fasteddie

Got back from the Wake and loaded up the ATV . I thought I would take an extra Chain-on along and took a box out of the shed . Crap , I had to assemble the darned thing . Pretty much set and time to head for bed ....................

The light came on on my Honda Rancher ATV that said Change Oil . It has 20 hours and 25 miles on it . I had to take the rear rack off to be able to remove the seat so I could take the side off and check the oil . The level was okay and I reset the system so it didn't read oil change anymore . I'll do the change after gun season . Got the shotgun and in-line ready as well as my gear . I have a Wake to go to this afternoon and then I will come home , change clothes and load connect the trailer and load the ATV .

I NEVER cared for that saying ! I'm not going to starve if I don't shoot a fawn ...........

Went to GEVA in Rochester last night . Caught some snow flutties going through Webster and had less than 1" of snow on the ground when we got home . It's 36 degrees now and the snow has almost disappeared . Doubt if we will have any this weekend .

I have a pair of the LaCrosse heavy insulated hunting boots and my feet still get cold . I call them my "Herman Munster Boots" . They aren't too great if you have to walk any great distance .

Welcome to hunting ny . Nice buck . Congrats ! Did you shoot him in Walworth or elsewhere ?

I am surprised it didn't kick the crap out of him ............

I will no doubt be attending my wife's aunt's funeral Saturday am in Avon . We were close and I am having a problem setting my priorities . I am thinking of driving separate and then bailing out to change my clothes and hunt in the afternoon . It would be a compromise ..........

Nope --- leave it as it is for Safety .

Some of it is but the jist of the article was about the Greedy Lumber Companies being against the Go Green concept because it would hurt their bank accounts if too many folks go paperless . And then some of these dumb ass Lumber Farmers don't plant trees to make up for what they removed . They are as greedy as many of these other big business' .

The D&C paper has sunrise / sunset times in the Weather section . On line --- Accu weather gives hour by hour forecast plus the sunrise / sunset .

I heard that the occupy folks plan to start a protest on some of the Logging Industries . They claim the logging of forest land is detrimental to the Go Green Movement . Maybe they will get some action there .

I would hate to be staring at the Monster Truck in my rear view mirror !

Are you going to use those arrows for Tomato Stakes in the spring ?

Arrived at my hunting spot in Geneseo at 5:30 today . Was at the stand by 5:45 . I had taken the pole saw and did some trimming as there was enough moonlight to see . Got up in the stand and sat back and rested . Ay 6:55 I saw a buck step into the field about 300 yards away . He wandered across and came into the lane-way . It was a small rack 6 point and he came within 40 yards of me down wind . He never looked at me but foot stomped and wandered off . About a half hour later I saw a doe in the neighbor's lower pasture lot . My oldest son showed up at 10:30 . I met him at my vehicle and we loaded a ladderstand on my ATV and we headed for the woods . We put the stand in a tree that he hunted from a few years ago . His plan is to use hiw 44 mag pistol in the woods . We took care of a job for my SIL and he left . My youngest son showed up around 1:00 . I had a couple sandwiches and we chatted . Put our hunting clothes on and I showed him the different stands and gave him his choice . He took the stand in the willow tree . I took the stand by the mowed horse trail . To my right was and overgrown field with thickets . Boring !!!!!!! At 4:09 I got busted by a couple does . I was looking down the trail through the brush and when I straightened up the does blew and took off . About 4:30 i saw 2 deer leaping through the high grass towards where my son was sitting . I waited a few minutes and texted him to see if he had seen then and he had . At 4:50 he called and said he had shot at one of them . Told him to check his arrow . Nothing on it but dirt . We checked the area where the buck had run through and there was no sign of blood . Walked back and forth and couldn't find any blood anywhere . Nick told me he had seen 3 different bucks from the stand and he said one of them was a Hog . I got my ATV and we headed back to the vehicles , changed clothes and left . That's it for Bow Hunting for the season .

Congrats on a great looking buck !

I am anticipating a problem for opening day . My wife's aunt died and her funeral is Saturday . I told her I would go to the wake Friday but I would be hunting Saturday .

