Good attitude man! If anything it will teach you to slow down and take your time getting to the stand, not that you can help it right now! Lol
One deer before daylight then a ghost town. Going to put up my groundblind in prep for tomorrow AM and use the LW to climb the nearest tree. What do I have to lose?
I know I'm not part of your team but I have been following along. Man that stinks. I feel you on the knee. I had a partial knee replacement second week of bow season. I'm out hunting a little now but man has things changed with it. Its hard to move around or do anything. Hope your ok!
My old man had bi lateral replacement about 10 years ago at 54. Kind of scary because it started to go down hill at 45 with a torn meniscus. I'm 40. And it hurts pretty good tonight. I got mired in knee deep muck today with about 40 # of gear so I had to really dig deep to get myself out. Another quiet night. I had 2 does walk in while I was hooking up my climber . At 1:30. WTF. No deer after that, although I did have a huge coyote come by at about 45 yards with about 30 minutes of light. First time I've seen one in the woods up here. Rarely get them on camera either. Hear them from time to time, and I had to shine them off of a buck I killed in 2015. I watched him drop in the CRP about 80 yards away with about 20 minutes of light, and I stayed in the stand in case another came by. I barely beat them to him. They were yipping and howling in the hedgerow about 40 yards away straight downwind. They carried on the whole time I gutted him. I ended up carrying him most of the way back to the truck fireman style and left my bow in the field rather than leave him to go back to camp to get the cart. Couldn't do that this year! Getting old sucks.
Mine went fast. I'm just 36 and had a lateral knee replacment. Its starting to get frustrating though. I can't bend down good and I can't climb yet. I'm just 5 weeks out of surgery but I'm use to doing whatever I need to on my own. But the Lord has blessed us. I'm doing good and I have a good year of hunting. I have hunted 7 times. Killed my biggest deer before surgery then killed a decent 8 for east tn and a doe the other night. So I can't complain. I hope yours does good. Take it easy.
Good for you- I heard parts of TN got hammered by EHD this year. I'm hoping to relocate soon and TN is high on the list. Low taxes, booner bucks and friendly people; what more could you ask for? Hoping I get off the schneid tomorrow with the rifle. Won't count to the team but will fill the freezer and then I can horn hunt with the bow in December.
Saw my first shooter buck from the stand yesterday morning, mature big wide 8 pointer. About 2 inches wider than his ears, not the greatest tine length but great beams and decent mass. Small fork horn had chased a doe into a thicket beside the stand and he kept looking down an old overgrown road and getting nervous then he ducked his head and got into the thicket. I kept watching the road and saw a deer just easing along and knew it was a buck as I was already standing I got my bow ready. He appeared about 60 yards away and immediately looks at my tree but the doe and the small buck are moving around and diverts his attention. The doe finally moves out of the thicket and across in front of the stand to go to the big timber. The shooter comes in to check her out but is still not comfortable as the wind shifted and started blowing right toward him(the wind swirls badly in this stand) He comes to 22 yards and I get drawn back but he is facing me dead on with his head turned toward the doe and I am thinking any second he is going to turn broadside toward her and give me a shot. He then pivots and turns directly away from me and takes a couple of steps, stops and looks toward the thicket with the forkie and again I thought he would turn and give me a decent shot but he doesn't and walks off the way he came leaving me wondering what the heck just happened. Man was I frustrated after all the time I have spent in a tree this year but it happens, kinda the way my year is going.
I'm off the schneid, boys! Doe down. Perfect heart shot with the .35 Remington. Won't count for points but I needed a win. Now I'm all Horn hunting. Thank god I saw her flop b/c it's pouring buckets. I wouldn't have shot her if it hadn't been a chip shot perfect broadside at 50-60. Best part is I found her and I got a full freezer. Second best part is what little she ran was straight towards the road instead of into the swamp. Only had to drag her about 80 yards to the road. Didn't even gut her, just tagged her, dragged her, and threw her on the tailgate and dropped her off behind the camper. After a celebration Budweiser I'm heading right back out.
Congrats dnoodles! Now time for a buck! You taking a bow for that or sticking with rifle for the day?
