Hunting Season 2019

This year's hunting season started off very cold with about 5 inches of snow on the ground.  On opening morning I got up at 4:00AM and made some breakfast sandwiches to have out in the stands.  I used our annual thick cut sliced bacon from Swan's Market to top these beauties off.

Jessica was up on time and enthusiastically hustled me out the door complaining about possibly getting into our stands too late.  I pulled off the road immediately across from Boughton Park so she could take a short cut to her stand.  The stand she used is one that we put up about ten years ago.

It is the perfect stand as the prevailing wind is out of the west and the deer are due south of her walking into the wind.  I call this type of setup parallel hunting.  Meaning you give up the fact that the deer will be walking into the wind and that it is almost impossible to eliminate your scent. 

Instead setup 50 yards parallel to the wind away from the where the deer walk.  100% fool proof.

Opening AM at my stand

I went to a relatively newer stand that is on a ridge overlooking a stream.  Very comfortable two person stand that I enjoy. more for comfort than for the hunting.

The rut was very active this morning.  I am not sure if I have ever seen so much rutting activity during the gun season.  The woods were full of deer grunting and brush crashing.  Ten minutes after sunrise a large six point walked up the trail due east from me.  He stood in the path for about 5 minutes listening to all the grunting off in the distance.  Meanwhile Jessica is texting me that she is surrounded by a bunch of bucks chasing does.  I passed on the six point and watched him march off with his head up towards the deer grunts.

Dana's XL doe

An hour later three bucks and a hot doe came running up by my stand from the stream below.  I was enjoying a hot cup of coffee from my Thermos as I watched the doe and two smaller bucks ran by.  I then heard some crashing through the brush and knew that was a bigger deer.  Sure enough, out walks this beautiful 8 point with his head high and chest out.  I put my coffee down, pulled up my .50 caliber muzzleloader, and barked "deer".  He stopped, looked at me, I fired and he went 20 yards.

Jessica came our of her stand to help me drag the deer.  You know your getting old when your 21 year old daughter does most the dragging!

We went back to our house where our friend Jim Byron had a large crockpot of Swan's brauts in a crockpot.  Boy were they good.

Scott & Dave kissed by their scopes

In the afternoon Jessica and I followed the same script as the morning hunt.  I was not in my stand for ten minutes when I heard this shot coming from Jessica's area.  After five minutes she said she dropped a ten point, but it was still moving.  I replied to put her scope on it and if it moved to shot it again.  She never fired again.

John Mitchell, Bryan, Alec, Jessica and Jake

I hustled over to her stand where she was poised over her gun looking in her scope pointing to where the deer was.  It was south across the stream and on the ridge, doing exactly what we predicted, walking into the wind.

I helped her out of her stand, hiked across the reed covered stream and up a steep ridge covered with hardwoods.  Where was the deer?  We looked, looked, and could not find him.  We could see her stand in the distance and we tried to estimate where the deer would have been when she shot.  We split up and where the hardwoods transition into the pines I almost stepped on him.  He blended in amazingly well with the woods.  Jessica excitedly ran over and we high-fived each other as it was a beautiful ten point.

It was 2:00 in the afternoon.  I called Tracy and she was enthusiastically coming out to the woods to see this deer.  She did the same thing when Jessica was 15 and shot another ten point out of the same stand.  We cleaned the deer then had a big team meeting over what to do about getting the deer to the truck.  This was a big deer and would require going down and up a large ravine for about a mile.  We decided to lug our gear back first than come back for the buck. 

Dave's cooking in the garage

It was quite a hike lugging our stuff to the road and we decided dragging the deer would probably cause a cardiac event.  Tracy met us at the edge of the road.  We decided to approach the neighbor whose property was literally 50 yards from where the buck was to see if we could drive on her property to get the deer. 

The owner of this large horse farm is Kim.  Super nice.  I remember when she built this huge farm on a fallow field.  She agreed to let us get the deer.  From her driveway to the deer we had to walk by the horse pasture and the horses were definitely not comfortable with us being there.  They would fake charge us and snort at us as we dragged the buck by them. 

Opening day was definitely fun and productive.  I got an 8 point and Jessica got a 10 point.

Pheasant dish for camp, thanks Dave!