NorthCountry Deer Report Week #5 2011 If you believe in the “lockdown” theory of rut behavior this was your week. The week started with fairly normal rut related deer activity but by the weekend most if not all of the breeder bucks were “locked down” along with the does. Last week we observed 11 bucks, 19 does and 21 fawns in 30 hours of sitting. This averages out to 1.7 deer sighted per hr. This was the second week in a row we had a marked decrease in deer sightings per hr. Unlike prior weeks where 50% of our buck sightings were 2.5 or older this week only 36% of the bucks sighted were 2.5 or older. “Lockdown” refers to that period of the rut when most of the does in a given population are either in estrous or very close to being in estrous. If there are plenty of does in your herd the breeder bucks don’t have to work all that hard to find a doe to breed. Bottom line, instead of walking around looking, they are “locked down” breeding. Does have been harassed so much that they are avoiding their usual hang outs. They are not showing as much on food plots and when they do, they are moving to them later in the day. They lay up with other does and fawns or pair up with a breeder buck for 2 or 3 days at a time. They often seek out the thickest stuff they can find or in out of the way places. This morning I saw the same doe and fawn in my dooryard I observed all spring. I have not seen them since late June. Neil has a whole group of does who have taken to his back yard to escape love crazed bucks. They come to plots late and leave at the slightest sign of buck aggression. Many doe fawn groups have been broken up by bucks and it is not uncommon at all to see lone fawns or fawn twins with no mature does in evidence on food sources. Does and fawns are very much on edge and young bucks are still moving about looking for some “action”. This is what we witnessed through most of last week and this is what we expect to see through most of this week as well. It is tempting to call “rut over”; in fact, a neighbor hunter stopped by with a “rut over” report last Friday (said his buddy read it in the paper). Nothing could be farther from the truth. The rut may be on but all bets will be off as the weekend approaches and the gun hunters take to the woods en mass. From this weekend on (at least for a week or two) hunting pressure will dominate deer behavior. If you have a hunting property with minimal hunting pressure your deer will return to normal in a few days following the gun opener and your population will no doubt grow as pressured deer seek sanctuary on your property. If your property gets hit hard your deer sightings will go down and probably stay down. As far as a bow strategy this week we will be once again hunting “intercept” stands near thick cover. The warm weather will slow down movement but a cold snap will probably put some lead in their pencils. As more and more does are bred this week our breeding bucks will be switching partners which may require moving from point “A” to point “B”. That’s when opportunity will knock. The sightings will be random but the rut is still very much in play and breeding activity is in full swing. You may not see many deer this week but it is an excellent time to intercept a good buck as they go back on the prowl. I just took Radar out for a bit of air and sure enough spotted a nice shooter buck running a doe through the woods 100 yards from a stand I hunted Saturday. Honest I just saw it a minute ago (10:30 a.m.) in the woods next to the cabin. Here I am, writing a report while…………… oh well, I’ll be in the woods this afternoon. We pulled the plug on our ratio and fawn recruitment data gathering for herd monitoring last week as our ratios are currently skewed due to the rut and will continue to be skewed due to gun season. Overall we ate pretty pleased with things here at Kindred Spirits. Slightly under 50% of our bucks are 2.5 or older (this is about as good as we have ever had it). We were also very concerned with fawn recruitment due to our increase in coyote sightings and explosion in bear sightings (someone sees a bear almost every time out). Our recruitment rate seems to be somewhere around .84. (102 does divided into 86 fawns +.84). This is just about dead on with the national average which has a range of from .5 to 1.2 fawns per doe (depending on state). We are pleasantly surprised by this number (remember only a small % of the 1.5 year old does in most areas of NY are bred as fawns). We also observed numerous sets of twins which suggests to us that the coyotes are not making a big impact on our fawn crop. If you have been looking at your twin numbers and you fawn to doe ratio and even your buck ratios all season do your tallies now before the gun harvest changes your numbers significantly. You should also be setting your gun harvest goals this week. Our current buck to doe ratio seems to be about 1 to 2.5. We would like to improve that ratio a bit. We would like to take our overall deer numbers down for winter. There is not a single acorn on the ground nor is there much left in our standing corn. The deer worked the corn stalks in the dry season when growing stalks was the best thing around and the bears worked it at the milk stage. This means we will enter winter many tons of food behind most years (no acorns, no corn and green plots hit hard all summer). Our deer will be eating a lot of browse this winter and that can really impact the native vegetation we have worked so hard to establish over the years. This is a good year to take an extra 10 does or so out of our population and trim back our numbers going forward. We are also hoping to thin out the bears some. Almost every sit someone in our gang sees a bear. They along with the deer ate up our early corn and they are very disruptive to an evening sit when they are working an area. The population in our area is way out of control. Will report next week. This is the time to be thinking about where you are numbers wise on your property. Best get it done now before the season gets away from you. We know it does with us (always waiting for that great shooter and never taking those does). Thanks for all your reports they have been terrific. Keep them coming and hunt safe. www.NorthCountryWhitetails.com 315-331-6959

If they want to protest against Big Business why don't they trash their phones , I-Pods , etc ? What the municipalities should do is Put a fence up around these folks and keep them inside of it !

I have a choice of 8 stands where I will be hunting . Not sure which one . I have it narrowed down to 3 . Trying to figure out where would be the best place to be when the guys with the semi-autos start emptying their guns and the deer are running .

It's forecasted to be 52 degrees in Geneseo opening day

Congrats on the deer . Enjoyed the story .

And ...... what would I fasten it to ? The fart pipe ? I did think about wearing a harness and running a rope over the peak and attach it to the ARV or Mower .

I bought a Photo Share SD viewer a couple years ago for about $30 . It's a handy gadget but has to be charged regularly as the battery drains even when it is off . Shows the pics larger than my camera but is slow to go from pic to pic ..

Not exactly a Honey Do job but I decided to clean the eave troughs today . I had purchased a gadget that has a loop and a nozzle that lets you shoot a pressure stream into the gutter . The theory is fine but it doesn't pack the gear to do the job . I ended up getting out the ladders to pull the leaves out and then used a straight pressure nozzle to clear the troughs . Had to put a step ladder on the peak of the addition to get on the top roof . I was up there spraying away thinking , what the hell am I doing up here ! Each time a little breeze blew , I got a bit nervous . Got it done though and lived to tell about it . I'm getting too old for this crap !