This is sort of a cop-out from posting the next hunt I had in my season, perhaps because it is too painful to remember. More on that on Thursday…
My garden fared very well through a couple of upper teen-low 20 temperatures. We are eating lots of lettuce, carrots, broccoli, and especially cabbage this winter. This was one of the best heads I grew.
With some of my Christmas money, I purchased a large seed order of heirloom vegetables that I’m real excited to try. I’m already stocked with my early spring garden seeds and plants which I started planting Sunday afternoon (sugar snap peas) followed by a pile of broccoli and cabbage plants yesterday with a cluster of sweet onions to stick in the ground tomorrow.
Kara, Raelyn, and I spent Christmas with family and friends in North Carolina and we just got back in town last night. I have a couple hunts to catch you up on from before we left to go to NC and a couple outings I logged while in North Carolina. Back in the saddle today at the office, but plan on giving the woods at least one try this weekend.
Sunday is the first day of January and that means the good hunting is at my door step. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do with the way my season has transpired so far, so keep close tabs on the blog as there will be updates flying!
I had another good hunt on Monday evening. It sure seems like deer movement has picked up the last week or so with the pre-rut finally starting to kick in a bit.
The evening started off early around 3:30 with this big doe and 2 fawns feeding along the edge of the food plot I was hunting. They paralleled the opposite field edge though and never came within 75 yards.
45 minutes later, I looked up to see some major headgear standing in the field. A solid 8 pointer, a little spike, then this monster 10 point stepped out. 2 great bucks but nothing that’s on my “hit list”. Instead, pay attention to the 0:40 second mark. You can see a set of antlers turn…4 year old 6 pointer that I would love to get a crack at. Unfortunately, I never saw him enter the field. He must have decided to head off somewhere else.
20 minutes later, this up and comer 6 point fed past my stand about 50 yards away.
I was just about to start packing up my gear when my night got even more interesting. A doe and a fawn came out to my left and were walking across the food plot to where the other deer had fed. Best thing was they were headed right by my stand. It was too dark to video, but I had a broadside shot at 15 yards at the big doe. I just had to get her stopped.
Not happening… I was at full draw when I grunted ever so softly to stop her, but she freaked out and ran to 35 yards. The green background provided an ideal situation for low light shooting, so I held my 30 yard pin on her. Unfortunately, I didn’t know she was actually at 35 yards like I already mentioned. In hindsight, it was a low percentage shot given the nervousness that the doe had already shown, but as you can guess I missed. Well, not totally… I got a couple hairs and a greasy fletching to show for my efforts.
What a night though. Multiple buck sightings and a crack at arrowing a doe. I just wish those darn things weren’t so jumpy!
I’ll keep throwing a reminder post every 4 or 5 days for the next couple weeks until I’m reasonably sure everybody knows to check that page as well. Put up a recurve hunt today. Priceless reaction by the guy who turns the arrow loose.
I put another hunt in the books yesterday, but I wanted to update on my dad’s hunting status on this post. He knocked down a nice 8 point tonight and a guest on his hunting property also dropped a “hitlist” 8 point as well. Dad’s buck was a stranger to the place – which is amazing considering he has over 40 individual bucks captured via trail camera or seen from a stand on just over 300 acres…truly remarkable if you ask me. The other buck was a buck he knew well and was the 3rd or 4th nicest buck he has had a bead on since the season started. Anyways, I’ll get some pictures up sometime soon. Also, another buddy of mine put a 140″+ Alabama 10 pointer down in the middle of a monster cutover this morning.
Been thinking I might add a new feature to my blog site – a video of the day and make a separate page for it. Pull videos from Youtube and other sources of outdoor activities – mainly hunting of course – for your viewing pleasure.
On that note, I followed a link from an Archery Talk forum thread the other day and came to this website which I thought was just outstanding. The photography is tremendous and I think you’ll enjoy visiting Fence Post Films from time to time.
The most interesting thing about it was that the central figure on the website is Jeff Simpson. If you were a fan of Heartland Bowhunters first couple seasons (which I think were its best…), you’ll recognize him as the man who spent the majority of the time in front of the camera. I reckon they either had a falling out or just decided to head in different directions. Either way, I’m glad I’ve re-discovered Jeff’s hunting adventures and tremendous photography skills.
With about 30 minutes left to go, I finally had a large group of deer pour out into the green field but it was pretty much a busted sit. No deer came within 125 yards. I will say that the impressively long-beamed 8 pointer is a deer I like to call the “Angry 8″ because of the way his antlers slope aggressively forward. That makes the third time I’ve seen that deer during daylight the last 3 years. I watched him square off with another buck last year during early January, and he also was seen the morning I shot “2-Prong” last year from the famed Red Oak tree. He busted off one of his main beams last year during December, so November 9th 2011 makes the first time I’ve ever seen him with a full set of antlers.
This is a new feature I’m deciding to run on The Outdoor Smorgasbord. Here is the link to the Video of the Day page. There are literally hundreds of thousands of outdoor-related videos floating around on the Internet – hunting, fishing, trapping, bow fishing, etc., etc. My plan is to place a video every day or two on this site and keep the most recent 5 or 10 up before pushing them away in favor of some new videos. That being said, you need to slide over from the main site and check this page every couple days to make sure you don’t miss any videos. Again, here is the link. The other way to reach this page is to click the tab next to “Home” at the top of my blog. I hope you enjoy!
Was a real short hunt, but I did see a set of 4 legs walk by within bow range. Unfortunately, it was totally screened by the dense midstory that you can see in the video. Great stand of white oaks though - I’ll be back but probably for a morning sit. I’ll be waiting on them when they filter back from a night of carousing to bed.
I got involved with 4 Corners Ministries through some folks at church. Matt and Jaime East felt called to the mission field and have established themselves in Uganda where an orphanage ministry called Abaana’s Hope is being founded. I’d encourage you to check out their website and see what great things they are involved in doing.
They hosted a great fundraiser this fall at Selwood Farms in northeast Alabama. The basic gist of things was to get folks to sponsor you for the 100-target sporting clay event which was held last Friday.
Here are a few pictures of the event. I think there were about 20 shooters and we raised $20,000 so far with some additional monies being brought in until the end of November.
No event is complete without a good grubbing. Full Moon Barbeque which was outstanding!
Here’s a group shot of all the shooters and a few other folks that helped assist the event.
This was station #6 – my one and only 6 for 6 station of the day. I shot a good score by my expectations – 63 out of 100. Not bad for not having shot skeet or sporting clays in several years.
Our team came in 3rd out of 5 teams, so we were perfectly mediocre with an average score of 53 clays hit per shooter. I was pleased to have the high score on our team, but had a reality check when I learned a guy on another team shot 79 for 100. A ridiculous score considering the difficulty of some of the shots. I was dead on hitting the ones I could hit, but nowhere near some of the other shots. Hard crossing shots and a couple 45-55 yard shots plagued my score bad.
All in all, a great event for a great cause and I was pleased to be able to contribute a good bit to the fundraising campaign for 4 Corners Ministries.
