
wolc123
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Everything posted by wolc123
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If you head to the Seaport, be sure you get the tour of that whaling ship. I remember it being relatively inexpensive and very informative. I was there about 20 years ago. Ever since, I have been wanting to try one of those "Nantucket sleigh-rides". The closest I ever came to that was having a 21" small-mouth bass drag my canoe around Cuba lake for a little bit. I can only imagine how getting a harpoon into a big humpback and wrapping the line around the loggerhead would make for quite the boat ride. The USS Nauteless Museum, just a few miles to the north, was free back then and also pretty interesting.
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If that ^^ was a black bear, instead of a deer, the yellow arrow would be just about in the perfect spot to aim, don't you think ? It looks a little far back for a deer though.
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The sky is the limit when it comes to what you can spend on food plots but they need not be so expensive. I never include the cost of tractors, mowers, etc because that stuff is needed anyhow for basic property maintenance. I just add up the input costs directly related to the foodplots, and that consists of fertilizer, fuel, and seed costs. I also do not include any allowance for my time, because that is not really work for me, since I enjoy all of it. I measure the output in pounds of boneless venison taken on or adjacent to the foodplots. On a good year, the cost is under $ 1.00 per pound. The last time I got below that was 2016. We use to raise beef on our farm years ago, and we never got close to that cost, even when you allow for inflation. Basically, food-plots can produce "organic" venison "dirt-cheap" if you use a few simple tricks. Trick #1: get your seed for free. Get to know some local farmers. They almost always have leftover seed at the end of normal planting season, and most seed stores well and germinates ok for years afterwords. Trick #2: Get most of your nitrogen for free by using crop rotation. This also saves you from needing lots of lime (and $) to maintain soil ph because synthetic fertilizer acidifies the soil. Trick # 3: Get a row planter, to allow for minimum seed and herbicide usage. Trick # 4: Get a pre - tier 4, turbocharged, 4wd diesel tractor for optimized fuel economy. Trick # 5: Realize that maximum yield per acre does not equate to maximum attractiveness to deer. Trick #6: Take out the competition: That can mean things like raccoons (trap) and weeds (roundup).
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How much do use think he weighs??
wolc123 replied to Bowhunter4life's topic in Trail Camera Pictures
Live weight: 489 pounds, 6 ounces. Boned meat weight: 73 pounds. Looks like a good boar, and would certainly make a nice rug with that big skull. Hopefully, one like that shows up in a few more weeks up in the Northern zone and I can get him with my crossbow or ML. -
Big raccoon ate his last bushel of corn last night
wolc123 replied to wolc123's topic in Small Game and Predator Hunting
Definitelty not that one. He looked kind of old and was loaded with bugs. Maybe one of the young ones would be worth a try, after a good frost scares off the bugs. The crock-pot makes anything taste ok. I have always wanted to try one. -
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I am going to switch to that after I use up my last box of triple 7 pellets. What is the grain equivalent to 100 grains of 777 ?
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Big raccoon ate his last bushel of corn last night
wolc123 replied to wolc123's topic in Small Game and Predator Hunting
He was a real porker, probably the heaviest of the hundred or so I have taken thru the years. Normally, I can use that shovel to easily throw them up on the rack for transport to the burial site (like I did with a 15-ish pound adult female this morning #10 off this years 3 acres of field corn). That didn't work with that big "double-wide" boar. When I used a glove to lift him up by the tail, I was surprised the tail did not pull off under all that weight. He looked like he had a half bushel of corn in his belly. If there were not so many bugs on them, I might have tried to get a chest girth measurement for TF. He may have been closer to 50 than 40, if you included the weight of the bugs. -
There are pros and cons for sure, especially if you are in a shotgun-only zone. If you are in a rifle zone, I think the cons vastly out weigh the pros. I live in a shotgun only zone and I used my T/C Omega 50 cal throughout gun season for about 5 years. Usually, I would also carry my short-barreled, open-sighted Rem 870 for backup and that came in handy for a couple "doubles" over that stretch. Not having a quick second shot available is the biggest con. I can say that I hit every deer I shot at with that ML (same load as TF), near my point of aim (about a dozen total), but I was not able to recover one of them due to some poor tracking on my part and a bad assumption of a miss. Fresh snow made me confident of that miss and that is one mistake I will never make again. Do not trust fresh snow to show blood because hot blood will cut right through it, leaving no visible trace on top. That buck was hit through one lung most likely, with no exit wound and expired about 350 yards from where he took the bullet. The shot was on the far side for that gun, at about 175 yards, standing still, quartering away, no wind, from a good rest, with a 7X scope. I wont shoot at another deer with that gun that far unless it is broadside. Energy at long range is another big con of the ML. At 175 yards, it has less than half the energy remaining of a 12 gauge sabot slug, and only about 1/4 of a 150 gr 30/06 bullet. When I found a rifled 12 gauge bolt-action, that would match my T/C ML's accuracy at 150 yards, give me two extra shots, and had a much easier cleanup, the ML started staying in the gun cabinet, except during ML season. It is so nice not to have to carry a backup gun to the stand, and even nicer having all that extra wallup out at long range. 150 yard shots are typical in the broken fields around home, and groups of deer are the norm. The biggest "pro" of the ML is that it forces you to make that one shot count. Personally, I would much rather learn that lesson on squirrels. That is the reason I am switching from my Ruger 10/22 to a pellet rifle for those this year. The relatively silent report is a second reason for that. When it comes to deer, there have been a lot of years when our family would have been forced to eat more chicken, had I not had a second (or even a third one time) shot quickly available.
