wolc123

Shortly after we were married, my wife and I stopped at a buddy's house, and he had a red fox mounted in the seated position, with its tail wrapped around front and a rabbit or something in its mouth. She thought that was really cool and asked me to get her one. It has taken quite a while, but look what showed up tonight, 5 minutes before the end of legal daylight. My brother-in-law volunteered a bantee rooster for it's mouth. This will probably be the best Christmas ever for her, with a freezer full of venison, topped off by this pretty red.

Last sit for me tonight. This vixen showed up in the wrong place at the wrong time (with 5 minutes of legal daylight to go). My wife has always wanted a fox mounted to sit next to the front door. It looks like I am done Christmas "shopping" now, She should be happy with a freezer full of venison topped off by this pretty red.

?

Do you look down upon us nut-eaters ? How about Rinella ? Is it ok that he eats them ? Is that why you like the early seasons better (before you knew he ate nuts).

Send it.

I can relate to that. My own father and brother are not much into hunting and fishing, nor was my grandfather on my father's side. I think I inherited my own fondness for those activities from my grandfather on my mom's side. He passed before I was old enough to hunt, but he took me fishing a few times while I was in grade school. He also left me his hunting and fishing equipment. Even though my dad and brother were not with me on many hunts, those when they were, were memorable. I will never forget the two red rows of corn, that the only buck my dad ever killed ran between, after he double-lunged it with a slug from his Browning sweet-sixteen pheasant gun. My brother and I had pushed it out of some heavy cover and he shot it right in the middle of the lane behind the barn. They still have that little rack on a plaque next to the fireplace, and I remember that hunt every time I look at it. While the memories of hunts that we have shared with our own families and friends on this earth are comforting, they ain't nothing compared to what we have to look forward to. I can't wait to knock down a nice buck up there with my grandad's Ithaca deerslayer 16-gauge, while he is standing by my side. It is a lot easier to not lament past losses, knowing that such a bright future awaits, and that it will last for eternity

Maybe G-man will chime in and back you up on that. He don't seem like the type to joke around with something like that. Nonetheless, I am quite satisfied with the results of the PA chest-girth chart, having finally got one of my own up on a scale and determined a WMU 9f, mature buck correction factor. If you do happen across that big one you are chasing, over the last few days of ML, why not get a chest girth on it ? If you can't beat them, join them. I still plan on taking Larry up on his offer to weigh one for me if I get a doe. I can't help but notice how many of the PA chest girth snipers have backed off a bit, since I finally put one up on a scale. I have to thank SJ, for being brave enough to take a tape measure to his daughter's buck. That gave me the incentive to throw one of my own up on a scale. Have you noticed that in all cases, the NY deer have been HEAVIER than predicted by that chart ? Not that weight means much to me, being that is is mostly water. VOLUME is where it is at. Good luck on your last few hunts this season, and I hope you get that big one.

Well I am a little short of doe data so I might take you up on that if I can get one of those this weekend. I don't want no gun pointed at me though, so you will have to hang her on the scale and read it (I can work the tape measure). I could provide a forklift and/or winch. SJ wants me to pass bb's, so if a pair of siblings shoes up, I will aim for the smaller one. Might as well start with a milk-fed doe fawn.

I am thinking she will taste identical to a bb. It is all about what they eat and milk makes them taste best. I know of a great former President who took up raising cattle after his retirement from public service. He dominated the beef competition in the US, in the early 60's, by finishing his Angus beefers on Holstein milk.

Your still $ 4 short since all the siphoning off of funds for the sheep hunt. The telescoping boom fork-truck out front would make the loading easy right now.

