wolc123

Some out of state work took a bit longer than expected this week, and I had some issues at the airport coming home. I still made it up to my in-laws place just before sunset today. I am ready for the Northern zone early ML opener tomorrow. It looks like the only thing that I forgot was my grunt tube. It is tough packing for a 9 day hunting and fishing trip in 1/2 hour, but that’s what I had to do to get up here before dark. Tomorrow morning’s weather and wind (8 mph SSE wind 53 deg) looks perfect for the spot where I killed the old doe up here last year, so that’s where I am headed in the morning. My father in law saw (3) antlerless deer back there earlier this week. Hopefully, I run into them in the morning. I can see light though my breech plug, so the touch hole is clear and there is no need to waste a printer cleaning it out. I’ll drop a couple 50 gr T7 pellets down the bore, and press in a black-sleeved 240 gr XTP bullet in the morning. My sling will stay in my pack until I kill a deer. Sunrise is at 7:20. I will start a slow, still-hunt back to that spot at 6:50. Any antlerless deer, over 1.5 yr old, or an antlered buck with (3) or more points on a side will do. I just found out that our oldest daughter is moving back home in December, so I can’t be that fussy, until our meat supply is secure. If I get another antlerless one first, then I will revert back to the (4) or more points on a side for my buck tag. I am bringing binoculars and will try my best to avoid killing a button buck.

Same genetics for sure.

That’s the best, when they go down in sight. Within hearing distance is second best.

A little back, quartering away is perfect. Sounds like the meat is as good as in the freezer.

I am getting closer, after getting stuck for the night in Charlotte airport, due to a missed connection. One more short hop from Baltimore gets me to Buffalo, then I pack my stuff and drive 4.5 hours up to the DAX. I made a list of all the gear to take. Sounds like it’s going to be a typical rainy week up there, so my tree umbrella ought to get plenty of use. I will try to remember my camo raincoat also. I am not bringing my pop-up blind this year, because I didn’t want to move it from the hotspot that I found for it at home. This shooter 8 pointer came up and licked it, while I was inside, during the early antlerless gun season, a month ago. Hopefully, he tries that again when I am in there with my crossbow next month. He will probably only do that if I fill that tag next week, during early NZ ML week, and he can get another “free pass”. The open stick of Evercalm that I had in the blind certainly fooled him as he got within two yards of me from directly downwind. I took this picture thru the window, from 20 yards, as he walked away after doing that. I wonder if the new “locked in a case” in a vehicle rule applies to Muzzleloaders ? I will try and find a second padlock just to be safe. I need the other one for my 30/30 case. I will need to borrow a shotgun from my father-in-law, in case I try for grouse. I will bring a few 16 and 12 gauge # 7-1/2’s because I think he has side by sides in both of those gauges. I might be able to squeeze my 16 gauge j Stevens and my Marlin 336 into one of my two pad-lockable, hard plastic cases. If I can, then no need to borrow one of his shotguns for grouse. Last year, I brought that shotgun up in a soft case. My best chance at grouse will be with a headshot from my 50 cal ML when I am deer/bear hunting. I passed a couple with that last year because my venison needs were greater and then, and I didn’t want to risk spooking a deer. I have a decent supply of venison in the freezer now (thanks to early antlerless gun season), so I don’t think I will be passing any grouse, if I get a good chance at one with my ML. It has been far too long, since I have got to eat one of those delicious birds, and the only one that I actually like the taste of.