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He will hit 2.5 on Veteran's day, hopefully about 20 yards from my tree-stand. 2.5's are my favorites - just the right combination of "quantity and quality", when it comes to the meat, and perfect for "free" euro mounts versus forking over the cash to a taxidermist for a shoulder mount.
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I took a wopper of a raccoon this morning, in a Duke dog-proof trap baited with cat food. It might be the heaviest one I have ever taken - guessing 40-ish pounds. Hopefully it is the one that escaped by busting the back hinges of a cheap Chinese box trap a few weeks ago. I got a picture of him before the burrying, on the rack behind my tractor. Not sure how to post from my flip-phone. That should save me quite a few bushels of corn this fall. Dispatching them is a little tougher in those dog-proofs, it took me two shots to hit the brain.
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If those are 9F bucks, All but the last (1.5) of last year's look 2.5, and this year's looks 3.5.
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I would not hunt that property with a North wind (unless you can find another way to access stand #4 from the South. All the stands look good for a South wind with #1 the best. # 4 looks the best for a West wind and #2 looks best for an East. I would also try and not over-hunt any one stand, even if the wind is from the optimum direction for it every time you hunt. Minimizing time in a stand is more important than always being in the "best" one for a specific stand. Your scent will linger in the areas you spend the most time, causing them to be unattractive to deer. Your odds are always best the first time you hunt a stand with an "ok" wind.
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Having had few close calls myself, I know what you are going through. It is much harder to not to take life for granted, or to realize who runs the show, until you go through some stuff like that. There is a lot of truth to the saying: "if it don't kill you, it will make you stronger". Without those times of extreme physical trauma, a couple of which the doctors expressed great disbelief that I survived, I would not be nearly as close to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as I am today. In the end, that, and loving your neighbors, is all that matters. I would not trade those tough times for anything. I am glad to hear that you are on the mend and you are definitely in my prayers.
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I also hate to see animals suffer, but not so much to do something as dumb as this guy did. Posting it on-line was dumber yet. What may have occurred here is that the trapper checked his traps in the morning, as most do, but the coyote came by later and got caught after he left. Most fur-bearers are nocturnal, so a morning check usually keeps others from observing the trapped animals. Making a set in plain site of a main highway is probably not such a bright idea however. I don't think coyote hides, especially during the summer like this, are worth more than a couple of bucks anyhow, so the arrow damage is no big deal.
