By Jerry Long, August 10, 2010 

For a change of pace I attend the National Trapper’s Association Convention in Marshfield, WI and get to spend some time with my father and an old family friend.

Not quite a year ago dad called and said he and long time family friend Harvey King, Harvey King Custom Knives, would be attending the 2010 National Trapper’s Association Convention in Marshfield, WI.  Since dad and Harvey live in Kansas and I live in Wisconsin this would be a great opportunity for us to get together.  Outdoors buddy Seth and I traveled to the Two Brothers’ Cabin on Friday night, partaking of the hot tub, checked out Camp Pug food plots on Saturday morning and then ventured up to the Marshfield fair grounds.  There we met dad and Harvey.

Dad with the shiny head like mine, Seth and Harvey in front of Harvey’s knife table.

Seth is much more of a trapper these days than I, but I grew up trapping and worked in a fur-buyer’s skinning shed for a few years in my teens.  I do love trapping, but it is just one more thing that competes with my available time for bowhunting.  I’m hoping that once I get caught up on my available vacation I can take a combined deer hunting and trapping vacation each fall.

Anyway, as one would expect, there were traps, some big enough to catch me, and accessories every where.  The wafting essence of skunk cover scent was ever present in the air and two days later seems to revisit my nostrils.  While trapping basics remain the same there have been some really neat innovations.

These traps are large enough to catch me.  Note the bow in the background.

One of the greatest new things in my mind is a hydraulic or winch powered skinning hoist that would easily reduce a fur-skinner’s labor by fifty percent in my estimation.  There are clamps at the bottom or at waist height that allow the “opened” flaps of skin from the hind-quarters to be clamped and then hydraulic or winch power is used to pull the hide off with very little need of knife work and no need of “hunching” like I used to do so much of.  Hmmm, deer application?  Also, I am quite impressed with the dog and cat proof “coon cuff” type traps that are species selective by design and seem quite humane.

There were a lot of great everyday people vendors.  Being a sucker for beautiful wood products I was immediately drawn to Kip Feroce of Ferocious Calls out of Lower Burrell, PA.  He had beautiful box calls from quartersawn sycamore, purpleheart, Osage orange, walnut and many more.  The boxes were beautiful, sounded great and were reasonably priced.  I highly recommend them.     

Kip Feroce of Ferocious Calls holds up a beautiful quartersawn sycamore box call.

We also ran into Steve and Tess Greene of Dunn’s Custom Knives.  Originally based in Kansas, now in Florida, I can remember barely being tall enough to look at the founder’s, Melvin Dunn, knives on his display tables.  I’ve always dreamed of owning a Dunn knife, but my custom knives have one thing in common.  Unfortunately, years ago, I lost a beautiful Harvey King Custom Osage orange scaled knife given to me by my father so now they all have orange scales.  When I asked about different scales Steve explained he was just too busy and too old to make custom orders.  Guess I’ll stick with my Harvey King Custom Knives. 

Tess and Steve Greene at their booth.

A Harvey King custom hunting knife of my design and a filet knife of Harvey’s design.  Note that both have handles easily spotted in the woods and grass. 

I was particularly impressed with the offerings at Northern Shire.  Since Mrs. dustyvarmint is a basket maker I have an appreciation for what goes into a fine basket and what they are worth.  I felt Northern Shire’s baskets were outstanding and of extremely reasonable price (maybe too reasonable).  I also have a life-long interest in blacksmithing – yet another hobby that I don’t have time for.   Northern Shire offers iron products for the hearth, campfire and other hardware. 

A sampling of Northern Shire’s baskets with some ironware visible in the background.

