Pygmy

Tastes vary..... Plain ground venison is very dry and difficult to make into a burger... For my BURGER, I always add some beef... Sometimes I use chunks of chuck or brisket, other times I add some 70-30 0r 80-20 ground beef...I use this for burgers, meatballs, meatloaf, chili, tacos, salami or any other dish that would call for ground beef.. I feel that most good pan sausages need some pork.. I add some chunks of pork butt to my breakfast or Italian sausage... Live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse... ;D ..... I can't help but think that my venison burger and sausage is still significantly healthier than straight beef or pork , since the end product is still 75 or 80 percent venison and the beef and pork I add is not pure fat, but meat with some fat content.. Are any of you familiar with the " Heart Healthy" diet...??.. There is one rule of thumb.... If it tastes GOOD....Spit it out....

Culver... Remember Coneseus in the GLORY days of perch fishing when you would see groups of several hundred fishermen all across the lake..??.. I have only been out once this year..Fished Keuka a couple of weeks ago with a buddy We fished the Penn Yan end and kept 45 nice bluegills..Put back at least as many smaller ones.. I had an invite to go back up today, but at -3 degrees, it's just too durn cold for this old fart to go out on the ice...

A grizzled old Marine Gunnery Sergeant, upon his retirement.. " When I joined the Corps, homosexuality was illegal... Now they tell it's optional.... I'm going to get the hell out before Obama makes it MANDATORY..!!.."

Hehehehehe..Gotta LOVE those Jarheads... ...

Due to a divorce a few years back, I no longer have room for some of my taxidermy mounts and am considering selling some of the larger ones, such as my caribou shoulder mounts.. I'm not sure where to start or how much they are worth.. Has anyone had any experience selling mounted big game heads..??.. I'd be grateful for any input...

Savage 93R17 in .17 HMR for sale..Excellent condition..It has a few small handling marks.. Wood stock...Bull barrel... BSA 3x 12x 40 Sweet 17 scope.... The rifle is about two years old ..I bought it new and have only shot about 200 rounds through it.. It groups under an inch at 100 yards with any ammo I have tried it... About 450 rounds of ammo go with it.. $250 takes the whole shootin' match...

Good luck with your retirement, Dave... I adjusted to retirement REAL fast... Took to it like a duck takes to water.. I am very fortunate to have several good friends with similar interests who retired at about the same time I did... I am also very fortunate to live in a beautiful rural area where hunting and fishing opportunities are literally right in my back yard...

Fishing... LOTS of fishing... I have a boat and the Finger lakes are a short drive away....After the ice goes out I try to get the boat out at least two days a week....I don't ice fish as much as I used to but still getout a few times each winter.. I support my hunting and fishing by handloading my own ammo and making my own fishing lures, such as flies and hair jigs.. HUNTING... LOTS of hunting... I hunt deer and turkey in season and extend my hunting with lots of small game hunting..My freezer is well stocked with squirrels and rabbits, plus a few ducks and goose breasts... The Month of may is committed to turkey hunting.. I hunt gobblers in Ontario, PA and NY... My significant other finds LOTS of domestic stuff for me to do in the meantime....We keep up yardwork on 3 different properties.... I take an out of state hunting or fishing trip now and then... And sometimes I take a couple hours in the afternoon and have a beer or two with my buddies at the local American legion... Other than THAT, I don't do much.... ....

As VJP said, the Mag 10 was developed BECAUSE of steel shot...That was before the development of the 3.5 inch 12 gauge , so it was a definite step up performance wise from the 3" 12 gauge... A disadvantage of the big 10 is that is is a big, heavy gun... I wouldn't want to haul one much further than my back yard... It also takes some getting used to swinging on waterfowl...Not what you would call a dynamically lively gun for wingshooting... The development of the 3.5 inch 12 pretty much put the magnum 10 gauge on the back burner... Payloads for the long 12 gauge are nearly equal to the 10 mag, and there are much lighter and better handling guns available...They do KICK like hell, however.. ??? ... Personally, if I can't get my game close enough to kill with a 3" 12 gauge, I guess I don't need to kill 'em that bad... ....