This is a long one and I am stuck in CLT airport, bored after missing a connection earlier tonight, so bear with me. If all goes well, I’ll be back out hunting for opening day of ML, up in the NZ tomorrow. The only before/after weather front-related deer harvest, that I recall, happened just after the front passed. I hunted that day, thru the driving rain storm, in a box blind, with my short, smoothbore 12 ga. I carried that gun, because I don’t like scoped guns in the rain. It was raining hard when I walked in, and I still-hunted my way back to the blind. The high winds and rain lasted about two hours and I saw zero deer activity during the storm, from the warm, dry, and very comfortable blind. It stopped suddenly, almost as if someone had thrown a switch. The wind dropped down to less than 5 mph, the rain stopped, and the sky cleared, over a span of less than 10 minutes. I left the blind, and climbed up into a nearby tree stand. I had just got up into the stand, when a young buck came out of the heavy clover and started feeding on clover, about 90 yards away. That was farther than I had ever shot that gun, but the he was standing broadside and I had a very good rest. Range is just one of many variables, when it comes to making a shot. If my freezer is empty, and the others are favorable, I am not opposed to pushing that one a bit. I settled the open sights, where I thought I should. My first shot missed clean. The buck raised its head, then resumed feeding. I guessed that I had aimed too high with that first shot. It almost looked like I saw a patch of mud fly, in the short cut clover behind him. I lobbed a second one, aiming significantly lower. That one struck him in the shoulder blade - DRT. I can also recall one mature doe harvest, right in the middle of a similar storm, from the same box blind. That one happened on opening day of gun season. It was not raining, when I walked back in the dark, so I had my rifled and scoped, 12 ga Marlin bolt action. I headed for the blind that morning, because I saw the storm was predicted later. That blind has nice 3 ft overhangs, so hunting with a scoped gun in the wind driven sleet and rain is not an issue. About an hour into it, near the peak of the wind and sleet, a doe and fawn walked past, about 50 yards out. As I always do, when I have antlerless tags, I aimed for the largest one in range first and fired. Both ran into the thick brush. I was not able to get off a second shot, with the slow cycling bolt action. I found the doe, double-lunged and dead, about 50 yards into the brush. One week later, on a lovely clear morning, the fawn (a fat button buck) emerged from that cover, to feed on clover, and got to join his momma in deer heaven (my food supply), using the same gun from the same blind. He was also double-lunged, and died right next to his momma’s gut pile in the “sanctuary” brushy cover area. There was about a foot of powdery snow that morning, and I found just a single drop of blood in the snow, near his tracks where he stood at the shot. No more blood was visible on the tracks leading back into the brush. Hot blood drops from a high lung hit often cutright thru powdery snow, leaving no trace on top. That was not the first, nor was it the last time, that a button buck got reunited with his momma in deer heaven, with some help from me. One other time, I did that in the afternoon with momma, when my buddy got the bb in the morning. He had also shot at and missed the momma in the morning. She came back out to the bb’s gut pile at milking time, in the late afternoon. Several other times, the pair made the “deer heaven” trip together, arriving just seconds apart, from slugs from the same magazine, when I was hunting with my fast-repeating pump guns. Usually, I only hunt from box blinds if the weather is bad. My favorite ones are two-story , with an open top-floor, providing unrestricted 360 degree visibility. I built those fit the specific reason of being able to get out there immediately upon the cessation of a storm, or to have shelter handy, if one pops up. Come to think of it, thats exactly what I did with that “milking day” afternoon momma mentioned above. I had been upstairs earlier, but shot her from downstairs, under cover, after it started pouring rain. That counts as another mid-storm kill. The only reason that I hunted from my box blind on the lovely day when I killed that button buck mentioned above, was that I had killed a deer on each of my three previous hunts. There was not much room left in our freezers, so I picked that spot based on comfort alone. There’s always room to squeeze in another button buck, if I still have a tag. Certainly there have been storms after I have killed deer, but I can’t remember any immediately after. I definitely do with lots of fish though. They always bite like mad, right before a storm.

Bill, I am thankful that such an esteemed fountain of deer hunting knowledge and accomplishment, as FSW, would find time to comment on my journal. He even went as far as to say that he might also have harvested at least two of the mature bucks, that I managed to bring down, over the last few years. It feels very special, for this meat hunter, to earn even that magnitude of acknowledgment, from such an trophy hunting grand master.

Maybe that would be ok for one or two in a suburban yard but not for the hundreds that I had.