Seth and I had great time at the NTA convention.  We both declared it the best outdoors event we’d attended together.  The people were nice, the products were down-to-earth and reasonably priced.  The convention comes to Columbia, MO in 2011 so if you are in the area you might want to consider it.

happy trapping, dv

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Last Friday I picked up outdoors buddy Seth and headed north to partake in Wisconsin’s final weekend of the 2009 whitetail season.  As we tried to find room for his gear among the three kitchen sinks in my truck he placed a stapled stack of paper on the driver’s seat stating it was for me.  His mother had been going through his old school work and found it.  Placed with my deer hunting regulations I was determined to read it later.  The weekend was busy with hunting, eating and sleeping including Seth’s harvest of a nice 6-point whitetail just hours later.  The contents of the school assignment follow shortly. 

Not long after picking him up Seth took this nice late season Wisconsin whitetail.

I met Seth and his family in 1994 or 1995 while volunteering as a 4H archery instructor.  Seth was fourteen at the time and I was active duty U.S. Navy stationed at nearby Naval Station Great Lakes.  He asked me to teach him to bowhunt; I and his parents consented.  Below is the unedited work with the exception of the photos I’ve added.  I do want to make one note, though.  Seth learned to climb trees using a safety belt (before harnesses and vests) and was wearing one in the incident described below which took place while practicing three to five feet off the ground.

Remembering

Every one looses a friend at some point in life for some reason or another.  When we loose a good friend we are all sad but we remember the good times we had together.  This is a story of the happy times I had with a good friend.

My best friend’s name was Jerry and he was a grown-up who was into everything I was.  I only knew him for about 6 months.  He was in the Navy and he got transferred to Washington state.  He liked to shoot archery and loved to hunt.  Jerry was a very smart man, he taught me a lot.  One of the things I like about him was his motto, which was “Don’t go around life holding onto the hand rail.”  Meaning, if you try something new don’t just try it, go out and give it all you can you can get back up when you fall and keep on going.  Jerry is a good friend to me and influenced me in many ways.

One way he influenced me was that he was into archery and so was I.  I was just learning and he knew and was willing to work and teach me some of the stuff I needed to know.  He showed me a couple different tests to help sight in my broadheads.  He showed me how to set up my arrows so I could attach my broadheads.  Jerry also showed me how to make tree steps and how to use them.  Then he helped me put up my tree stand and when I fell out and hit the tree on my way down he showed me how to do it.  These are just some of the things he taught me.

Jerry showed me many spots that he knew to hunt and bow fish.  He took me up to Portage Wisconsin and showed me many of his secret hunting spots.  We went up scouting 3 weeks before season and he taught me what to look for when I am in the woods.  It rained the first night we were up there but we went out anyway.  I saw about 20 wild turkeys and found several of their tail feathers.  For 2 days we walked all over public hunting grounds and found several good spots and we found several good deer signs. We walked through lots of swamp and I got real tired.  When we were done we went back to the camp ground and ate, then we went out and explored the town.  The town had this pool in the rock were they took the rock for grants tomb.  There was also a river that was crystal clear.  We talk and fished for a little while then went to sleep.  The next day we went scouting for half a day the drove home because I had school.  I learned a lot from that weekend and will never forget it.

Seth, his brother Zach and I pose with our fish from a contest – we won “smallest” fish.

For the next 3 weeks I practiced and sighted in my bow.  The Friday before bow season open Jerry picked me up and we went north.  When we arrived up there the first thing we did was to go out and scout some more we put up some reflective tape to find our way in the dark.  Then we went to the campground and set up the tent, ate, and went to bed early because we were going to get up at 4:30 the next morning.

