11-1-2012 First November Buck Hunt in YEARS!

Here's the hunt's specs:

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: New Oak sit on food plot two-track

Time in: 3:00pm

Time out: 7:30pm

Wind: N/NW/W winds throughout the evening


So this would be the first official hunt in the new set...love the cover oak trees provide, but man is there a lot of limbs on ones like this that have enough sunlight. Realized we didn't cut a good spot to pull gear up, but made it do.

I'll be honest the shots here are chip shots to the two track but with all the cover around between the oaks still with dead leaves hanging and some evergreens the deer will be on you before you or they know it! Good thing but man it calls for you to be on top of your game. The following pictures show you the three main shot lanes, you'll notice only really one area provides a shot out over 20 yards (shots out to 45 yards can be taken on that one).

Directly in front of stand...12 yard chip shot for the win to the track.

To my right front (17 yard shot)...scrape right under one of those.

Left front...15 yards to track, but have shots all the way to 45 behind it.

Now the younger Oak that is between my front and left front has a very active scrape under it...it's perfectly located for a time to get set and draw one a buck that moves down the trail as the leaves cover any kind of movement...I can barely make the scrape out through all the leaves even!

Love this set, felt like death was near the entire hunt....but sadly nothing worked. However, it was nice to have a buck tag for the very first time in November in more than 4 years of tagging out early....means October didn't go well, but also means I may once again get to see this thing they call Rut haha!

Left bow, bag and seat up the tree and awaiting my return today when I'll leave work early again to slide into the stand. I plan on streak hunting this spot this afternoon/evening, Saturday, possibly may hunt poplar in the morning as other hunter is going to be running morning interference to the East, and switch to here in the evening then Sunday all day here unless wind or other hunter dictates other plans.

10-28-2012

Here's the hunt's specs:

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: Middle two-track (poplar stand) *My dad would be hunting with me a mere 70 yards to my West along that two-track.

Time in: 4:00pm

Time out: 7:20pm

Wind: N winds



Well, the day after I had the close calls that I didn't know about I decided to hunt the Poplar yet again with the winds being northern and still hoping deer were bedding off to the West of the property. My father was hunting the far west two track and I the center one...but sadly we would see absolutely nothing this night.

10-27-2012 The day of OH SO CLOSE

Here's the hunt's specs:

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: Morning hunt: Ground Blind by food plot...Evening hunt: Poplar stand along middle two-track

Time in:approx. 7:00am

Time out: approx. 7:30pm climbed down.

Wind: N/NE winds

Well I got to the property about 10 minutes later than I'd liked and got ready a little slower than I liked (downside of getting completely dressed at site). Due to all of that I decided I would just simply slip right into the ground blind and hunt the morning instead of traversing nearly double the walk by two track over to the middle poplar stand I intended on hunting  that morning. Well I slipped into the ground blind on a very chilly morning (temps around 34 when entering). I called some, could of swore I heard something at one point rustling through some thick stuff to my NW but nothing....absolutely nothing. So I call my dad from the blind to talk over what our afternoon plans are as if a big boy hadn't shown himself yet I doubted one would. At the end of the conversation we decided to move the camera overlooking the track by the poplar stand...he didn't know where just said to move it where I feel we may get action....

So I proceed to wait another 10-20 minutes, slip out of the ground blind and go over to the camera and take it off the tree, had just a few pictures since the last pull but I didn't look at them and headed right where I knew I wanted it to be. The two-track that was dumping into the food plot had scrapes on it, and I'm not talking a couple it had 6 for sure with a 7th being possible as well, with dirt flinging in both directions I knew at times bucks are traveling here in morning and night (of course through the night as well)...but more importantly they are moving both directions. I quick set up the camera on a tree and as I'm leaving a spot an oak tree I'm fairly certain we could put a stand in if trail gets hot...moving the northern bedding stand which is hard to get to and not hunted much seemed like a waste to me lately and this camera could prove it worth a move.

Well guys, if I'd have check that camera before re-positioning it I'd have discovered that RD had come right down the poplar two track that morning!! Now I know it was before legal shooting time, but man so close. Here's the image (burst of 3 but just posting 1).

Anyways, decided to head home do some work around the house before getting de-scented again and hitting the poplar stand that night.

I got back to the property and up the tree probably around 3:30pm and it felt good. It gradually didn't feel good as hour without any sightings turned into 2 hours then 3...well at dark I started packing up. It would have been shortly after 7:10 a time I remember looking and even though I had till 7:15pm I started packing up quietly. Not hearing anything or seeing anything (could barely see then anyways) I decided to toss the two apples I had in my pack down as they were getting old....little did I know that the noise I heard shortly after has a really good chance of being RD...based upon the pictures we got at the brand new camera placement just 70 yards away along that two track....notice the time of the picture and yes...he's looking the direction of my stand!

Just imagine...if I'd hunted the plot blind depending where he entered the food plot (this picture would have been after he already walked by or through it) I may have had a shot.....OH SO CLOSE.

