The Orion Syndicate (#12) - 2020 & 2021 Champions

I don’t know what’s going on guys. I hunted today and felt really good. I left my pack and my Ozonics in the tree with every intention of going out again in the morning.

My wife left at about 3:00 for a 3 day hike with a friend of hers and I sat down and within an hour I started feeling kind of rough. Now I feel pretty awful.

Maybe I wasn’t ready for a four hour sit in sub-freezing temps this morning.

Im going to sleep in tomorrow, go get my gear, take a few days off and keep my overzealous butt by the fire where it belongs until I heal up.

 

I know what I said last night, but I slept in until 9:00 am and woke up feeling fantastic. I’ve felt great all day so I decided to go ahead and get in a tree for the pm sit.

I have zero confidence on a full moon afternoon sit but with a front coming in tonight maybe something will move before dark.

It’s a very comfy 55 degrees and it feels great being out.

 

Guys, I feel so good right now it's incredible. It's really strange how illness works. Last night I went to bed thinking this crap would never end. This morning I woke up and after two and a half weeks it was just gone. I was sitting on stand this afternoon feeling great watching does walk south and north within bow range and I just felt wonderful.

I climbed down at dark, walked back to the house, changed, fed the dogs and then logged into the forums. I'm sitting here amazed at how we take good health for granted. When I'm okay I don't give it a second thought. Today though, I feel fantastic after feeling like crap for a while I'm just kind of jazzed that I feel so good. It's a shame we aren't this excited and thankful every day that we wake up feeling healthy.

It sucks it had to happen during the peak of the rut here, but I guess that's life. The good news for me is that the peak of the rut is still coming where I hunt in Arkansas, so don't count me out on bucks yet.

Oh, and @fletch920: KILL!

 

I can’t seem to win where bucks are concerned. I slept in this morning because the weather said it was going to rain from 5:00 to noon this morning.

I woke up and it hadn’t rained. I got dressed and stepped out onto the back deck and a beautiful buck was there at 35 yards staring at me.

I just stood there and had a stare down for about a minute and he finally blew and took off. He was no giant but I definitely would have shot him.

 

Good luck out there Fletch.

I'm going to be heading out the door here in a few minutes. I already know that right now there's not much need in being on stand more than an hour to an hour and a half before dark here.

 

Also, I’m still going to try for a bow buck this evening and tomorrow morning.

If I don’t kill one then tomorrow afternoon I’m taking the 45-70 out and dropping the first mature doe I see since it’s the last day of gun season. I’m way behind on my body count.

I know, I know. They won’t show tomorrow afternoon.

 

Well, I saw a ton of squirrels this afternoon, and I did get a glimpse of a deer walking the far ridge about 150 yards away but I couldn't tell what it was. Nothing came onto my property. I really didn't expect anything to on the pm sit. I moved the stand from across the road to behind my house solely to sit there in the morning and see if that buck will venture back into the area.

I guess I'll find out in the morning.

 

So, that didn't work. I didn't see a thing again this morning. It's been a while since I've seen anything in the morning but I've seen at least one deer every afternoon sit. Like I said, since this afternoon is the last day of gun season I'm going to take my 45-70 this afternoon and if a big doe shows up a big doe will die.

We do have a muzzleloader season in late December that I could use the gun tag for, but archery season is still open during muzzleloader season and I can use my archery tags, so the way I see it I might as well punch this tag if I get a chance.

 

As I suspected, not a single deer showed yesterday afternoon.