC. Let them investigate it if they choose to do so, or ignore it if they think it doesn't warrant investigation. That is up to them once they get a tip.

The location would just be the icing on the cake, but not having that info does not mean that the tip without that information is useless. As far as the guy who sells the corn, I have no idea whether that would be useful to the investigation. It would not get him in trouble, but it might help in the investigation. I don't know about those that say to mind your own business. Breaking of en-con laws is your business. The DEC is not the enemy. I see them as trying to do a job with the handicap of being underfunded and under manned. Who's side are we really on?

8 Tons of corn is a dump-truck full. Would be no problem locating it from the air. The DEC with their shrunken law enforcement crew needs your help. We cannot whine and cry about game management shortfalls and then ignore offenses when we come across them, knowing that it is highly unlikely that law enforcement would ever catch them without help. Do the right thing. But I will say that what you have written here is not anything that would stand up in court so there needs to be some corroborating evidence available. It would be great if you could find the exact location of the dump(s) of corn and supply that information.

This is probably the closest to my thinking. It seems to me that disrespecting the laws that govern the rules of hunting is the same as disrespecting the act of hunting itself and any gains derived from hunting.

Ha-ha....Yes, I do understand that there are some like you that are reading-challenged and can't handle anything more than 3 or 4 sentences at a time. So I thought I would give you a break. Maybe this time you will actually be able to comprehend a bit of the content. Probably not, but at least you won't strain yourself too bad by having to read too much.....lol.

I guess some people's principles can be bought. Frankly, I know a lot of people that own sporting arms that are semi-autos just like all those super scary-looking AR-style "black rifles" that have all the libs so spooked. And those sporting rifles can fire ammo just as fast and efficient as those rifles that have been labeled assault rifles by the ignorant "Chicken Littles" that are all running around in circles worrying about the appearance of certain guns.

The choices are being made for me with my slowly failing hearing. I used to rely a whole lot on my hearing which allowed me a few visual distractions. But these days if I don't see the deer approaching, I probably will be caught unaware that he is coming in and the resulting chaos and panic will probably cost me the shot. So it is constant scanning for me with no luxury of any visual distractions.

I hate night-time blood trailing, unless the blood is flowing so fast that you can just walk along wit a flashlight right up to the deer. Blood trailing can get very tricky under the best of lighting conditions without add problems of a quick onset of darkness.

What I have done in the past is simply to pick up the pace and get by him as quickly as possible and when out of sight I resume my painfully slow pace and finish out the original hunt. I have had it happen to me before where I was on stand and another hunter comes through still-hunting. They can spend an hour or more getting by you. That's all time that you can sit there freezing waiting for him to just get out of the area you are trying to hunt. I would really appreciate it if they would just increase their pace to a good brisk, fast walk and get out of the area. But unfortunately, that doesn't always happen. I know how much time can be invested in setting up a good still-hunt, so I really don't expect them to trash their day's plans and clear out of the area completely just because I am there. I just would like them to do their best to minimize the impact on my hunt and get past as quickly as possible.

QUOTE: "Is losing a deer an inevitable occurrence?" I think the answer is likely "yes". I don't know anyone who has hunted for any length of time that can honestly say that it has not happened to them. It is something that we must all try to avoid. Bad hits and other unfortunate things can happen to anyone regardless of how much planning and care we exercise. We sharpen our tracking skills and have preplanned methods for recovering wounded game, but they don't always work either. So when it does finally happen to us, what are the ways of coping? Well, unless the deer is taken under slaughterhouse conditions and tools, we have to understand that whenever a life is to be taken in a wild and uncontrolled atmosphere, things carry no guarantees. You go through a period of anguish and grief an hopefully eventually get over it and accept the fact that occasionally sh*t happens. Just like falling off a horse, eventually you have to mount up again, analyze what went wrong. Try to correct mistakes and hope it doesn't happen again.

So you have gone a long way out of your way to get the wind just right to set up a stretch of ground you intend to still-hunt through. Now you have the wind right in your face where you want it and you're starting to slow right down to a super careful, slow, still-hunt at a painfully slow pace. You have hours invested approaching this favorite area from the right direction and have had your still-hunt in progress for another hour or so. Then all your cautious scanning brings up a flash of blaze orange way out ahead in the area you wanted to hunt through. What is your next move? Do you continue to move along ahead at your normal still hunting pace, guaranteed to piss off the hunter while you slowly sneak through the area that he is trying to hunt? Do you pick up the pace so as to not be lingering around the area that he is trying to hunt and hurry up to get by him? Do you just hang a hard turn and get the hell out of his hunt completely, but wrecking the hours of set up that you have invested in setting this all up. It may even be a rare wind direction that is perfect for this area. It becomes a case of how much damage to your own hunt you are willing to incur in the name of trying to hunt with the maximum amount of etiquette to preserve the hunt of others. It also becomes a question of what reaction on your part will cause the least disruption to the other guy's hunt. It's not a rare happening in some of the more densely hunted areas of public land. What do you do???

