Doc

Okay, so now you all have had an opportunity to experience the new hunting hours of 1/2 hour before sunrise to 1/2 hour after sunset. What's your opinion on on the safety aspect of the level of daylight at the two extremes of the hunting day. Would you feel comfortable taking a shot at the very beginning or ending of the legal shooting hours?

It has been real quiet here in Bristol. I am hunting state land and feeling pretty lonely up there. Where the heck is everybody? I always thought it would be nice to have all this state land to myself, but there seems to be just enough people to put the deer in the survival mode and not enough people to get the deer up and moving.

I have to say that the morning hunt usually seems more productive. Also a deer that is badly hit in the morning gives you immediate daylight to locate the first blood and the rest of the day to locate the deer. That can be a a great advantage over relying on a flashlight to try to find that first blood or your arrow. However getting up in the dark and climbing up that killer hill is something that gets harder and harder to do as age keeps creeping up on me. I have to admit that my early morning hunts are usually now limited to opening day of gun season. It's not the way I want it, but it's getting to be the way that it has to be. Regarding the part of this thread that deals with hunting alone vs. hunting with someone, my hunting is done alone now. The people that I used to hunt with have either stopped hunting, or moved away, or died. Yes, at my age, hunting alone is a gamble, so I stay pretty close to home and carry a cell phone for any sort of emergency. The good news is that the deer drags are usually downhill to the house......lol. No more wandering all over the hill and valley to hunt for me anymore.

An observation regarding age vs. still hunting: Nearly 81, and my favorite way of gun hunting is still-hunting after opening day. That has it's positives and it's negatives. The old circulatory system likes the idea of walking to keep warmer on some of those bitter cold days. However, my stamina isn't what it used to be. Also it seems that as the years advance, I am losing my "sneak". I don't walk as smoothly and light on my feet as I used to. That causes a few more noisy steps that break branches underfoot or shuffle through the leaves a little louder than I would really like. The old eyes are probably not what they used to be, but my long distance vision is still good. That is super important in still-hunting. My hearing aids do improve the ability to hear deer coming (maybe even better than I used to). Some more of the good news is that age has naturally slowed my pace to the proper speed of successful still-hunting. So there are some pluses and minuses relating to this style of ground-hunting at an advanced age. There are some trade-offs regarding my decision to come down out of the trees years ago, but I still enjoy the challenges of sneaking around the woods trying to best the super-senses of the critters on their own terms. Just being able to get up that old "killer" hill behind the house is quite a challenge, but there is a lot of satisfaction in still being able to do it. Age has taken away some abilities, but has given a few satisfactions back as I succeed in fighting back against time.

You got your birthday wish. Good for you.....and all the rest of the country.

Well, we didn't do too good on the state Proposition #1, however the right person won the presidency, and it looks good for a Republican majority in the house and the Senate.

Same here!

Frankly, I really have no interest in what is happening on the other site. One hunting site is all I have time for, and this is the one I started with and this is the one I will stay with. So what they do over there is really of no concern to me.

I just got off stand with no luck. I think I will skip the pm stand. The temperature is coming up fast. That's ok. I still have some work to do outside here on the homestead.

And by the way, that proposition one needs a "NO" vote too. The wife and I did our voting this morning.

Too often, when you hear people complain about losing rights and government interference in their lies, and other malfunctions of government, when you ask them if they voted, they say no and then come up with a list of reasons why. Here is a chance to put your actions where your mouth is......Get out there and vote. This year is more important than ever before.

It's time to get out there and make your voice heard.

It's time to put up or shut up. Get out there and do something about the fiasco that our government has been turned into. Don't just talk about it........VOTE.

You need some kind of over-and-under. Is that legal to deer hunt with a .22 barrel and a deer caliber as an over and under rifle? You might consider a double barrel 20 gauge with slug on one side and shot on the other side. Is that legal? Frankly, I am getting at the point where I could forget about the deer and just load up for squirrels.

Is there anyone besides myself who wonders why after all these years are we not stumbling over hundreds of deer carcasses that have fallen to this "highly contagious" disease. Every so often these articles show up declaring a new case of CWD and everyone panics for a while and then the story gets forgotten for another dozen years or so.

