The alarm went off bright and early this morning, and I just didn't feel like getting up. I was awake coughing most of the night and just wanted to sleep. But, I peeked out my window to find snow on the ground, and it was still falling. SNOW!!!! I jumped out of bed, dressed and out the door. I stopped by my parent's house to pick up my oldest son, he will be muzzle loader hunting this morning. And we head to the riverbottom. There was a truck there, and I stopped to talk to the guys in it. They are duck hunting a neighboring property so they're of no concern. So I drop Austen off and I drive down the road a bit. Seeing tire tracks in the snow heading down the farm road was not a good sign. I got to my parking spot, which has been vacant all year, to find 4 trucks sitting there. 2 sets of foot prints headed to the thicket where my stand is. I loaded up, dejected, and we headed back home. Feeling sorry for myself it occured to me. I have no one to blame but myself. I've fallen victim, this year, to my own arrogance and laziness. I put most of my eggs in the riverbottom basket, and didn't really have a back up plan. I've only got 1 treestand, and have neglected my sometimes anal scent control policy. Hm, wonder why I'm not seeing the deer I was earlier in the season???? I'm here to confess that, and to announce that it ends today. I will get my scent control back under control, and my lacidazical approach is gone. I went into the season thinking "Hey, I'll just shoot another one on the riverbottom this year and be done with it." LOL..yeah, like it's that easy. I convinced myself that it is though. So, in the offseason, I will do FAR more scouting and will look for new lands to hunt locally. I've already decided to lease 300 acres in northern MO with a buddy of mine next year, but don't have much locally to hunt. I will also have one more treestand in my inventory. The problem this morning is that my stand is in the woods, and without a back up.......I'm stuck. So I didn't hunt this morning at all. Yeah, the best day of the year so far, and I'm at home because I was foolish and lazy. It ends now. In short, I've been doing alot of complaining to myself this year, and feeling sorry for myself for not getting the job done. Truth is, it's my fault. Arrogance and laziness.
There have been a ton of deer taken from the ground my friend. The pressure the others may have put on the deer may have been in your favor as well. We know we can't kill them from the couch, just being there may have your best choice, and it would have relieved the stress or whatever it is your feeling this morning. I wish you luck Don.
It's public land, but it's a very unknown piece of property. I was spoiled, last year, in that I never saw anyone else hunting it. That's not been the case this year. And while this is 440 acres, it's 85% crop fields, there isn't much wooded area to work with. This post was more a self pep talk than anything. I realized all of this on the ride home this morning, and talking about it a little helps confirm it, and gets me moving in the right direction again. I hope it didn't sound like I was crying and wimpering, in fact it was just the opposite. It motivated me to get off my tail and do something about it.
Anal Scent Control! Now Mo, your not saying your one of those guys that wear a pair of underwear whith a 4" fart stain on them and try to cover it up with a ScentLok outfitt are you? Ha Ha. Sometimes we all need to step back and reevaluate, Good Luck the rest of the season.
