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Opening Day of Archery Season 2021!

 

Oh, opening morning I have longed for your start.   My favorite time of year!

I am not really a morning hunter.  Some say there are special deer in the morning…..I don’t even much care if there are special deer at 6 in the morning, I just don’t like to get up so early.  Ahh, some girls do some girls don’t!

I went opening morning because I could because if  I couldn’t(like I had to work) I would have wanted to be out there and couldn’t.  So I got up and went out to prove to the lesser of two evils.

So….I sucked it up.  Marcus had to work so, I got up with him at 5 am and he saw me off, with good wishes, a kiss and friendly shot straight.

I had all my stuff packed and ready to go the night before, so all I got to do is dress my tired self, in the morning.

It was a cool morning and the grass was wet.  I walked in from the front of the property to my stand.  This is something I don’t normally do, but I am a tad bit unprepared this opening day, and I am unsure of my route from the back end of the property, as I wasn’t even sure I was going out this morning.  Preparation is everything, but winging works too.

I park the UTV at the front-drive. Rocks/stones have been placed on the drive-in to deter the flooding and make the back fields accessible to vehicles and farm equipment.  I find I don’t like this new stone as it is loud to walk on in the dark as I am trying to be quiet as hell.  I try to find some grass on the side of the drive but have little luck.

My dad always said you are in their house!  If you were at home and heard footsteps in your house, what would you do!  So, I try to remind myself of this when I walk into the field early morning.  I mean…I know what I would do if I heard footsteps in my house in the dark!

Of course, walking in the front way is avoided in the morning, as I think the line of trees I walk by are bedding areas occasionally, and of course this morning they are….I scare up deer.  They are close as I can feel their presence as they get up and run away. The alert call makes my heart jump and I grabbed at my chest to make sure my heart is still there.  Thanks for the heart check!

All, I think as I keep walking is, blew any chance of seeing any more deer the rest of the morning!  Go figure!  Par for the course I guess!

I am questioning myself why my boots are getting wet and slowly my socks and feet, the grass is soaked from the cool night and I ponder getting new boots, but I love the ones I have.

As I round the corner to my blind, I see a shadow in front of me and can feel the ground speak so to say as a big deer run away into the darkness.  Lord, I am sucking at this scaring deer thing this morning.  Yes, it is still dark out!

I get into the blind and settle in.  So, quiet.  The sun is coming up and I am enjoying my view as the fog lifts from the cattails into the heavens.  It been a long time.  There is something quite special about spending those 1st minutes of light with mother nature.

Around 630am  I have at least 3 deer to my right,  I can barely see them, they are left behind my line of sight, past the open window, so I have to lean forward in order to see them.  So, I just decide to mind my business and let them be, they left.

I hear many rustles around me, the woods are alive this morning. The birds are active and fill the air with movement and color.

At some point in the morning, I  had a little bird fly up from under my blind and into the blind as if he has done this before a million times.  A small wren if I had to guess.  He sat and looked at me for a few minutes, I bet wondering what the heck I was doing there. He then flew up to the window and visited for a little while more and flew away.  I am pretty sure this bird had built a nest in the blind, as the last time the guys took supplies to the blind, they said they pulled out a nest of some type.  As the morning got lighter, I did notice his little marking here and there around the blind. Sorry, little birdy!

At 808 am I had a small doe walk the tree line to the right of my blind, way past the food plot. Way out of bow range for me. I watched as she cut through the woods.  I know what she is up to, she is trying to avoid me and walk through the woods to get to the other side of me. Mama taught her well.

Yes, a short time later there she was on my left side, in the big food plot to my left, munching on some beans. She stayed for some time before wandering off. The morning is lingering on and I have the feels I will not see much for activity the rest of the morning.

I had a wasp visit inside the blind, he was trying to be shady, it snuck in quickly and climbed under the window to stay warm, had I not seen it go there I would have grabbed the window shade when I packed up to leave to close the window. I for sure would have gotten stung as he didn’t move from where he first went in and I would have grabbed him, I hate wasps,  I had a bad encounter with one last year.

The rest of the morning was pleasantly quiet, I tried to soak up the beauty and quiet all around me as it has been way too long since I have spent some time with my best friend, the outdoors!

Life has been chaotic and stressful lately……I will be back….I very much look forward to my next hunt!

 

 

Early morning fog lifting from the cattails.
Sunrise….fog rise!
More morning beauty!
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Dare to be different!

Saturday November 8 2020

Saturday night hunt with Marcus

Got out in the woods a little later than I like

Lazy Saturday I suppose.

We are the King/Queen of random ground hunting

After all,  I  did shoot my bow buck last Friday from the ground with less than a 10 yard shoot.