My still-hunting is what you might call a series of mini-stands. I move about 25 to 50 feet depending on visibility and then stand behind a suitable sized tree for anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes scanning every log, dip, or anything that could hide a deer. I am looking for ears, antler tips, tails or anything that looks even a bit out of place. This is not tactic that is used randomly throughout the woods. The moving part of this process is carried out with the same care I would use if I were stalking a deer that I had already spotted. Care is taken to ensure that there is no clothing that loose to the point where the wind could start it flapping around. Past experiences tell me the most likely places to find deer, and then I have the confidence to carry out such a time-consuming pace. I also use my binoculars almost constantly, and carry a Primos trigger stick in case I get caught out in the open when I spot a deer. I am lousy at offhand shooting so the portable gun rest is very important. It is not an easy way to hunt, and that is why I move through areas that I have seen deer bedded or feeding before. It requires great confidence to keep the pace down slow and careful, and that is why I put so much emphasis on prior experience. It requires that I genuinely believe that I will see a deer in the area that I am still hunting through.

What is with this cutesy title of "A Caravan"? Why don't we call it what it really is? ..... a stinking foreign invasion. And what is with all this discussion about whether this mob has lawbreakers and bad people in it. They are ALL coming to break U,S. law. They will become 100% law-breakers that have zero respect for the laws of the country they will be pretending to form an allegiance to. I think it is time to adopt a hard-line attitude on these would-be criminals and bounce them all the way back to their country of origin. Furthermore, once they are caught trying to test the sovereignty of our country's laws, they should be deemed forever ineligible for even legal attempt at U.S. citizenship. And if ever a case was proven for the need of a real border wall, this mass invasion (and now series of mass invasions) makes an irrefutable case for the wall.

You have to have some standard for legal shooting hours, or people would be out shooting at shadows that they THINK might be deer. I suspect that if you made it 1/2 hour before sunrise to 1/2 hour after sunset, you would still hear people talking about shooting way outside of legal hours. Of all the regulations, this seems like the easiest to get along with. Also, I am struck with how many hunting accidents happen outside of legal shooting hours. Coincidence????? I think not, especially when there are those that insist on wearing full camo during gun season. I have to admit that during bow season, I have actually quit early at times when I conditions warrant. There are conditions of dense over-story and fog and heavy clouds that really put in question the ability to locate that critical first blood. Those conditions have driven me off stand early, and I really don't regret doing so. I don't suppose the argument will ever end, but for me it is not something I would call an important priority. I get along just fine with the rules the way they are.

Ya know....Somehow this forum just isn't the same without Growie. We lost an interesting member who always offered a different way of looking at things. Had a few disagreements, but even those were fun.

Cold fried egg sandwiches on toast. 5 per day on opening day. I have a heck of a time making them last 'til lunch. Fill the scrambled egg full of busted up bacon slices while cooking and sometimes add some onions. On stand, I always keep a cup of good hot coffee within reach and then it doesn't really matter if a deer comes along or not. I just hate it when I have to set the sandwich down and grab the gun. Stand set-up for endurance. There's the bag of sandwiches to left of the stool, and the ever-present thermos of coffee. And gun rests everywhere just in case I have to stop eating long enough to take care of business.

So I am still trying to make some sense of this topic. I must be missing something. What specific laws would he be breaking? How is any other person being harmed or inconvenienced? What's the big deal? I wouldn't think the guy has picked out the best spot in the woods and chances are he won't really be accomplishing a whole lot, but it does remind me of a newbie up at work that decided to try hunting, and so he went out with a bunch of guys and sat at the base of a tree a few feet from all the parked cars. Yup!....You guessed it. He was the only one to get a deer that day and it was a pretty decent 8 pointer. He never went hunting again, claiming that it was just too damned easy.

The most memorable amazing shot that I ever made was about 4 or 5 feet from the tip of my arrow. I was standing behind an approx. 4' diameter oak watching a trail that was 20 yds away. A huge doe came along the trail and then turned and waked directly to the tree I was standing behind. I drew the bow while screened by the tree, and started walking around the tree as the deer walked around the other side. Finally I stopped and waited for the heart/lung area to be exposed as the deer kept walking. she ran about 15 yards and piled up. I swear I could have almost touched that deer. Even getting that shot without being detected was amazing. I had all the leaves raked away around the tree just in case a deer came from an unexpected direction. What I hadn't expected was having a deer walking straight at me to the other side of the tree that I was standing behind.