Last year I told you about growing up a duck hunter in a bird hunting family. I mentioned that as a teen my Grandfather exposed me to deer hunting and, indirectly, to big game hunting. I shot a few decent Ozarks bucks during college and brought some of what I had learned home with me when I returned to Kansas. The Old Man started chasing deer with me during the rifle season, and then during the bow season. That’s been more than a decade now, but one thing has remained constant through out… I kill better deer!
It’s really not a matter of bragging, in fact I think it’s mostly luck, but coming into the 2010 season he had one buck on the wall that was even in the same class as several of my better ones. Generally speaking he was short on patience and long on effort. That produced a lot of opportunities at 110-130 bucks which produced a lot of filled tags.
But coming into the 2010 season he was claiming it would be different. I was skeptical. Then one day I was driving to the cabin at dusk when I got a call. He was obviously excited about a buck he’d just shot but he needed help getting it loaded. My daughter and I changed course and met him at the scene:
With good mass, good length, and double split brows, he gross in the low 140′s.
So The Old Man had punched his Missouri archery tag, and now it was on to Kansas. A few days later I was chasing Missouri deer when I got a call, again. He didn’t tell me what he had, just that he would meet me at my house mid-day:
Decent mass, good length, and great width, this one also grossed in the low 140s.
So he’d gone 60 some years without killing a no-doubt P&Y buck, and now he’d killed 2 in a week! Both DIY, fair chase, with good clean kills and simple tracking jobs. Just like in the books. And while that suddenly left him with a shortage of whitetail tags, he wasn’t complaining.
Once again, congrats, happy Father’s Day, and thanks.
The Kansas archery turkey season opened yesterday. I was booked up in court or with my daughter all day and didn’t get a chance to get out. This morning I promised my wife I would stick around the house so she could sleep in (it is her birthday and all). So I won’t get out to chase turkeys until tonight, but I just walked back from checking a game cam here at the house. My feeder has been getting crushed by the deer and I’m going broke trying to keep it filled. I’ve caught 3 hens using it occasionally but mostly just deer… Until today…
How cool is that? Yesterday I caught enough bass with my daughter that my thumb is raw, today I’ve got a tom strutting by the creek. Spring is here!
I’ve always liked the Drury brothers. They’ve got Midwestern roots and they don’t try to pass off killing fenced in bucks as hunting. They represent the ethic as I’ve always known it. Their emotions on camera seem genuine and fits with what I experience myself. It’s not a bunch of gibberish about how wonderful that rutted up old buck is going to taste…
Anyway, I was sent this little piece that Bowhunting World did the other day and I thought I’d pass it along. I particularly liked this:
BW: How often do you go out on your farms and get skunked like the average guy?
MD: A lot. Most days we get skunked, just like everybody. I don’t care how much land you’ve got and how good it is and how well it’s managed, mature bucks win most of the time when you’re hunting with a bow.
TD: Want a good example? A few years ago I killed my first buck of the year on my 60th day of bowhunting. That’s a lot of getting skunked!
60 days of getting skunked before dropping the string? That’s dedication, and that’s what kills big bucks. It’s also more time that most hunters will spend in a decade… Here’s the whole piece.
Sorry for the lack of action here. My computer is still in the mass of boxes and my brain is fried. Tomorrow I head to Colorado and Saturday I start hunting. I’ve loaded a few things to run while I’m gone including the second part of antelope hunt.
Unfortunately I have bowhunted exactly once this fall. In the 13 years since I discovered archery I’ve never hunted so little. Last Saturday The Old Man and I spent most of the day hanging stands, checking sites, etc. We quit by 4:30 to shoot our elk rifles:
Then I took a shower and grabbed my bow. I sat in a stand I’ve had fantastic hopes each time I’ve sat in it, and I’ve yet to see a solid buck there. It sits in a narrow strip of timber between a lake and a cut corn field.
Looking left:
Looking right:
The idea is to catch deer trading from the big cover to the cut corn fields before dark. The idea is good, the quality of the deer has not been. Two does came by and that was it. I’m not giving up on it though.
One of the truly great bowhunters of all time passed away today. Glenn St. Charles was one of the pioneers of archery as well as a quality hunter and ambassador. He was a founder of the Pope and Young Club and wrote one of the best hunting books I’ve ever read. I gave you a review of Bows on the Little Delta here.
You can find more information at the Archery Hall of Fame.
I guess that’s a somewhat misleading title. I once attended an induction/fundraiser for the Waterfowlers Hall of Fame in Mound City, Missouri. If I remember correctly it included a duck calling demonstration by a friend and a rendition of Grandma Got Run Over By A Snow Goose sang by a collection of elderly locals. Interesting experience. I also drive by the Farmer’s Hall of Fame on my way to work most days… I’ve always figured this was some type of K-State Mecca… but it’s apparently $7.00 to get in, so I’ll pass.
Anyway, what we’re talking about here is the highlights of my 2009 season. A few years back I ran out of space on my desk and book shelf for any more pictures, so I combined the best 3 pictures from that season and framed them together. Then for 2008 I made a matching set but had to use 4 pictures. Now my 2009 set is done.
So apparently my two bonus points defied the odds and earned me one of the hardest managed hunts to draw in Missouri. Assuming similar statistics to last year I had a roughly 10% chance of drawing the rut archery hunt for Longview Lake, but the permit is sitting on my desk as we speak!
Now the tough part… I’ve never set foot anywhere near Longview Lake. If I had more carefully studied the drawing odds I probably would have applied for a rifle or muzzleloader hunt… Nonetheless, I’m excited about the challenge. I’ve never tried to bowhunt public ground on a tight time schedule, during the rut. In fact my public ground experience is limited to a few years when I first started bowhunting and really had no idea what I was doing. Now I’ve got an opportunity to hunt the first two weeks of November on a prime piece of limited-entry, suburban lake ground. The rules require me to kill a doe before I can stick a buck, which will also be new for me.
Look for pictures from scouting missions and hopefully some horns… If anyone reading this has any experience with Longview I would love to hear your thoughts! You can email me at dukkillr@hotmail.com or comment below.
Growing up my father was a duck hunter who occasionally returned to his bird hunting roots. I was in a duck blind at a young age. I’m sure he put up with a lot of annoying crap in order to drag me along.
Obviously that exposure eventually became a big part of who I am, and what I do. For that, and many other things, I’m eternally grateful.
As I got older my grandfather exposed me to deer hunting. A few years later I started teaching myself to bowhunt with considerable help from friend and loyal reader CA-Chucky. Around that time The Old Man started going rifle deer hunting with me. I gutted his first deer or two, and we worked together on a few fantastic deer and elk hunts. Then he bought a bow… We were going to bowhunt in Montana for big elk. He practiced a great deal and at the moment of truth he made a lethal shot at 40 yards:
His first arrow ever was a bull pushing 340! I hope it’s not the best animal he ever kills, but right now it’s the one he has on the refrigerator! Congrats, happy Father’s Day, and thanks.
I’ve been turkey hunting or bowfishing since Friday at 2:00. More on turkey hunting later. Saturday afternoon I waded into a flood, in the rain, with a bow. Here’s part of the haul:
This afternoon The Old Man and I tried it again, but the river was on it’s way down and we struggled to find the right combination of current, depth, and fish. We shot a couple and saw a few of these friendly guys:
