Al Bundy

This year not as bad as last for ticks for me, so far anyway. I only pulled like 2 or 3 off my lab this past weekend. None on me yet. But good advice.

I can place it further away, but then the shooter has to shoot toward the cliff. I would like to avoid that scenario. I did think the deer would be spooked by this thing until they get used to it. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

I put out my popup ground blind for the mrs. and am actually rethinking where I should put it. The deer run a trail literally the edge of a cliff. A foot or two off the trail is a large dropoff/cliff. I didn't want to put the blind right on the trail, so I placed it about 6 ft away, on the no cliff side of course. Not sure this is optimum. I figured they would see the blind in their trail and change their pattern if I Had place the blind on the trail. Wondering now if I should put right on the trail... ??

One main gun since 1983, 12gauge Browning. Has shot large numbers of waterfowl, some number of whitetails, some turkey. All I have on it is the factory dark bead at the end of the barrel. No scope. Never been an issue for me. Second gun a year or two ago now, scoped 30-06 rifle. Have not gotten a shot yet with the rifle yet. It can be done without a scope. Back in the day, nobody in my hunting crew used a scope.

grrrrrr. a six just snuck up behind me made me and trotted off..

i swear i got grunted ar a bit ago. couldnt see as its thick where grunts were.

no wind here. quiet still and a great morning. where are the deer????

lots of nothing for me. not even damn squirrel.

Doubt wind did that. The string hangs to about five feet off the ground so I can easily grab it. It was looped 10-15 ft above that. No way wind would be able to blow that much line. Would have hung up on branches, even if wind blew that hard.

I arrived to my stand, tied my bow on the string and climbed up. Went to pull up my bow and noticed the string was wrapped around an upper branch. Literally looped around. At first I was like well maybe I wrapped it last year. But leaving stand today noticed no way that was possible. I was able to stand on a branch and pull up my bow and unwrap the string. A bit loud, a bit clunky, but only a pain in the ass and not dangerous. Wtf...

so far... nothing. wind and a bit of a chill.

lots of wind. wife not getting up this morning. going solo.

Smoothies/juice whatever you want to call it. throw apples, some bananas or other fruit in blender, add some milk or yogurt or coconut juice or ??. Liberally add honey from your hives if you got any and blend it all up. good stuff. This year was a banner year for my apples trees and this is what I been doing. OK wife been doing...

My wife hunts with me and I was quick to give her the best spot I could. I am also quick to get doe tags if possible. I got her a popup camo tent she can sit in and stay hidden and play on her phone. On drives, she is usually a shooter and seldom a driver. If she is not seeing much, maybe she is squirming around pretty good and getting spotted. Maybe you could ever so gently suggest to try and remain a bit more still. Good luck..

This is actually an issue I have been dealing with for a few years now. I hunt on an 18 acre piece and another 7 acre that is next to it. The 18 acre piece is owned by several people, and each hunts and wants others to hunt there. Commonly 3-4 people would hunt it and there was talk of others coming to hunt it. 7 acre would have 2. There were 4 on the 18 one opening morning. I didnt hunt that day as I would have been 5th. I was across the street and watched the police come yet again. I finally put my foot down and said this was crazy and someone was going to get hurt. Caused a big rift, I became public enemy #1 and still am. Good thing is nobody got shot. I think packing people on the land like sardines is begging for an accident. For reasons unknown, I was the only one who thought/thinks this. It was doable, somewhat safely kind of maybe, if each hunter knew to point in one direction only, don't move anywhere, etc. I was not at all comfortable with this though.

My neighbor on the other side already calls the police quite often when I shoot or when hunting. I don't want a repeat of that. I tend to think if I spoke to the land owner and said this person walks their dog and screws up my hunting he would likely say So what.. I was more thinking maybe when the person walked their dog I could be friendly and approach and mention that people are hunting out here and maybe its not the safest thing to walk through the woods during hunting season and allow your dog to run around off leash. Not sure how this may be met. Sometimes it looks like a mother walks the dog and other times looks like a young teenage daughter. They did spook a doe on me last year and who knows how many other deer I didn't see got spooked.

One semi close neighbor owns a house and 1 acre that butts up against where I hunt. Most mornings weekends one person from the house takes their dog for a walk through the woods and pass by within 50 or so yards of me. This usually during bow season. I don't own the piece they walk on, and neither do they. I would like to ask them to not walk in the area but I am afraid this will backfire. I don't own the land so I really have no claim to ask them not to go there. I also heard from a former neighbor at least one person in the house "enjoys seeing the animals". I don't think they have seen me in the tree ever as they are watching the dog and not looking in my direction. They must hear my shooting at times so are aware at least guns are around. Its really annoying as any deer will hear and see them walking and the dog is often times barking at whatever it sees. Any ideas on how to approach them? Leave it be?

I had a shop refuse to give me my car back after they looked at it. Brakes were grinding and they said something like it was the worst car they had ever seen, completely rusted and not safe to drive. The car was old and had some rust and did need pads and maybe rotors but that was it. They shoved an estimate at me for several thousand and told me in no uncertain terms they were not letting me drive the car out of there. Ahhh no. I was polite at first and said no I will take my car thanks . It escalated from there and I finally said if they did not give me my car they could explain to the police why they were withholding my property. They wanted me to sign a legal waiver saying they were not responsible if anything happened. Took the car home and replaced the pads and rotors in a parking lot.

Hmmm. Never thought about a distance competition. Not a bad idea! She is an awesome lab and loves loves loves water and jumping. Last month boat trip on Long Island sound. I stopped for a dunk in the water as it was HOT. 3-4 of us were splashing around when my buddy comes by and screams out is all OK since I was adrift. Y and me and others start chanting to him "JUMP JUMP JUMP"... What does my lab do? She clears about a 3ft rail and LAUNCHED into Long Island Sound.. I guess she thought we were telling her to jump in. Scene of the crime attached....

Check out the images. A bit far away but they look good if you download and expand them. My lab is primed for ducks! Had her retrieving 3 sticks at once and I am hoping this translates into doubles. I wish I had time to go for resident Canadas.

The other thing not mentioned here is tastes change.... The popular wine grape of yesterday may not be a good seller today. At some point in time there is a financial decision to be made to pull old vines and replant with newer more productutive, more disease resistant, more in demand.

Website needs a major overhaul in my opinion. Lack of details seems a bit worrysome. I check this one now and again: http://www.terrafugia.com/ (flying car)

What a great season closer. Two days of hunting and two fairly successful hunts. My lab did great! I worried about her breaking and chasing. She did great though. No hint of breaking and she stayed fairly well alongside me. Sat dropped a few, my lab kind of tried to grab them. She had it in her head she was supposed to get it but was a bit unsure. At home after half hour of throwing, she had it figured. Then.. Sunday morning a bit of a far shot, my hunting partner dropped one. My lab ran with him to go get it. He points, commands "BACK" and that dog took off and didnt miss a beat grabbing it and bringing it back the entire way to the truck. Wagging her tail and head held high she was prancing around with her prize. She proved herself a hunter.

You could go it without decoys actually. If the fields you hunt already attract the geese then you should be in good shape without them with some caveats. If the field(s) are monster corn fields with no hedgerows or usable brush then decoys might be better. If however the fields do have cover and some hedge rows then you can stalk them. Often times this is lots of effort, but its do-able. a good number of days of my youth were spent belly crawling through a corn field or sneaking through a woods. Use the terrain of the field and your brain to figure a good stalk approach. Many times you can get within shooting range by being stealthy. Also helps to have a non shooter. You can get into a position where the non shooter pushes the geese toward you for times when you cant sneak up. Maybe there are a few knolls or a patch of cover you can get to. The non shooter stands where the geese can see them and feed away from the non shooter, toward the shooter. Ultimately the non shooter walks toward the geese "pushing" them to fly over the shooter. The wind comes into play in this scenario if blowing. I have almost never hunted with decoys, but have shot many many Canadas using the techniques listed here. Its possible. One more thing to mention, safety. Safety. Safety.... Now and again stories about stalking decoys circulate. I actually had a very scary situation years ago with this. Be careful. good luck. Snow season is coming up and if you are fortunate to attract snows to your fields its really a blast.

Finished round one of shoveling. Light snow, not bad to shovel. I had a Hollywood moment. Slipped and fell flat on my back, just like you would see in a movie. A layer of ice below the snow, where my gutter leaked. Didn't hurt as much as one would think. Wasn't fun though. My lab is loving this snow. Round two of shoveling in a while.