Cabin Fever

Oh yeah. Sure saves a lot of $$ on buying urine too! Charles Alsheimer says that he urinates in his mock scrapes also. I don't know why, but last fall, I had a grey fox come into my most active mock scrape on several occasions and it would roll around in it!

Excellent quality! Great bucks too!!

My local Walmart required me to show them my pistol permit before they would sell me 9mm ammo. I was pissed, as I needed to go back home to get it!!

Did you ask him when the RUT will be this fall???? Also, where do they to disappear to during gun season???

BTW, those are all videos. The only one where the buck seems on on edge is the last one, but even then, he doesn't seem very spooked. I've never put anything on the licking branch. I just whiz in the scrapes myself.

They may notice it, but I've never had the kind of reaction that that guy did in his research! They may look at it and think, "WTH". I've gotten the same bucks visiting the same scrapes over and over again on video. Maybe because they are rutting and let their guard down? I dunno. I mount my cams 3-4' high and nothing special! The scrape where most of these videos were taken, are all me.... scrape, urine, and all! LOL Some scrape vid's....

That plot is usually really wet in the spring and holds standing water for a while. That was my only concern with doing it in March.

We're considering selling my house and we walked a realtor through it. When we got to the family room and she saw the mounts (3 bucks, a gobbler, and a squirrel) and antlers, she said that, "I might want to remove those from the house before any potential buyers come through, as they may not like them and be offended". WTF?? I stearnly told her if someone felt "offended" by them, that they didn't have to buy my house!!! She shut right up!! How STUPID!?!?!?

Very cool! Damn, all the time I've spent out looking for sheds in the past few years and I've only found ONE!!!

I have a couple existing clover plots that are getting thin. I mowed it a couple weeks ago, as I thought the weeds were taking over, and purposely I mowed it short ("yard" kind of short!), thinking the clover was all done for. Now, it seems like the clover has really perked back up again (maybe because of getting more rain) and I think it looks promising. I would like to overseed it while it's mowed so short, as I think the seed would have good soil to seed contact. My disc broke last year, so I can't disc the plot. I do have a york rake, that I could scratch the ground up with before seeding, but it may destroy the existing clover.? Do you think the seed would germinate well by just overseeding without working the ground?

During the spring season, I regularly saw 2 hens hanging around my one foodplot. I figured they had nests in the nearby thicket. All summer, I've been seeing 4 hens (I assume the same 2 that were joined by 2 others), always together, in the same area. I've seen them on multiple occasions and have a bunch of pics of them also. The odd thing is, they have NO poults with them. Not even one! I don't know if nest raiders wiped out their nests or what? There were gobblers in the same area in the spring, so they certainly should have been bred. We don't have many turkeys in my area anyway, so I'm pretty bummed that recruitement isn't going to be squat this year!

I always started mine the first week of October, when season opened ~Oct 15th. Some years (like last year), my scrapes are HOT before season opens, being visited by mature bucks. If you have community scrapes on your property anyway, I wouldn't hesitate to get one started mid-late Sept. Might be a good experiment anyway! Scrapes are my favorite place to have cams setup to get videos in the fall! You learn so much and it's so cool to see how the deer interact with the scrape and overhanging branch! It's amazing to see how many bucks visit the same scrapes too! I bet 75%+ of the bucks come in and just work the licking branch, without actually freshening the scrape! Before setting my cams up over the scrapes, I always judged how hot the scrape was, by how fresh it appeared. NOT the case!!

That's EXACTLY right!!

I bet you were just itching to check that cam too!! Nice buck!!

My son's lifetime license finally arrived today.

It dawned on me last week how close we are to season. I went out and checked all 10 stands, to make sure they were all good and secure. I trimmed up 7 of the stands, so they're all good to go and I won't need to go back out to them. I'll get out this week and finish the other 3 stands! After that, I'm all done! Just need to wash the camo!

OMG!!!!

Looks like you found the "sweet spot"!

It says its a large (lg).

I noticed that also. The catalog definately said $103.99 though, after rebate. Unfortunately, I tossed the catalog into the recycle bin and they picked it up yesterday... Whoops! Might be worth calling to confirm.

Of course, it's not gonna get an accurate reading through brush. My concern is in open hardwoods. This model uses a box in the center, instead of a crosshair type reticle, to take a reading. From what I've read, and from what Elmo has described, the box makes it more difficult to lock onto a specific target.

Very nice!!! Boy, PA bucks have come a long way since I hunted there last ~8 or so years ago!

Your right! This was the one complaint that I read about on some of the reviews. So it might be difficult to get a reading 100+ yards through the woods, due to other trees, branches, and such?

I can't believe you posted this! I was gonna do the same thing! I've never really needed a rangefinder, as I always limit my bow shots to 25 yards and I typically step that off at each stand before season, so I know my limits. I think I would like to have a rangefinder, even to help my son (17) to start judging distances, for bow and gun. I'm just not sure I want one bad enough to spend $179+ on other brands? (That could be another cam!) I saw the Simmons in the Cabelas catalog for $104 after rebate and it sure is tempting me! I read the reviews at Cabelas and several other sites and people are happy with them! It's only a 4x though and I would prefer a 6x, but don't think getting another brand with a 6x is worth the extra $80+. Again, IF I had more use for it, it would be. I just haven't made my mind up yet!

For me personally, it really depends. From mid-late summer, I sometimes have to move my cams to a different area, as I see the same bucks (and does with fawns) over and over again! At times, even after moving the cams a few hundred yards, I'll still get some pics of the same bucks! From October through late November, when the bucks are out patrolling and moving around more, it's not uncommon for me to only get pics of a buck 1x, if they are just moving through the area. But, sometimes I get multiple pics of the same bucks then too. For example, the buck in my avatar. I got pics of him in 4 different locations and multiple times. The last time was mid-Feb (still packing his rack), so I know he made it through last season. BTW, interesting observation about the bucks just walking through your plot! I've found the same to be true with my plots! You would think by putting the plots right in their normal travel route that they would stop to feed, but the deer seem to just use my plots as a crossing as well! I've tried about everything to plant in them, but it just doesn't seem to matter! I've given up! My property is surrounded by corn, soybeans, and an apple orchard. Maybe they don't want to eat anything at my plots and spoil their appetite, as they head to the ag fields and apples!