Official team 25 - Rack Nasties thread

Nice! 15th? Shoot right around the corner. Good luck you will be one of the first in the stand for us!

What do you guys fish for? Any walleye out there?

 

We open Sept. 15th as well but we're generally still hot and buggy that early so I don't know if I'll get out or not. I've never been a big fan of MO going back to 9/15 opener but I like my bucks rutted out and heavy instead of still skinny. I liked it better when it was 10/15 personally. It is supposed to cool down with daytime highs in the low to mid 80's though by that time 9/15 so maybe I'll hunt mornings anyway. I'd like to pop a couple does at least early on for some meat and to get a few outa the way early.

 

11 days for me, my trigger finger is getting itchy.

 

25 days...

 

I'm going to try to get out and check my camera today. I'll let you know!

 

Has anybody been out early season goose hunting yet? I went on the opener and we shot a few just didn't know if anybody else on the team waterfowl hunts?

 

I do a very little bit of waterfowl hunting. I've built a couple thousand acres of duck marshes over the last 15 years or so and generally am granted permission to hunt whenever I want plus I have 14 ponds here at home ranging from 1-8 acres and then on land I rent and manage we have a 35 acre lake and 25 acres of permanent marsh that is generally loaded with birds. The marsh has been catching a local population of canadians most of the summer.

I never got real big into waterfowl hunting because to be honest I just don't care for their meat too much. I like a mallard or a goose once in a while to eat but just never could justify shooting a bunch of birds for the sport of shooting them and not use them. I admit I love shooting them anyway but personally speaking, I never got over the guilty feeling for wasting birds I didn't really want. I do love the premise of waterfowl hunting though and can deffinitely see what guys see in it.

Now managing marsh for waterfowl....I absolutely love x10. I've come to the conclusion over the years that in nearly every aspect...I am mostly a "Producer" and not so much a harvester. I'm fine (in most cases) with producing the environment conducive for great hunting and seeing others harvest the animals. Deer and upland birds being the only exception....I do love my deer and quail hunting, lol. Waterfowl and turkey I like but can take or leave but love to manage for.

Lol, every time I think about waterfowl hunting I lol thinking of one of my old friends and dozing customers reflecting on a lifetime of duck hunting and comparing it to 'standing in a cold shower, tearing up $100 dollar bills', lol.

 

Used to be into it big time...until I became obsessed with bow hunting whitetails. I chose to focus on the BH, as a deer is a much better reward to me. But I still chase some puddlers late Oct.

24 days boys til opener!

 

We actually go down to Milford Kansas for all of our lake activities. It's a great place with walleye, wipers and white bass. At least that's mainly what we fish for..

 

I'm going to look like a fool from all my bragging about the nice bucks around here.....I know we still have some but I've yet to get any decent ones on camera. I ran the trail cams this morning and had over 600 pics even with the changed settings but nearly all does and fawns...again.
I did get two 8's this time though, about 50 pics on three cameras of the same two running together since 9/2/13. Okay so here are my first two on camera this year...kinda sad.

 

You guys have some sweet bucks on cam! My brother and I are going out tomorrow afternoon (after the colts game, or they have it wrapped up) to set up the last stand, remove the feeder, cut a trail and block an opening in the fence (eff the neighbors).

Tomorrow morning I'm heading an hour south to try to get on some geese and teals. This is the first time I'm going at it alone, still very much a rookie, but my friend I go with is busy and I won't get experience on the couch.

I'll post up some trail cam pics if there's anything good.

Bob, how did yours look?

 

Thanks, yeah the two of mine are really pretty young bucks...I didn't mea nto sound ungrateful before...they just weren't what I was anxious to get on camera, lol. Those to young fellers have some potential and I'm happy I have deer even that good running around here. Seriously my neighbor and his buddies slaughtering deer have really wrecked the hell out of what I did have here and I know disease got some last year too. I have a bunch more property to scour with cameras yet anyway, maybe I'll find some of the big boys before this is all said and done.

Good luck with the water chickens Indy! No ducks on ours yet but here's a few pics of our permanent marshes as of three weeks ago:







There's several acres of these marshes, we originally built them with intent to pump from a 18 acre lake down below them but that didn't work out so we just started leaving them full year around. I plant smartweed and millet around the edges and seems to work okay.

 

Ah man that's awesome. There isn't land like that around here, too many old farmers .
I saw a few geese this morning but couldn't get them close enough for a good shot. It was actually only my third time waterfowl hunting and the first by myself. I definitely learned a few things. It's the very first time I have gone this early in the year.
It didn't help that some guys in the next pond over were shooting at literally anything with wings. Not a good idea seeing how there is a state conservation post a couple hundred yards down the road.

This afternoon is back to prepping for deer season. After the colts game of course.

 

Omg I'm road tripping to all your farms.

As mentioned before I never see a single buck in camera until late September early October. So for me it's a complete airports once the season starts. Your guys are making me so Jelious though.

 

Thanks, yeah I'm proud of everything here, super proud...I love this area and my job! The marshes are actually on upland...which is an oddity here at least. This area has a lot of rivers and streams and marshes are generally confined to those bottoms but these are up on the high and dry, this is the first summer since 2007 they have been full all summer (a bit low now) but that big one in the first pic I just designed and built last summer. They are all stair stepped so the upper one can drain into the next lower and so on in case one has more food or something. Figured in most years I could let the water out of the upper two into the lower one and have flooded food. The lake that was down below had to be drained due to some low PH underground water leachate...freak of nature type thing...otherwise it would have been perfect. I think there is like 25 acres of water in the three marshes.

I don't have any pics of the 35 acre fish lake but will take a few and post them here one of these days. It's four miles from home here but I need to get in there and set up these feeders and trail cams and mineral stations anyway...too hot to do it today...97F here right now.
We have an early teal season here in October, thats the earliest I've been out and it is my preferred waterfowl season as it's generally cool but just warm enough to be comfortable and my Weimaraner doesn't deal well with really cold water. She's awesome in October water though.

 

Went out to the property today and pulled the card on the cam. 1000 pics but all were does and that boar that I posted earlier. Hopefully ill get my other feeder going this week on the other part of the property to see if anything is traveling through there.

 

I'm hoping that I get how the deer travel the property figured out quickly so I can have a little success this season.

 

Guys pulled my card and had a few nice bucks on camera only had about a 177 pics but I got 7 or 8 shooters on one farm so I'm looking pretty flood come October 5th. Also I've been tryin to upload photos but for somereason my droid won't put em up and my computer sucks gonna have to buy a new laptop but if any of u would be interested in maybe posting some of the pics for me I'd appreciate it. Also good luck hunting the flying water beasts that I don't see much here in PA

 

checked a couple cams this weekend, one shooter and lots o does. Hung a new stand as well. Check that camera/stand spot one more time before season, and that should be my last time in there. Gonna let it sit for a bit. less than 2 weeks til early doe weekend.

 

I went out yesterday and hung the other stand on the property at my parent's. I also checked the cams. I had about 600 pictures and 575 pictures of deer... 3 deer to be exact lol. there's a doe with twin fawns on the property and they are not camera shy at all.

I'm not all too concerned. Once season comes those does will pull the big bucks out of the big woods ours butts up to.