I have shot more deer from ash trees than all other species combined but all but one are gone now. I did shoot a doe already this year, during the early antlerless gun season, from that last one, which has been dead for over a year. The only green left on it, is the poison ivy growing up the side. They say that is a preferred deer forage. If so, who needs foodplots. I passed a small doe from it at 5 yards and shot the big one behind her from 10. I am going to cut off the dead top this winter (I’ll heat my house for a week or two with that), and cap the stump with an upside down gray plastic 5 gallon bucket. Maybe I can get another 10 or so years out of the stand that way. It’s only 4 ft high, so I shouldn’t get hurt too bad if and when it falls over. Going forward, I am using maples, cherry, and poplar. I think I am at (5) deer killed from (4) stands in maples, (3) from one stand in a cherry, and none yet from one in a poplar. I have got to be close to a hundred, from about 10 stands in ash trees. I am going to keep that last one, as long as the capped stump stands. I did kill one of my largest bucks, from the ground one minute after climbing down from a stand in a hemlock, from which I had never scored.

Like most of the others here, I have never been concerned with barometric pressure for deer hunting. Maybe a little for fishing, because that does seem a bit better, during higher pressure. I always take the wind into consideration. As mentioned prior, if a deer smells you, then it’s game over. Barometric pressure is quite irrelevant in comparison. Moon phase might have a greater effect, and I never paid any attention to that either. If I have the time, I am hunting in a place and method determined mostly by wind direction. Maybe it is something that I would consider, if I had more free time to pick and chose when I hunted. I do agree with the op, about the possibility of lessening the effect of wind direction and scent detection. Scent free soap and deodorant helps. I have also used hot cider and Evercalm as cover scents, with good results on mature buck and doe (considerably tougher to fool).

Yes, I thought it was very good. It was especially interesting, that the podcast meat expert said that the worst thing you could do, was to cook up the meat before rigor mortis set in. I think Chef is now pretty close to admitting that he made a mistake on voting for Biden, so maybe he’s ready to try aging a deer carcass this year.

Did they teach you that venison was red meat in any of those classes ? Did they teach that red meats are subject to rigor mortis ? I am just wondering why, with such an “education”, that you don’t age your venison. Did you listen to the “Meateater” podcast where Rinella interviewed the meat expert, who explained the benefits of aging venison ? How do you think that your credentials on this subject compare to that guy’s ?

I thought I had enough grind for a year, but I just found out that our oldest daughter has had enough of downstate college, and wants to move back home at the end of the current semester. We were only “empty nesters” for one semester. That means that I will need to grind at least one more mature deer (she loves venison tacos). She also likes sliced backstrap hoagies and stir-fry. That shouldn’t be a problem. I am very well stocked with ammo now. I just hit Dick’s, in Lynchburg VA, and they had 2-3/4 12 ga Hornady SST’s for $ 17 a box with no limit on quantity. If only I had that extra ammo for the early September antlerless gun season, I might have punched my second 9F dmp and had plenty of meat for her already. Oh well, I’ll just have to put in a little more time over the Holiday ML season, if it comes down to the wire, or maybe settle for a 6-point buck.

Very true. We go thru lots of grind. On mature deer, I usually grind everything but the back straps and we always run out of grind before back straps. I never add any pork to the grind, or make sausage.

Nice job and good luck with it.

I see that he has a double brow on the right. That’s would make him a sure shooter for me this year. He better not head too far north for 9 days after October 14th. I usually look for at least three on a side, for my buck tags. Our venison supply is ok now, so I am upping that to (4) this year.

AD’s chart shows why you can aim 2” over a crow at 100 yards and hit it almost dead center with a yellow jacket, sighted in dead on at 50. The drop is 4.1” and that puts the bullet right thru the crow’s boiler room. Piece of cake with no wind, and a good rest. It’s much trickier on windy days. There is also plenty of energy left, at that range with one, to double lung a broadside coyote.

Remington Yellow Jackets

I make a pile of butchering waste/deer carcasses, dead coons, 100 yards behind my bedroom window. I sight in my .22 dead on at 50 yards, and I aim a couple inches high at 100 yards. I regularly kill crows with it, off that bait pile. I do take the wind into consideration on the shots, holding off farther upwind even it is really blowing. I also killed a big male coyote on a moonlit night off it one time. He only ran off about 30 yards, after taking a .22 LR yellow jacket thru the lungs from a 100 yard range.