I didn't learn all of this until later on Tuesday of the following week when cold, rainy and windy weather prompted me to follow my gut and my father and I did in fact relocate that one stand over to over look the trail the above picture was taken on. THE CRAZY THING IS WE DIDN'T CHECK THE CARD TILL THE NIGHT AFTER WE HUNG THE NEW SET.....talk about feeling good about your new set up.

Now we do have some hunter interference being ran to the East from time to time, but we have no control over that and have to hope RD's instincts are sharp enough to not be fooled by him (not as scent conscious or wind conscious). There is a good chance though that he's running up to the woods from the sanctuary using the western tree line now that he can't do so with the cover of corn....hopefully we get it done.

10-26-2012

Well this week was hot...I'm talking Mon-Thursday was hitting 70's! Well Friday a huge cold snap moved through and dropped temps into the 40's. I actually still kinda burned out by all the hunting I have done with hardly a tail flick of action decided to simply go to work and not take the day off.

As the day wore on I had a feeling I needed to get out there...the temp changes were stirring up action everywhere from what friends were stating or posting on various online sites.....so last minute I threw a vacation time slip on my boss's desk (with approval of course) at 1:00pm and headed home to shower, load up and hit the swamp property.

The Swamp Property hasn't really been a friend of mine this year. The combination of it being our first year hunting it, the corn sucking deer to it, the deer seemingly only bedding to the South in the sanctuary has equaled very little deer sightings.....but it seriously takes seconds to change a season and I fully expect that to happen at some point between now and the very last hour of the 2012 hunting season.

Here's the hunt's specs:

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: Middle two-track (poplar stand) *My dad would be hunting with me a mere 70 yards to my West along that two-track.

Time in: 3:00pm

Time out: 7:16pm

Wind: N winds

We expected deer may come from the Northern bedding area moving cautiously with the wind, or more likely slipping from the West quartering/crosswinding to the East.

It was a great hunt except for the fact we only saw one deer. It was the same young 8-pointer I saw on the ground just 5 days prior. He slipped from the North and headed South right between us, presenting me with a 18 yard broadside shot (10 years ago he'd have gotten the arrow).

I sat hoping the entire rest of the night a bigger boy would use that same route, not likely yet without rut hard...asking a lot for a big boy to tailwind like the young one did.

So another disappointing Swamp Property hunt....all the changes in stand locations are just killing me and I'll probably be changing one tomorrow possibly even sacrificing some vacation time to make it happen!

10-16-2012 Afternoon/Evening Hunt

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: Far SW corner of corn field in tall grass

Time In: 2:00pm

Time Out: Dark

Wind: S winds


Well after a very uneventful morning hunt I decided to try something different. With the North/South corn rows and East/West corn rows flowing into the SW corner of the field I figured I'd give setting in the extremely tall grass in a tree line located right there. Here is some pictures to show you where I was seated in the 60+ degree sun...

So hot I took rubber boots off in order to not sweat a ton in them. I did put them back on once it cooled off some.

War pain needed obviously hah!

     Well just so everyone knows the original spot farther South down the line I was gonna sit in I discovered was in fact a buck bed! I took one step into the weeds/grass and saw them: TWO BIG FRESH RUBS...then I saw the bed with the customary back rest log in it.

     My initial thoughts are this very well could be one of AWD's beds due to the fact of how he's moving along the Southern edge of the corn field...but only time will tell if I'm right I guess.

     Well I'll make this quick, only saw 2 deer and heard some deer blow across the access road all at the same time....ALL DUE TO THE NEIGHBOR RIDING HIS HORSES JUST 25 MINUTES BEFORE DARK ON THE ACCESS ROAD! DUMB!

10-21-2012

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: SE ground blind on food plot

Time In: 7:00am

Time Out: 9:30am

Wind: SW to S


      Well I ended up hunting the ground blind, just erected 10-20, on the Southeast side of the food plot due to not getting ready to head out early enough in my opinion to get to the tree I was gonna hunt  (like to be nearly an hour before legal shooting time/hour and a half before sunrise).

      Well all was quiet till around 8:00 when I heard something off to my NW. Grab the grunt call and decide to see if I could figure out what it was. Grunted some and ending with some tending grunts. I hadn't even got the call down on the ground of the blind before I had a young 70 inch 8pointer coming straight for me through the food plot. He would continue till about 15 yards to my front before cutting West(left) and stood broadside for a few minutes.

      He would continue to circle in behind me and approaching the blind close enough for me to hear his breathing. He eventually did get uneasy and blowing just a touch before taking off for the corn.

      That is all the action I got but it was the first buck spotted while hunting and wasn't a terrible buck. Big body and rack for his age, which I'd say was 1 1/2 year old.

     Finally saw a buck at swamp and he was reactive to calling....could be heating up?!

10-20-2012

Where: Swamp Property

Stand/Location: Far west two track stand

Time In: 2:30pm up tree

Time Out: Dark

 Wind: Westerly switching to SW late

I'll make it short and sweet.....SAW NOTHING!