It is not over until it's over, so keep at it. I will send one up for you (a prayer that is), to get it done with you crossbow. I am tempted to break mine out again this weekend, since missing a doe with my ML up in the mountains last weekend. The Good Lord must have had a different end in mind for that big doe, putting a branch in just the right place to deflect my bullet up and over her back. Our own venison supply is secure, but I would like to get another for my brother-in law, who raises beef cattle and makes the best jerky from half ground venison and half ground beef. I don't mind a good steak on occasion, but I know that venison is a lot better for my heart. Also, it is hard to imagine the flavor or texture of any beef topping that of medium-rare, milk-fed, button-buck backstrap. Don't be afraid to take one of those. They say they are the "dumbest deer in the woods". I don't know about that, but I do know that they are the tastiest. To be fair, I have not tried a doe fawn yet but a buddy gave us one this year so I will finally get to try that after the bb is gone. We usually eat them in order of arrival, but I will save some of the bb roasts for "special occasions". The doe fawn was a lot smaller. I did not get a chest-girth on her but it looked like she made about 25 pounds of de-boned meat vs around 50 pounds from the bb. She was killed with a rifle bullet through the heart, so there was not a lot of bloodied-up meat to trim away, but there was none of that on the crossbow-killed bb. That is another big advantage of using the crossbow instead of the ML, you don't end up with bloodied-up meat to trim away.

Fortunately I have done well enough hunting (and fishing) that trips to the store for meat have not been necessary. How's your season going ?

You all can put the whole wad towards Biz's sheep hunt. Now that I have a PA chest-girth / NY correction factor (thanks to putting one of my own on a scale this fall, and a few of the braver scale-owners here breaking out their tape measures), the only way I would weigh another would be at gun-point. I will throw in $ 10 towards that sheep hunt if it is a "button-ram" and you save me the liver.

I think there is a "block" feature you could use to take care of that.

Is weight important to you ? What percentage of a the weight of a fresh killed deer is made up of water ? If I told you it was about 60 %, would it still be real important to you ? Sometime, if you decide to let one hang a week or so and have a $20 scale handy, it would be interesting to weigh it again at the end of the week. I checked the chest girth at the start of an 11 day hang and again after and the number did not change. Volume, not weight is the important thing when you are looking to estimate how much meat is needed to last for a year. Water contains no calories and can not sustain life by itself. For this reason, weight means nothing to me.

In the first pic with the gun, it don't look as heavy, but that second one, with the buck out front of your dad, caused me to guess higher. I guess it is kind of like making a fish look bigger by holding it way out front and shooting from a low camera angle. Less fat is why I prefer processing buck's over does. It takes me a lot of time to trim off that fat, which I don't even like in the grind.

I will go with 163 pound dressed weight and 40" chest girth (it is too late to get that now though) for Biz's dad's buck. I will also guess that he got about 75 pounds of meat back.

You betcha. That is why I am interesting in gathering more semi-meaningless data from folks with scales. Did you ever measure any of your's ? It would be interesting if we could find even a single case where the deer's dressed weight was lighter than predicted by the PA chest-girth chart. As I have said repeatedly, I don't place a whole lot of value on a deer's dressed weight, since most of it constists of water which has zero nutritional value. A few folks on here seem quite fixated on it however, even offering me a free scale a time or two. "Volume" of venison is what is important to me.