I had a good dinner tonight at the Dahlia, down in Lynchburg VA. Shrimp/Crab red pepper soup, Grilled AHI medium rare, coleslaw, sweet potato fries, with key-lime pie for desert.

Notice that there are a few of those 200 some year old, 12 ft long white oak planks left from the center section of the “1883” barn. I probably won’t have time to recover then until next year. Hopefully, I will be able to save a few more of them then. I saved most of the “threshing floor” boards from the first of those old barns that I dismantled, to make room for my new pole barn. White oak holds up pretty good to the weather and it comes in handy for things like the “ditch crossing” plank in the prior post.

Awesome, no bird tastes better than ruffed grouse.

It is a little cramped and I wish I would have made it a little bigger. So far, I killed a doe out of it (4 or 5 years ago) and a hen turkey about 3 falls ago. It replaced a larger stand, that was built in a clump of ash trees, about 10 yards north. That was my most productive stand, from which I killed over a dozen deer, including my largest antlered buck. When the emerald ash borers started killing the trees, I had to cut it down. I didn’t mind that too much, because it was a maintenance nightmare. It was attached to three different trees and would always get pulled apart from year to year. The platform is big enough, but the walls are too tight on the new one. Rebuilding them wider is on my to-do list before next fall. I was very limited in what I could do this year, due to the big barn demolition project that I have been working on. That’s almost done now, so I should have a lot more time to add and improve stands next year. Here is all that’s left of the old barn:

This afternoon is probably going to be the last time that I can get stuff ready at home for crossbow season. I have to go out of state for work the rest of this week, then I am going up to the DAX, for 9 days of hunting and fishing. Most of my blinds and stands are in good shape because I used them during the early September antlerless gun season. There was two that I have not checked on yet so I took care of them today. The straps were still in good shape on the $ 20 double ladder stand that I bought from a former site member and set up last summer, on the front corner of my woods. That one is good to go. Maybe the maple tree grew into it a bit because it feels more solid than it did last year. I don’t like to get up too high, so I didn’t use the bottom section of the ladder when I put it up. I don’t have any good food plots near that stand but it seems to be a spot where the deer like to hang out. I seen quite a few deer around it during the early September season, as I was hunting in other spots, or walking to them. This other small tree blind near the back of my woods needed a little work. One of the leg support concrete blocks had shifted and needed to be coaxed back into position. Shooting lanes to the ditch out back had to be trimmed. My white oak barn floor plank, (for crossing that ditch if I drop a deer on the other side) is still in place and leaning against a nearby tree. I moved that back there, after soaking a foot in freezing weather the last time that I shot a doe across the ditch from that stand, 5 or 6 years ago.

I had a number of problems with my garden (I mostly just grow sweetcorn) and lawn this past year and I thought of a simple solution to most of them . The hardest part was getting my wife to sign off on it, but I managed to do it. The plan will go into effect next April. List of problems: 1) It took a long time for the ground way out back to dry up last spring, so I was late with my spring garden tillage. 2) Heavy spring rains made the lawn around the house grow like crazy, taking lots of my time to mow it, that I could have otherwise used on getting the garden ready. 3) Our front lawn is very rough, multiplying the above problem, forcing me to drive slower with the lawnmower, taking even more time for that task. 4) Summer drought, weeds and coons destroyed most of my early sweetcorn plantings. 5) I cant get our kids or my wife to help with the garden way out back, and it is pain for me to check coon traps back there. The plan: Next April, I will plow and disk most of our front yard. There I will plant our early sweetcorn. We usually finish picking that in Early August. Having it close to the house will make it easy to irrigate with a hose, in case we get another June drought, and I should be able to get the wife and kids out there hoeing and harvesting. That ground is well drained, so early spring plowing will be easy, regardless of how much rain we get. That will also cut way down on all of the grass that I need to keep mowed. After the early corn is picked, I will bush-hog the stalks, disk and level the ground, and reseed the lawn in late August, the perfect time to seed a new lawn. With all the time that this plan saves me next summer, I should be able to spend a lot more of it fishing.