The Hunting Times

I took this photo Friday morning (see earlier post).  Now I'm calling out a specific tree. As I mowed the yard yesterday, I thought this tree had a fungus growing on it.  As I trimmed around it, I noticed that it was shredded by a buck.  Got that?  A buck came into my YARD and rubbed this little tree.  Broke branches and scraped off the bark - in my yard!  What great guard dogs I have... Standing at edge of driveway.  Arrow pointing to tree that's been rubbed by a buck. I guess the wildlife really loves the prairie grass, sunflowers, and 1,300 trees we planted this Spring!

After church, Alex and I mowed the pond and the lane.  Then we cut up and loaded the last of the lightning strike tree.  And since it was 65F with full sun and no wind, we decided golf would be in order.  We had to dig the clubs out of storage, as they were put away for the year. We figured since the crops were all still up and it was really warm, why not?  Probably would not have seen any deer anyway. Went to Deer Track Golf Club and rode 9 holes with a 6-pack of, um, "soda" for $25 total.  That's 2 people, riding 9 holes, with drinks....What a deal! I actually shot pretty decent for not having picked up a club in 2 months.  Started double-bogey, bogey, but then had 3 pars, followed by 2 bogies and then 2 more pars to finish at 5-over 41.  I'll take that.  Plus, we had the course all to ourselves.  We saw 4 other people the entire round. How'd Alex do?  Well, he shot 5-under.  5 lost golf balls that is.  We didn't trac...

Alex and I headed out at 6:45 am this dark Saturday morning.  I dropped him off at Vice's and then went around and parked.  It was 55F.  I walked in the bottoms and bumped 3 doe N toward Alex. We then sat for the next 2.5 hours without seeing a deer. Sun coming up over Marshall's bottom ground, Saturday, 10/25/14 I texted Alex about 9:30 and told him I was walking W to the top and then back to the truck.  He should wait at least 10 minutes before moving, in case I ran anything else out. As I crossed the picked bean field, I saw a very large buck run out of the killing finger, angle toward the drainage ditch and then cut N onto Neal into the standing corn.  I have no idea how large he was because he was too far away.  I do know it was a big buck, though, because I could see his antlers gleaming in the sun. Alex stepped out and jumped 3 doe (probably the same ones from earlier that I pushed).  They were 20 yards behind him and offere...

In the September/October issue of Ducks Unlimited magazine, on page 16, is a recipe for "The Best Duck I Ever Ate."  Since I'm out of ducks, I substituted Cornish Game Hens in their place and tried it out tonight for dinner. I followed the bit about browning the "ducks" in olive oil, but then I switched and put them in a crock pot instead of leaving them on the stove.  I added carrots, a very large onion, a can of golden mushroom soup and enough water to almost cover the ducks.  I let them simmer on low for 3 hours and then finished them on high for an additional 2 hours.  The meat fell off the bones. The recipe called for "liberal" amounts of Cajun seasoning.  For my taste, I was either not liberal enough, or I had too much water in the pot.  So, after they came out, I added more directly to the skin.  Very tasty. Now, was it the best I ever ate?  Not quite, but it was not shabby either.

Another gorgeous day here in Central Indiana.  Light breeze, full sun, no humidity, and 65F. Spent the afternoon yesterday mowing the yard.  Finished the lane and pond today and put Sta-Bil (TM) in the lawnmowers and parked them for the year.  Who'da thunk we would still be mowing on the 26th of October! For lunch today, I thawed out some of the doves we killed earlier in the year (see the post on Dove Opener from September 1).  I wrapped them in bacon, but on about half of them, I put in a slice of jalapeno that I canned in Feb 2012.  The canning process adds 1/3 sugar, 1/3 water, and 1/3 vinegar.  The sugar helps sweeten them up and they are not as hot / spicy.  Then, I threw the entire batch on the grill. Of course I had a Kona Brewery Longboard Lager helping me!  A very fine beer.  If you get the chance, have two or sixteen.  They are awesome!  Yes, you can get them in Hawaii, but I also found them at Jungle Jim's Grocery S...

Had a "later" meeting this morning....thus, was just heading in when the sun was coming up over the farm....took a normal shot on the cell phone and then zoomed in.....what a glorious way to start the day....

Alex and I left the girls sleeping on the couches in the Family Room with the Colts on TV.  Yes, the Colts won, but the girls had no clue.  We hit the woods 30 minutes earlier than usual, arriving at 4:00 pm instead of 4:30.  It was windy, steady 9 mph winds from the S-SW with gusts to 23 mph.  It was 54F and mostly sunny. Alex sat along the creek on Vice's and I went to the cornfield along the Marshall-Boyd-Neal property lines. The view looking NE.  Beyond the close trees is Boyd.  Can't hunt there. View to the SE.  Beans are now gone.  Way over there, that's were I saw my only deer today. I saw one deer, in the woods, 150 yards away, at 5:00.  Nothing other than birds and squirrels the rest of the evening.  One squirrel, however, did come up and sniff my boot.  That was cool.  The beans are out now, but all the corn is still standing.  And yes, it was windy and cool - I was glad I had a coat. Alex, on th...

