On Veteran's Day, the wind was so bad that I climbed down from the Sky Condo to sit in the ground blind that we had not removed since turkey season. I am usually all for rocking in the trees but there was just enough extra creeks happening that I felt better on the ground. It sleeted, the wind blew and nothing moved. Saturday was different. I started off the same way as the weekend before; Sky Condo to tree seat. I left the Sky Condo a little earlier than I had the week before hoping to see more deer than just the two does. There were fresh rubs that were a little bigger than the ones the week before, but it wasn't from a large buck. The leaves were somewhat crunchy and I took my time getting to the stand. ...
We had to revamp our hunting plan since we were now one hunter down, but Dad and I stuck with what he knew would work and where we thought the deer were. I started the morning in the Sky Condo and when it was clear that nothing was moving through, I headed to a tree seat not far away. There were fresh rubs along the path that I used and although they were made by small deer, it gave me hope that the deer would be moving through. I left my pack at the bottom of the tree and climbed the 16 feet up to the seat. I think I am more comfortable in treeseats than the bigger stands. I can't move when I am up there because every part of me is exposed to unseen deer but there is something about being so much more present with...
We've waited all year for this! Deer season was back. Hubs, Dad and I had a rough idea of where we were going to sit to start the morning, when and where we would move to next and the basic game plan for the morning hunt. But then, I looked at the trail camera pictures. The 10 pointer that we had had on the camera last year had shown himself for the first time two days before at T3. Up until that point, we had only smaller bucks on the cameras. But this one... we've been watching him for at least 4 years and he was beautiful. I declared that I would start the season sitting in T3. Hubs was bumped to the Sky Condo and Dad would still hunt. It was a perfect morning - quiet and calm. I got into T3 and settled...
I posted these pictures on the Facebook page and asked people what they thought was going on with my doe's shoulder. We got a few different responses but I am not sure. Warts? Burdock? a horribly placed bow shot? I am hoping to keep watching her and see. This is the first time that we have seen a deer with something like this. On the flip side, she looks very healthy.
Dad was able to mow the field around the Sky Condo the other day and when we pulled the memory card from the camera, I instantly put it into my digital camera and started turning the wheel to see if we had any bucks. The first picture that I came to that had hunt-able animals were these: The bird that we swore had disappeared into the ether when we were hunting suddenly came back in full force. There were all kinds of pictures of turkeys. Like this one. I especially like that the jake made sure to show me his beard. I was more excited about this photo. Not because it's a button but because that means that the bucks will hopefully start moving around. We got the first photo of the 10 pointer...
There are three does around my parent's house. One of them looks as though she doesnt have a tail OR that she has a solid white tail. Over the past few weeks, she has disappeared, presumably to have a fawn. I couldn't zoom in as much as I needed to, but I think this could be here. I spotted her after I had put O to bed after his day long birthday party. Also, there were not a lot of deer pictures on the trail camera when I checked it the day before. A couple does, a racoon and some caterpillars crawling over the lens. We need to mow the grass down and hopefully we can get some bucks walking through. But, there are deer around and I will take that any...
I am now going to be stalking the trail camera pictures and probably trying to put out more as the summer goes on. This is a new buck - a little smaller than the earlier one that I posted which means that at least a couple of them made it through the winter and with the amount of does that are around, I would say that we have a pretty healthy deer herd hanging around! Look at those...
After my incident last season, Dad decided that it would make more sense to be hidden in the woods and have more coverage than my treeseat gives me. This will help me get a better view of the more traveled deer trails and not rely on the deer to come my way. He wanted to build a permanent structure that would allow us to hunt in all weather conditions. So, Dad has been busy building T3. He constructed it in the barn to make sure all of the dimensions were right. Our first treestand was built 16 feet off the ground using a 12 foot ladder. Not ideal and clearly not built by hunters who knew what they were doing. The Sky Condo was considerably better with insulation and a tar papered roof. T3 is...
Well, I can still look at the photos right? Since Dad and Hubby still need to fill their tags, we are still looking at the trail cameras to see which deer are around. It is also fascinating to see how the deer change their behaviors as the season progresses and the rut starts. Case in point - those two big 8-pointers that I want the guys to shoot, are still around! These are from a couple week ago. I forgot to get the newer pictures from Saturday am when they walked through. I have been chasing this second deer for two years now. If the guys don't get him this year, I want to land him next year! Also, how funny that the two biggest deer around are within three minutes of one another in the...