Marcus has a bad knee and had surgery to repair it,

However, he needs the knee replaced and is too young according to the doctors to have it replaced

So, he can no longer climb a tree stand

Well the guy is pretty smart and he over thinks many of things, especially anything hunting

But he does know what he is doing

So, he picked out a really cool place to sit at the edge of the marsh

Oh, and if you read my blog from yesterday

I could handle this walk

Cut beans to my left, tall grass to my front, a tree to my back, and tall grass to my right

My front and right beyond is all marsh

It a small hidden field, well not really a field, I don’t know how to explain it.

Last year we cut it and made a food plot

This year time got the best of us.

We nestled into a bush and put up the good old Ghost Blind.

Using the blind has been by trial and error

Marcus kept eye to the right and I to the left

Those same flock of black birds from yesterday flew all around the sky

Here and there and everywhere

With all the tall grass around me

I had hoped I would look up and see a big rack appear above the grass,

Well no such luck.  Not a single deer was seen

A whole bunch of ducks flew out form the marsh at a few minutes before closing

For sure teal and wood ducks.

The weather again was beautiful

Marcus loves to hunt and he loves BIG BUCKS,

So, I said a little prayer the BIG BUCK makes an appearance.

Cuz my man needs to get a BIG BUCK

The day light is getting shorter and that makes me sad

Day light saving time is not my friend.

As I love to hunt in the evenings

Ahhh probably will go out tomorrow!

Shoot straight!

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The thrill was at the end!

Friday November 6 2020

I have been looking forward to this hunt all week

As it has been a whole week since I have been out hunting

Oh, wait I don’t need to hunt right now

I got me a big buck

However, going out hunting even if it’s not my hunt

Is as rewarding as if I were hunting myself

I love being outdoors

So, another Friday night hunt it is

This time Marcus had the bow in his hands

He said he had a new place to sit, I mean I trust him with my life 🙂

At 1st he just wanted to old school ground sit

But I said let’s take the Ghost Blind

Some cover is better than none

Well the walk in was horrendous

The field we thought was half plowed

Was fully plowed

You ever walk the edge of a farm field

Were the field meets the grass

Horrible especially for a girl that had ankle surgery this past year

I was carrying a hunting chair with no strap

I have carried this chair before and it sucks

I know my arm strength is weak

Thanks for the reminder that I am a wimp

So, the chair got the best  of me

Plus, I carried the Ghost Blind, I have not broken down and bought the backpack for it yet

But the thing is awkward to carry

Long walk over

I can’t even tell you how far that walk was

But I never wanted to walk it again

I thought of how I could get back with out going back the way I came

Marcus had picked a spot on the bottom of a huge bean field(that was tilled up already)

This bean field butts up to marsh and lots of cattails

Next to an ancient huge tree, which I have always been fond of

I knew this to be a promising spot

As over the years I have seen many a deer here

Once we got settled in it didn’t take long for a deer to be spotted in the field over to our left

Far away for sure

Then another comes out in front/left of us

From the cattails

100 yards would be my guess

I don’t know my yards from feet, so who knows

The weather was so nice 70 degrees for sure

It was nice to bask in the warm air

As I know soon it will be gone

I spot a flock of birds over head

This turned out to not be a normal flock

I am assuming they are blackbirds, red wing black birds, and grackles

Their flight in the sky went on for over 10 minutes

10 minutes of continuous flight of birds

Like I said I haven’t seen this type of migration for over 10 minutes ever.

I notice a doe cross the bean field diagonally

To our side of the field

They seem to be all congregating to the same area

There must be an area in the beans yet for them to eat

All does no bucks

Its closing now and we must pack up

A few does  are still down the tree line from us eating

Which leads to a tricky pack up

As I  am standing up now

And I see the deer(big deer)

To me left, over in the direction of the does, in the field beyond

Binoculars up

Big Buck

Marcus got a good look too

Big Buck

Its past dark but his rack is big enough to make out

We think it is BUD, he has a real tall rack

He slowly walks up the tree line at the end of the field

Of course, on the other property

He then turns around and walks back

He has his eyes on the does that have been in the field with us most of the night

It was a nice sit

Saw my biggest buck of the season so far

The walk back killed me and I had to draw inner strength

To keep my sanity on the way back

I really just wanted to scream and cry out loud

Instead I screamed and cried on the inside

And it was loud

About halfway back I had to dig deep

Mind over matter

Boots to the ground

Focus it will end and it did

I really liked the spot we sat in

It covered a lot of area and I could see lots of land

So much possibility in this spot.

Oh and I cant wait to see how sore my body is in the morning!

Shot straight! !

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Delightful Awesome Sit 5

This was the little doe that walked within 10 feet of me!
This is the buck I saw a minute before he stepped out into the field where I saw him. Picture off the Cuddelink, but boy that’s blurry!
Much better picture! Pretty sure this is the buck I seen last night coming back where he came from.