They even have a BLACK one on the website.... Give me a minute to get a beer and some popcorn.... ...

Yeah, it's fun researching hunts yourself... Most of my hunts have been DIY... I took my one and only muley buck on a DIY early high country hunt near Eagle, Colorado in The Holycross Wilderness area...

Nothing here in Steuben that would stress them much yet... There's a little crust now and maybe a foot of snow, but nothing to limit the deers' mobility.. As long as they are mobile, they can get plenty of above ground browse... At this point, thier fat reserves would about get them through the winter, even if groceries DO get a little hard to access.. It takes a pretty severe winter down here ( as far as snow conditions go) to affect deer survival very much, and we haven't had one of those in YEARS...

A good way to find a good hunt is through a booking agent.. It doesn't cost anything to use them..The outfitters pay them to drum up business..The good ones will find you a hunt that fits your budget and even help you apply for tags, etc... I ( and a number of my friends) have had good luck with Butch Manasse's Outdoor Adventures.. I don't have the website addy at hand, but it's easy to find on the net.. Give 'em a call...Talk to Wally, Butch or any of the reps and tell them what you want to hunt and what you can afford.. They are nice folks and very honest and down to earth..They'll find you a good hunt.. Mulie hunts for decent representative animals can still be had pretty reasonable...Keep in mind that if you want to hunt areas with high trophy potential, you'll probably have to pay more $$$.. Good luck and let us know how you make out..

Reminds me of one of those guns that I SHOULD have bought but did not... About 20-25 years ago an elderly friend of mine offered to sell me his Marlin 30-30 rifle for $100.. I don't know if it was a 36 or a 336, but it was rifle (24"barrel) with a half magazine and it was not drilled and tapped for a scope.. It was in very good condition..I ended up passing on it, simply because I had ENOUGH guns and I did not really need it .. Wish now I had bought it..The old gent passed away about a year ago..

Good point, Bubba... I agree about the knowing my target and beyond.. I am very conciencious about that and have passed up many shots at deer, turkeys, and other game to avoid hitting more than one critter...In this case, I must have been concentrating on my trigger squeeze and never saw the little nipper amble up behind his Mom..I know he wasn't there when she first stopped and I got her in my scope.. Just goes to show ya.. No matter how careful you are, sometimes "compost occurs"....

I would say yes, you did the right and honorable thing.... Sometimes "compost occurs" and you have to make the best of the situation.... I had a somewhat similar situation occur a few years ago.... I was with a group driving a woodlot...I was on drive and one of the standers shot, and a group of deer came back through the drivers...They passed to my left on the flank of the drive, where I knew I had a safe shot...A nice doe long nosed adult doe was in the lead, and when she stopped broadside at about 30 yards, I settled the crosshairs on her ribs and squeezed off a shot... She bolted and went running up the hill, and I could see the blood pumping out of her side, so I knew I made a good shot.. I walked up to where she had stood, and just beyond where she was standing when I took the shot, lay a button buck, shot in the head...Evidently, when I was concentrating on my target, the fawn had stepped up behind her and I did not realize he was there, and the slug went through her ribcage and then through his little melon head.. I HAD two antlerless permits, but I only had ONE of them with me.... I could have left the second deer lay and driven home to get my other permit, but one of the other hunters in the group offered to tag the button buck and was glad to take it... Technically, it was illegal... Somebody else tagged a deer which I shot... This was BEFORE the days when you could sign over a DMP to another person.. Illegal..??.. Yes..... Unethical..??... With no malice aforethought , I don't think so.... We did what seemed sensible and practical....

Take a headnet and LOTS of bug dope.... .... Good luck, hope you get a nice bear and lots of fish...

Stoney is doing fine... Recovering well from his bypass surgery... He's contracting again down at Sullivan Park ( 3rd time back since he retired) and doing rehab therapy at Healthworks.. He's not doing the moose hunt with me, but I think he's got a New Mexico elk hunt in the works.... Good luck in Ohio...Some great hunting there, if you're into the big whitetail thing..

