Closing the Seasons.

With deer hunting season coming to a close this year it's time to re-cap my adventures in the wild. In late summer I plowed and planted a small food plot then with the help of my grandkids and dad built a 2 man blind and watched the food plot grow. Fortunately approximately 2 weeks before bow season started the deer disappeared from my hunting area. I hunted from my blind, from my stands and even hunted by large trees throughout my hunting area but nothing, not a single deer was to be found. Muzzleloader season and special antlerless season came and went and still no deer. I scoured the woods on my hunting area for any signs of deer using the area but with no prevail. Rifle season then opened but by then I had already became so disguished with my hunting experience this year that I'd just about given up hunting for the year. All I could think about was the deer I'd seen last year and throughout the spring and summer months of this year and just knew they had to be somewhere in the area. Then 2 weeks before the end of rifle season came I finally got a break and found deer even though they were only does at least hope had come back that they would bring with them the bucks. January 2nd, 2010 I was able to go hunting with one of my grandkids ( Bobby Rubio )and we were in the woods watching a big bottom with 3 ridges coming into it. At 7:30 a.m. Bobby spotted 3 dogs in the bottom heading up one of the ridges. 5 minutes later the dogs struck a trail and began chasing deer through the woods. We both waited and watched the woods carefully for deer and had hopes of seeing a buck but everything was does, 5 to be exact. After about 30 minutes of the dogs chasing deer through the woods and barking loudly I decided we wouldn't see any more deer that morning so we headed home. January 3rd, 2010 I was to go hunting again with another of my grandkids ( Cody Botkins ) but when I got up and checked the weather report on the internet I found out the temperature was 9 degrees and a weather advisory issued for the area and decided we neither one of us needed to be out in that kind of weather so we opted to stay home in the warm house and Cody returned to bed to sleep in under the covers. Come spring I'll be out looking for new property to hunt and planting food plots all over again. Hopefully next years deer hunting will be a better year for me and my grandkids then this year was as it can't get any worst. Hope everyone had a better year then mine was.

Hunting-- A Weekend Update

Saturday morning the barametric pressure was changing so I decided to go hunting again and of course my grandchildren wanted to go along only this time there was three of them. Fortunately for me I was hunting in a long saddle area so I spread the young adults out up the draw as I made my way to the top. AS I dropped each one off at a stand I would give explict instructions to stay put till I returned to get them. Just two hours after daylight one of them showed up at the top of the saddle and had gotten with the other two on his way. That not being bad enough ,they stood around talking and laughing just 75 yards from my stand and did all this just about the time for the deer to come in. This is the very reason why I prefer to hunt farmlands without other hunters. Now I have been told that I have the patience of a saint but for some strange reason this incident of hunting with the grandchildren just didn't sit well with me and I came down out of my stand madder then a bull in a china store. I came crashing through the brush straight toward the young adults and as I got to them I ask why they were out of their stands and talking so loud. I could here them over at my stand 75 yards away.Their reply was "well Ihad deer all around me snorting and some hunter came walking through so after he got out of sight I came up here". I ask how many deer he saw and he said none. By now I was out of the mood to hunt any longer so I decided to check the back side of the saddle for deer and tracks but the young adults just couldn't be quick so we headed for home empty handed again.That evening we collected three of my deer stands from across the lakebed and I spent the evening by myself putting them back up for rifle season. Sunday morning I hunted one of the new stands and spooked a deer out of the area as I went in to my stand before daylight. Unfortunately the deer never returned while I was on stand but at least I may have finally gotten away from the dogs and atv's. Only time will tell if my new stand sites are any good or not but at this point it doesn't matter to me anymore.