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Distances you've killed deer with ? Archery that is
wolc123 replied to turkeyfeathers's topic in Bow Hunting
The real "sweet spot" for range with archery equipment is between 15 and 20 yards. With closer shots from a tree stand, the shot angle is a little steep for a good "double lunger" broadside shot. 25-35 yards is the range where "string-jump" is a concern, especially if the deer are alert as they often are if they get a glimpse of your draw or if they are responding to a grunt or rattle call. In these situations, a low heart shot is a good point of aim because they will almost always drop down when they hear that bow release, especially in calm, light-wind situations. If and when you develop confidence and ability for longer range shots (35 - 55 yards), string-jump is a lesser concern because that is beyond the whitetails "danger-zone" in which they react quickly to the sound of a bow's release. I have killed about a dozen at less than 55, with archery tackle (vertical and crossbow) and just one at slightly beyond. That was on a dead calm day and that buck never flinched until the arrow had pierced his heart. I have also struck and lost four with my vertical bows (I remember those more than the recovered kills) , and all of them were hit at a range of 18 - 25 yards, (3) in the shoulder blade and one too far back. The primary cause of those bad hits (which all happened more than 15 years ago) was "string-jump". I wish you the best of luck this season and everyone is right about it being a great time to be in the woods. The limited effective range of archery equipment adds difficulty but not as much as the reduced hunting pressure (and lack of gun-shots) removes. -
So, I guess This Is The Breakdown
wolc123 replied to DirtTime's topic in Gun and Hunting Laws and Politics Discussions
One good thing that came out of the Cuomo / Nixon fight (especially if you are not a NewYorker) is that Cuomo promised that he would not run for President in 2020. That single statement will likely cause him great harm in the race if he changes his mind. There is not much tolerance for "flip-floppers" in American politics these days. As far as Hillary winning the popular vote goes, probably no one mentioned it because most on this site know that Trump did not waste money on states that were not up for grabs. I bet Hillary wishes that she hadn't. -
When you buy your NY ML license, you will get a single either/or tag. If you also purchase an archery license, then you will get an additional "antlerless only" tag. To purchase an archery tag, you need to take the NY archery course. During the late ML season in the NY southern zone (there is no early ML season there), you may take up to three antlerless deer in most zones with your ML, because the regular season buck tag becomes an either/or tag during that season. In some grossly-overpopulated zones, a non-resident can take up to (9) antlerless deer. That would include (2) DMP tags purchased prior to October 1, and (2) more after Nov 1, (2) transferred from other hunters, and the (3) tags previously mentioned. No one, including state residents are allowed to take more than (2) antlered bucks per year in NY. I think they should at least let residents, who buy a gun, bow, and ML license, to kill a buck with each. I doubt that will happen any time soon as there are actually a few trophy-hunters calling for a "one-buck" rule in NY. Things get a little more confusing up in the Northern zone, where there is an early ML season and it runs concurrent with the last 7 days of archery season. Up there, the crossbow season runs the last 10 days of archery. Some of the Adirondack zones (one across the road from the camp I hunt) do not allow does to be taken during ML season, while others do (like on our side of the road). Most zones do not give out any DMP's, so the only way to take a doe is with a crossbow, regular bow, or ML in most zones except those mentioned above.
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The fixed-blade broadhead range testing went ok today. It took a bit longer than I expected to get my 300 fps crossbow dialed in with 125 gr field tips (I ended up needing to adjust dot site down one half turn and left a quarter turn) at 20 yards. At that range, the Muzzy hit almost the exact same spot as the field tip. The Wasp struck an inch to the right and the Allen was 1 foot low (right on the bottom of the foam block. Out at 40 yards, using the the middle dot, the field tips and the Muzzy were right on. The Wasp hit an inch low and three inches right. It took me about 10 minutes to find the bolt with the Allen, in the weeds next to the target. Again it struck way low and way left. Needless to say, I will not be using them on deer. Now I see why Walmart had them so cheap last year. It seems that they must be a lot heavier than the 125 gr they were marked. When I was checking thru my inventory, I noted that one of my three remaining "used" mechanicals was still in decent shape. There was no nicks or bends in the blades or the forward cutting tip. I cleaned it up, honed the blades back to "razor" sharp, and added a new o-ring. My quiver will hold that and a couple of Muzzys on my first hunt up in the NZ in a little under a month.
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Prayers sent for him and his family. Thank you for sharing this here. Reading this will probably cause many others to be more careful. I know it will me, and I am a bit behind on my own firewood this year. Your concern for the girl is admirable and she is fortunate to have you around to give her some of the guidance she will be needing.
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It is definitely my kids favorite place. Our power was out at dinner time so I was afraid to open the freezer door for a pack of venison. I had no idea when it would come back on. The power company said 6:30, and they hit that almost to the minute. My wife has to deal with Texans frequently and she always points them that way. They always say that is the most "authentic" Mexican food they can find in Western NY.
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I never tried the drowning thing but a dozen or so that caught the shotgun lead never released any scent. I stand just far enough from the cage, so that the wad does not push in the wires too much, and I make sure that the pattern is centered on the head. Maybe you were a little far off when you shot the "sprayers". I am not much of a turkey hunter, but they say "patterning" your shotgun is important for that. It sounds like it also is for us "skunk-shooters".