Yeah, but when you do connect, the feeling of accomplishment is overwhelming. There is no need to count points or measure up score when all the rest of the hunt is done with some of the most stringent handicaps imaginable. Some of the most intense deer hunts have been from the ground with a few does and their fawns checking me out. One set of eyes will get the old ticker beating, but when you are trying to overcome multiple noses and eyes and ears from the ground, you start to learn about real challenge.

Yeah, I came down out of the trees quite a few years ago. Yes, I recognize that I have handicapped myself by doing that, but a severe case of "fear of heights" left me with no choice. But in the process, I found an added level of excitement through dealing with deer on their own level.....Eyeball to eyeball. I know that there is no room for error. There is an extreme nervous and exciting feeling of vulnerability on my part because I am left at the mercy of all the deer's superior senses. yes, i no longer expect to get my archery deer every year. I have put myself at an extreme disadvantage. But I have to say when that deer (any deer) approaches me, I immediately go into a fit of trembling, the likes of which I never experienced while I was up in the trees. I know that I cannot get away with anything......Absolutely nothing! I have not mastered the art of still-hunting with a bow yet. I do construct ground stands. So, I still have a long way to go to hone that ultimate way of ground hunting. However, still hunting with a gun is my "go-to" method of gun-hunting.

Back tension has been a hot topic of archery shooting procedure for decades. I have archery magazines from the late sixties where Sam Fadala and others talked about back tension. But it was never explained as well as this video. Of course back then videos were not as easy to come by as they are today. But actually seeing someone go through the motions of creating proper back tension really is a good way of teaching, especially when it is done by an archery coach. This the first time I ever saw it related to muscle and joint longevity though. It all makes sense.

Congrats on a fine looking buck.

Years ago, I picked up a military style kaybar belt knife for $5 at a yard sale. That thing has the best steel of any of the knives that I own. Yes, I suppose by most people's standards, it is a bit big and clunky for field dressing deer, but I have not found that to be a problem. Once I put an edge on that thing, it stays shaving sharp for the whole season, even when I use it for hacking small limbs for shooting lanes.

Great video!

This is the best all-around fall for just about every activity. And yes the squirrels are going berserk. I have been dining on the little fuzzy-tailed rats quite a bit this year.

They really don't have to be all that old to figure out their survival mode. Have you ever noticed how all the deer seem to vanish into thin air after the first few hours of gun season opener? They find out that panicky running through the woods is not a real good idea. They also figure out where the orange army does not go. Yes they occasionally make mistakes, but not all that often. I had a nice buck that used the old "lay still" method of evasion. It was in a thicket that is in front of my house. I was going down our long driveway to get the mail and I took my gun along. His mistake was not realizing that the new snow of the season silhouetted him very nicely. I'll bet he spent may days watching us drive back and forth on the driveway and even walk up and down the driveway a bunch of times. It would have worked again except for that snow. It was a short drag to the driveway where I loaded him up for butchering. But the point is that they do seem to have some version of reasoning.

We have an excellent thread regarding deer anatomy that will help you make up your mind about neck-shots. Look closely at the size of the target of the neck area, and then look at the size of the vitals in the chest area. There is a big difference! Two incidences have made up my mind: The first was seeing a very nice buck standing alongside the road on my way to Naples. His entire lower jaw was just swinging from his head......Not a pretty sight. Could have been an attempt at a head shot, or a neck shot that had gone very bad. That deer had a very long and anguished end to his life in store for him. Nothing I could do. It was after dark and I was in the car with no gun. The second was listening to a deer on the far side of a huge ravine wheezing through what I assumed was a severed wind pipe. It was loud enough so that I could hear it the 200 or so yards across the ravine. I'm sure that deer was also going to die a long and suffering end, But there was no way for me to get to the other side. I have to concede that a neck shot that hit the spine will drop the deer right on the spot. But I have to wonder about a shot that is a few inches off the mark. Click on the picture to visit that thread and make your own decision.:

It all sounds kind of treasonous to me. Kind of makes you wonder what countries they are working for. It certainly isn't the U.S.