The information in this post comes from the November 2014 issue of Petersen's Hunting magazine.  The article was written by Ben O'Brien.  I'm not attempting to violate any copyrights here, and I want you to know the source of the data. Wanna know what deer see?  More importantly, wanna know what they don't?  Read on... Back in 1994, Dr. Jerry Jacobs and Dr. Jay Neitz completed a study on deer vision at the Warnell School in Georgia with Dr. Karl Miller.  They found that deer have only two classes of receptors versus the three we humans have.  Thus, deer can see the differences between short and long wavelength light but NOT the middle to long wavelength light. Thus the good doctors contend that deer can distinguish between blue and yellow, but not the differences in green, yellow, orange, and red.  Understand that all of this was based on the make-up of a deer's eyeball. Other facets of deer vision: A deer's vision is based mostly on move...

Alex, Nick, and I headed for the field this morning at 0630.  We dropped Nick off at the Colonel's and he walked to the creek.  Alex and I parked on Neal and Alex walked to the W stand.  I went to where I was yesterday, along the Marshall-Boyd line, in the beans.  It was a chilly 38F.  Winds were almost out of the due E at 10 mph - but they swirled, at least where I was. The sun took its time coming up.  You may have been "legal" to fire an arrow at 7:30, but it was no where near light enough to do so. Nick texted at 7:55 that deer were moving along the W ridge on Marshall - he could see across the creek, up the ridge line.  At 0800, four doe (mama and her triplets) came out S of the killing finger, walking West down the draining ditch - through the still standing beans.  Again, I had set up to catch them coming out of the woods across the beans to the NW.  Foiled again. I sat in the fence row and did not move.  In fact, my legs we...

Alex and I headed for the field at 0630 - after scraping the frost off the truck.  Nick did not go as he is fighting a headache (allergies & weather).  It was 38F with very little wind. I had previously called Vice and received permission to archery hunt his tree farm.  So, I dropped Alex off (after drawing a map) and sent him toward the creek.  I drove on around and walked to about the same location as last night, the NE corner of Marshall's woods on top. Today was the day Purdue played Michigan State.  We had an opportunity to sit on the 50 yd line, row six, right behind the Purdue bench.  We gave that up for hunting.  We think we made the right call, but others may disagree.  That's okay.  The tickets were enjoyed by Cuz Shane, his wife, daughter and her boyfriend.  I'm positive they liked the game more than we would have.  We would have spent the entire time at the game thinking that we could have been in the woods... ...

Alex and I went out tonight.  We hit the field about 4:30 pm.  The wind was much calmer than it had been, only pushing 9 mph versus the 35 mph we had been having.  Oddly though, it was blowing from the NE to the SW (opposite of prevailing).  It was 52F. Alex walked N through the corn on Neal and sat in the W stand.  I walked NE across the open bean field and sat in the NE corner of Marshall, just inside the woods.  I anticipated that the deer would be coming out from the woods (directly to my E) and heading toward the field.  See photo 1 below. Looking E toward the top of Marshall's.  Anticipated route of deer. Please note, plenty of shooting lanes. At 5:50 pm, I looked to the SW out in the beans, and there stood a large doe.  She had come out of the woods S of me and was cutting to the NW right across the beans.  Safety was off and red dot was on.  Thinking I would not have deer coming in downwind of me, I had put myse...

I had commitments that kept me out of the woods, but that did not stop Kathy & Alex from going out Monday night.  They took Ole Brownie (1984 Dodge W100 pickup truck) and hit the field. Kathy walked in the "long" way, following the outline of the corn field instead of cutting through it directly to her stand.  Alex went through the corn to the W stand.  Along the way, Kathy came upon fresh tracks that she determined were either made by a Large Doe or a Small Buck, such was their size.  She figured she was close behind him or her.  See photo below. Fresh Deer prints in soft ground.  Deer traveling "up" the picture or away from Kathy. You, dear reader, can go back to earlier posts to learn that indeed it is a small buck that made these tracks.  All the information you need to determine that is in the picture above.  Also note that the ground is soft due to all the rain we have received in the past four days - thus, the tracks are de...

The weather has not been cooperating.  Very windy and raining - talking gusts up to 35 mph and over 2" of rain.  The rain bit included some sleet, as it was down in the low 30's with wind chill.  Yuck.  Wasn't quite ready for all that.  So, I spent Friday evening inside and all day Saturday next to a fire and watched some awesome college football games. The wind let up on Sunday, so I went out to Marshall's and sat in Dave's stand in the Killing Finger - mostly because he wanted me to check it out for him AND because Harold said he saw six doe up there when he was cutting beans on Wednesday.  I walked in about 5 pm because I saw Davey mowing the yard, so I stopped and had a beer with him.  Otherwise I would have been earlier.  Spoiler alert, turns out it didn't matter what time I got there... I walked in from the S because the beans were gone and it was easy walking.  At the point of the finger, I saw this: Photo at SE end of finger ...

Kathy, Alex and I went out tonight, Wednesday, 01 OCT 2014, to commemorate the start of deer season 2014 (archery - excluding urban zones & the youth hunt which started earlier). Yes, it was warm.  74F when we hit the field at 4:30 pm.  Breezy but nice, not a cloud in the sky. Harold Marshall was cutting beans, as you can see in the first picture - they are almost completely out.  This is nice, for it allows us to drive closer to any deer we happen to take. Kathy & Alex.  Opening Day of Deer Season 2014 Kathy took her crossbow and Alex his compound.  They walked through the standing corn to the tree stands on Neal.  Kathy sat E and Alex sat W.  I walked down the road to Marshall's bottom ground. We sat for two hours with nothing much happening but birds and bugs.  The mosquitoes were pretty bad - even after we had utilized Scent Shield's No Stinkin' Bugs (TM) bug spray.  I shiver to think how bad they would have be...