Weapon of choice...CZ-550 American in 9.3 x 62 Scope... M8 4x Leupold Load.. Barnes 250 grain TSX over RL-15... 2600 FPS... Shoots as flat as a 30-06/180 grain.. Kills great with little bloodshot meat..You can "eat right up to the hole"... .. I plan to take TWO rainsuits and TWO pairs of muck boots... ;D .... Are you going too, Larry..??..

Cool.... Is it a hound hunt..??..

I've just been invited on a Newfoundland moose hunt this September with a group of friends... I don't even have all the details yet, other than we will be hunting opening week of the moose season, which opens September 10th... The party I am going with has hunted with this outfitter several times, and they always tag out...We'll be flying in by helicopter, which will be a first for me... I'm pretty excited..I really enjoy moose hunting..I've hunted them 3 times in Alaska and once in New Brunswick, but this will be my first Newfie hunt.. Anybody else have an out of state big game hunt planned..??..

I wasn't advising, I was just "commenting".... .... I like to keep things simple with my gear eliminate as many VARIABLES ( pun intended) as possible... .....

12 ounces.... I could live with that.... ;D ..... I've just seen so many guys take a really nice handling rifle or shotgun and put a huge, heavy, fat over powered MONSTROSITY on it... And ruin it's handling and athesthetic qualities... Simply because they think they need a variable with a lot of magnification...Seems like everyone thinks they need a 3 x 9 to hunt deer.. They would take a cheap 3x9 any day before rather than a better quality, lower powered fixed power scope.. Here's an example.. A friend of mine, who is an excellent deer hunter, described his "new" deer rifle to me...It was a Remington pump, probably a 7600, in 7mm08.... The scope he put on it was a 4 x 14 X abomination with a huge objective lens... I can't remember what make..It could be the best scope in the world, and it would still be inappropriate.. Then, to add insult injury, he put a BIPOD on the thing... Talk about taking a decent deer rifle and turning it into something damn near worthless as far as FUNCTION goes... Now, if he had put a nice fixed 4x Leupy or Zeiss, or , if he really felt he needed a variable, perhaps a 1-4x or 1-5x quality scope on it, he would have had a nice deer rig... As it turned out, he ended up with a rifle that would be better suited for Buck Rogers to use to shoot lunar elk.... .... ... ... And those huge objectives... They are not an issue when talking about hunting during legal shooting hours... My binoculars are Leica 8 x 42 Trinivoids...Not exactly cheap glass... I have looked through my M8 4X Leupolds in the woods WELL before legal shooting time, and then looked through my Leica binocs, and that 4x 33mm scope was brighter than the binocs. Good optics gather enough light for shooting under any responsible hunting situation, even with a 20 MM objective..

You guys know what opinions are like.... .... I'm sure that you will think mine STINKS, and that's Ok, I promise not to be offended but I'm going to give it anyway, just for the sake of conversation... I can see no utiliity in putting a high power variable scope on a shotgun...Why put such a big, heavy, large objective monstrosity on a rig for shooting deer sized animals at ranges of less than 200 yards..??.. I do not even OWN a 3 x 9 scope...My highest power scope ( and the only variable that I use ) is a 2 x 7, and it is more scope than I need.. I keep it set on 2 power most of the time.. My "go to" scope is a 4x fixed Leupold and I have killed deer and caribou with it at 300 and 400 yards, no problem... Those big variables are heavier, bulkier, and really throw off the balance and lines of a nice hunting rifle or shotgun... Most of us would be better served by buying the highest quality fixed power scope that we can afford... I can't imagine needing more than a 4 power on a shotgun, or a 6 power on a rifle, unless you are into shooting at extreme ranges, meaning 400 yards and over.. The advantages of a good fixed power relatively low magnification scope for a big game rifle are... Relatively light weight.....long eye relief.... wider field of view...less bulk and better handling....PLUS less stuff to go wrong...Not the LEAST of which is having it set on HIGH power when a close shot opportunity presents itself... I don't know of any of my friends who has not had his scope set on 9 power and had a deer jump up at close range and could not get the critter in his scope.. That does not happen to me with my fixed 2.5 or 4x scopes... Strangely enough, when I get a shot at longer ranges, I have never missed an opportunity due to LACK of magnification.. Just my view on things... ....