Sticking w the .35, due to the rain. I'm restricted now, can only shoot one w/4+ on one side. If I smoke one I still got 2 WI bow tags and an Indiana tag left. After tomorrow AM not sure if I'll be able to get back up here to MI unless I really kiss up to the wife. Tomorrow no rain and colder I may take the bow out, but don't want to chance it with this rain tonight.
Didn't matter what I carried; that rain didn't let up till about 5pm and nothing was moving. Don't think many Orange Army folk made it out; I heard a decent amount of shots until shortly before I killed my doe (9-ish), but shortly before that the rain really opened up and mine was the last shot I heard until after 5pm. I'm really tempted to take the bow and climber out tomorrow AM to my old stomping area but I'll have to wait and see if this storm clears out. It was supposed to be done by 2-3pm today and it's still raining hard off and on. It also wasn't supposed to start until 8-9am and it was pretty steady most of the night and only let up for an hour after dawn.
Side bar... I've always heard how devastating a deer gun a .35 Rem is. This is the first time I've shot a deer w/one. It's actually my wife's gun; my uncle gifted it to her after we got married as a "welcome to the fam" gift. It was my maternal grandfathers before that, and honestly I'm pretty sure it was never carried into the woods and possibly never even fired at the range. Both those guys were bird hunters and not much on deer. It was a true safe queen. Marlin 336. Anyway, I was using the Hornady Leverevolution FTX 200 grain round and I don't know what to think about it. It went straight through her without expanding at all, it split her heart in half but the entry hole is exactly the same size as the exit. I'm normally a Hornady fan boy, I swear by the SSTs in both .300WMG and 30-06 having killed whitetails with both rounds usually the exit hole is the size of a golf ball or even bigger. Last buck I killed with a 06 I hit the front shoulder slight quartering to and it looked like a grenade launcher hit the opposite rib cage on the exit. He went down like he was hit by a truck. Actually bounced backwards. Anyway... don't know what to think about these. I'm actually kind of laughing at myself, it's the first deer I've killed w a gun in like 5 years. I usually tag out up here or kill one and trophy bowhunt after that and just don't get the chance at another good one. Usually Nov 15 rolls around and I got a full freezer and a belly full of treestand therapy. I'm also kind of drunk and rambling. G'night, boys.
What's going on guys? Who's going to be out this weekend? I will be out tomorrow somewhere. Still looking for that doe. Got a couple hunts in this week but not a single doe, just a few small bucks.
Creaky and cranky but I'll give it a month before I worry too much about it. Funny thing is I hurt it by being Mr. Safety. I was using one of those safety ropes and as I hopped out of the climber I stepped on the end of it with my right leg and caught my left toe.
Hey guys......killed a buck but I'm out gun hunting most of week and cell service is sketchy. Try to get pics up as soon as I can. He should be around 100" I'm guessing but haven't scored it yet.
I’ve had a fairly dismal season thus far...seen deer but not my shooters. My Bro-in-law shot our number 1 shooter 10 pt in the shoulder and we tracked him for a mile then lost blood and tracks. We believe he’s survived but haven’t had him back on camera since. Then opening of gun season I sat in rain for like 8 hours in my rut stand right on the edge of doe bedding and didn’t see a single deer. My Bro-in-law is hunting in our box blind with a gun and our number 2 8 pt comes out and he dusted him with the 12 gauge. Happy for him as he was real bummed about the unrecovered 10pt, but now I’m rudderless without a target buck. My only hope is the wounded 10 makes a reappearance or another buck moves through my area. I’ll be out tomorrow and eventually this season a doe will go down with my bow.
I have been in a stand every day for the last week. Mostly mornings as my work schedule allowed. Have seen a lot of deer but not the shooter I am after. The rut has been strange as I personally have not seen a great deal of chasing even though I have seen a ton of does but our buck to doe ratio is crazy off here. I typically see about 15 does to every buck that I see. Last year our rut was strange also as we had bucks chasing does in January which is unusual but we saw 2 big bucks fighting in mid January and they are usually losing their antlers by then here. I passed on a nice 115-120 inch 8 pointer yesterday. Have had about 30-35 sits this year with only one shooter buck that didn't give me a shot. Still have a lot of time to get it done but need to take some time off from the stand as getting a little tired from the grind of hunting and work responsibilities.