There were a lot of antlerless deer around my in-laws place in WMU 6c this weekend. Saturday morning, I left their house for the woods a little after 7 am. They took pictures of three, eating the birdseed below their back deck, at 9:00 am. All I saw in the woods that morning were lots of tracks. That afternoon, I hunted a bit closer to the house and saw a single antlerless deer walking thru the woods at 3 pm, that never offered me good shot. This morning, I got to my favorite late-season spot up there (about a mile away) at about 7:00 am. Sunrise was 7:23, and at 7:45, I saw a single antlerless deer, moving slowly through the pines. I was standing in a little clump of cover, When she stopped, 60 yards away, I thought I had a clear shot at her front shoulder. I centered the crosshairs on her shoulder blade and fired. I was surprised to see her run out of the plume of smoke, along with two other antlerless deer. I reloaded and walked over to where she had stood, finding no blood or hair. I followed the three sets of tracks a ways, finding no blood in the powdery snow. Returning to the spot where I had fired, I noted a branch in the path of the bullet, with a cut across the top where the bullet must have struck, probably deflecting it away from the intended target. About 15 minutes later, another antlerless deer approached, but never offered an "extremely" clear shot, so I passed. I know this area pretty good, having hunted it for the last 7 years After a couple more hours, I circled around, and still-hunted into the wind, thru the area where they usually bed. I jumped (4) antlerless deer up there (a group of (3) and a single). Each one appeared perfectly healthy, and none offered a good shot. I am fairly certain that the doe I missed was the leader of the group that had been feeding at my in-laws house. That was my last hunt up there for the year. At least the in-laws will still have the entertainment of watching the deer clean up the spilled birdseed below their deck this winter. I will have to try and fill my muzzleloader tag back here in the southern zone next weekend. This was the first of (4) trips up there this season where I did not see any sign of an antlered deer. There were some nice fresh scrapes on my last (3) trips. Surely, with all those doe around, there should be more next year. I have the opposite problem at home, where almost all the deer I see have antlers. Even the one I thought was a doe, turned out to be a bb when I walked up to the carcass to gut it. Fortunately, I will have another tag for "antlered" ones, once ML season opens up here next weekend.

That one seems to underestimate the dressed weights by more than the PA chart (at least for the larger chest girths). Now I see why you use the PA chart. Do you have any of your own numbers that you could share ? I am especially interested in doe numbers. The correlation that Tac's and I got, with WMU 9f bucks, was pretty close to the PA chart.

The two properties that I hunt in the southern zone (on opposite corners of WMU 9F) add up to about 100 acres. I am the only one who hunts them and have been averaging about (2) deer a year for quite a while. Does are getting harder to get the last few years because the a few farmers, located in between, hammer them pretty hard with their nuisance permits before October 1. The buck hunting has been pretty good though. I have seen them on almost every sit since tagging out on opening day of gun. I am eagerly awaiting the opening of ML season, when I will have another buck tag. It has been a while since I killed (3) bucks in a year. That would be doable this year, including the bb that I used a DMP on during archery. I certainly won't pass on a doe, if one gives me a chance, but I don't expect to get any more cracks at one of those this year. As far as your question goes, there really is no "too many" in zone 9F at this time. The state has been struggling with overpopulation here for many years. I have (3) more DMP's in addition to an antlerless and either/or ML/archery tag next week. Even though I have enough venison for our immediate family (a buddy gave me a couple in addition to the two that I killed), I would not hesitate to fill more tags if I get the chances. My brother-in-law makes awesome jerky from half venison, half beef (which he raises). Making venison into jerky, for people to enjoy, beats the heck out of feeding coyotes with it. That is what happens to most of them that fall to those nuisance permits. It also beats having them get hit by cars.

Now we have (4) NY deer that were all heavier than predicted my the PA chart. Different correction factors for each DMU would be nice. Tac's and mine had nearly the same correction factor and they were both 9F's. Also, there should probably be different charts for bucks and does. Does typically carry a lot more weight in their rear ends, especially post-rut. That would explain why Buckmaster's doe was so far off the chart, in addition to his getting it on the scale 2.5 hours after the kill. The faster you get them on the scale, the higher the percentage of the weight is made up of water. I imagine he ain't worried too much about that while watching some play on Broadway.

Happy not sad, especially if he saved the liver. When the Good Lord blesses you with one of those "fatted calves" it is as good as it gets.

You are welcome. That is cool. Maybe I will go back and see if I can find the skull from mine back on the carcass pile. I have some seasoned rough-cut walnut in the barn. My dad could make a nice plaque for it with his planer. Usually the yotes drag them back to their den, so it is probably gone. There may be a den back in our woods though, so I might still find it. I saw a very fat coyote run out of there last Sunday afternoon.

I don't shoot spikes, but button bucks and hen turkeys are yummy. Crossbows are awesome and I don't mind the seasons like they are now.