At 4:30 the next morning we got up and got dressed.  I saw a raccoon on a trail by our campsite.  We were in the woods by about 5:30 a.m. We followed the marks in and all of a sudden we couldn’t find the markers anymore.  I was lost luckily my friend wasn’t he found our spot and we set up.  Putting a treestand in a tree 20 feet above the ground is not easy.  It took me a half an hour.  Up in the tree I was holding my flashlight under my chin while holding my treestand to the tree and holding the strap in my mouth trying to keep my balance.  While doing all that I dropped the flash light so I had to do it in the dark.  Once I go t it hooked and tightened down I was able to get my other flash light out of my pocket.  It was an experience but I was glad that I was able to do it.  We didn’t see any deer that morning.  I did see two raccoons and two squirrels though.  We got down and packed up.  Then we went scouting and found a very good spot.  We were done scouting at about 12:00 so we went back, ate, and took a nap.  We woke up and it was raining.  We waited and headed out.  When we got there I didn’t want to be by myself so we went in together and set up in two small poplar trees.  After sitting there it started to rain and the winds was blowing.  So we got down and we went back to the truck.  On the way back we came around a corner into an open field and 150 yards away way a big doe (female deer).  So I saw my first deer while hunting.  I was excited and couldn’t wait until the next day.

The next day we woke up at the same time and went out to our spots.  To get there we had to walk through an open field.  It was beautiful the moon was full and we were able to walk through the field with out light.  We set up and sat till about 8:00.  I was frozen and wanted to get down.  I looked over at Jerry and saw him staring at some thing.  I knew it was a deer.  He pulled back are released the arrow.  The sound it made when it hit the deer was like a bass drum popping.  We waited a half an hour and went to find it.  That was one of the experiences that I will never forget.  He let me track it and showed me how to clean it.  That night we were headed home.

Seth and I with a young doe I harvested just two days before being transferred to Washington State.  He was in a treestand just yards away.

That is what it mean by even though you lose a good friend you still have a lot of good memories and chances are you have learned a lot from them and the experiences you shared.  Jerry moved to Washington but we still keep in contact.

Seth routinely takes young and old prospective turkey hunters, deer hunters, bowfishers and fisherpersons into the field as well as hosting an annual National Wild Turkey Federation Banquet.  He is passing on the tradition.  Something I’ve become less involved in over the years as my career became more demanding.  However, I’ve vowed to return to 4H archery this upcoming summer. 

So, please, if you have the opportunity to take a friend or family member into the field, do so.  You likely cannot imagine what the result will be or when you might be reminded of it.  

happy hunting, dv

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We awoke Saturday morning to minus three temperatures, but it was still and sunny outside.  The fishermen took off for the lake and I took off for the woods.  The depth and duration of the snow and its effect on the deer concern me.  We’re going on two-plus months of this.  It has got to be hard on them.  The fresh snow was two days prior to my visit, but in a day-and-a-half of woods’ wandering I found only one new deer track.    They can’t wait that long to eat in these temperatures.  

As mentioned I found no sheds.  I did find one young doe carcass and saw lots of coyote and other predator prints, squirrel prints and some porcupine trails.  I probably should have tried some coyote hunting, but thought my time would be better spent refining my familiarity with a couple of potential deer and turkey ambush points.  I found a new hot deer stand location and will tweak another by seventy yards based upon my scouting. 

Doing some scouting.  Trying out the Targus Grypton Portable tripod (I’ll detail that more in a future blog) mentioned in Photographing Your Hunting Trophies.  The pack is practice for an upcoming adventure I’ll announce in a future blog.

This guy was hanging out in the sun.  We’ll talk more about him and his willingness to sacrifice in order to help us try out a new product in a future blog.

By all accounts ice fishing wasn’t that great.

 I think the best part must have been lunch.

One of my favorite things about going to Deer Camp is checking the trail cams.  As much as I like it there, I am usually excited to get home and check the SD cards. 

I was surprised and elated to see this guy survived gun and archery season.  Looks like he lost a tine off the left side.  Click the title to see the video. 

Surviving Buck

It was also funny to see this gal eating right at the beginning.  Click the title to see the video.

Eating Doe 

Overall it was a great weekend.  dv’s Best Black Bean Huntin’ Chili got lots of compliments.

happy hunting, dv

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Coming up on Mostly Archery

• How To – Make Your Own Turkey Friction Call
• Overhauling My Bow
• dv’s Gear Provider Recommendations – ACE, provider of ASAT, Sitka Gear and Wilderness Athlete Products