Friday October 3, 2020

The weather is getting cooler, so I wanted to hunt tonight

Plus, I had some bucks below the house the night before.

So, it was my hope one of these big guys would have bedded

down below the house and would pay me a visit tonight.

Mud Duck is in for an oil change and maintenance.

So, I had to take princess (Dodge truck) down to the hunting spot.

It was a nice walk in

A little longer than normal because I had to park further away.

The water is down as there is no flooding only one little puddle

I kick up one deer as I am walking in, a doe

She is in the large food plot

My new stand is looking beautiful than ever. 

Once I was settled in

I couldn’t help but notice the large amount of bird movement.

All I could see were yellows and blues

There were so many birds I was having a hard time watching them all.

Several of what I think were yellow rumped warblers

And……blue birds.  Lots of blue birds.

And then just like that they were gone.

Maybe migrating through maybe not, I have no idea

Another doe out in the big food plot

To far away to shoot

About 15 minutes later a small doe comes out from behind me and to the right of me

I happened to be looking through the binoculars into the woods to the right of me

And the doe walks into my line of sight in the binoculars

She came out from the willows from behind me

She cautiously walked thru the small food plot

And then pranced within 10 feet of my blind

My long bow shooting window is open and she walks past that

 Then she was out of site

I knew she had went into the woods

As she made the decision in her small tiny brain that it was safer to walk thru the

Woods to the big food plot

Than to walk down the path in front of me

Smart girl

For the next hour to the left of me 5 or 6 doe and fawn eat in the big food plot

They continue to eat in the field for the next 53 minutes, until closing time.

The last 5 minutes of my hunt, there is this doe in the big food plot and she is very curious

Always trying to look in in my direction.

I believe she want to come down the path in front of me to the small food plot.

She would creep closer and closer

And we would just sit and look at each other.

But the exciting news of the night was…….

I saw a buck

Roughly 630 he peeked his head out from the hidden path

I thought I had seen movement through the woods in the direction of the hidden path a while earlier.

Plus, we have a Cuddelink camera on this hidden path, as I was hoping to get him on camera.

Well we did it turned out to be blurry, go figures

Anyways he peeked his head out, he had a tall rack but it looked small

Not small small, but medium small.

I at the 1st sight made the decision he was not the guys I wanted to shoot

If he got within range.

And of course, he never did

He was probably 55 plus yards away(not very good at measurement)

He looked in my direction several time but wasn’t interested

He had other plans

He walked straight out from the path into the grassy area behind me

By the time I was able to get the binoculars on him, he was almost out of site

But then as I put the binos on him, he looked pretty enticing.

I was hoping for the next 23 minutes he might come back my way

Or circle around behind me in the willows

And come out on the other side of me to the big food plots but he didn’t

But I was already

The group of does and fawns munched the whole time in the big food plot

And the one curious little doe just would not give it up,

it’s well past closing she is 40 feet maybe form me

and she just stares in my direction

I slowly try to close the window as to not try to scare her

But she still does not leave

Even with me zippering the window closed. 

She is finally gone

Packed up and ready to go

It was quite dark already

And I could not see around me

The last few time I have hunted it was light enough to make out shadows

Not this walk out.

As I made my way around the last curve to my truck

There must have been a doe and fawn on the path

Who must not have seen me until last second

As they ran quite quick

It sounds like the doe ran into the cattails right next to be

Really made my heartbeat and I could hear little movement to my left in front of me

My guess the fawn

As I continue to walk the fawn must have just been in the woods to the left of me

As I walked past I could hear it rumbling. 

The boys made salmon, rice , and zucchini for supper

I realize I am a lucky girl

As I reflect back on the night

I have come to the realization that the stars must really have to align

In order for me to shoot a buck and I have seen bucks over the last 5 years.

Some shootable some not to my standards of course

Some close and some not,

But But But………

It must be a momentous minute when that right buck for me comes with in shooting distance,

How does that saying go right place right time?

Well until next time……..

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Ma and fawn in my backyard!

I got to take a picture of ma and baby in my backyard. we have at least 3 sets of fawns, with one being twins. Ma has been hanging out in the field for awhile know, usually coming out in the same place. I think if I had to guess baby was close by. Soooo glad I was in the right place at the right time!

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2020 Fawns

At least 2 fawn families so far. One set of twins and one single fawn. So darn cute! I sure enjoy watching GOD’S little creatures grow!

I love this time of year!

I get these pictures off a trail camera system that send pictures to my email every hour. I love how this system works.

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Turkey Season 2020

3 jakes up on the side hill!
Watching the action in the field
A tom working his magic!
I think the tom’s magic is working!

This mornings sit was even colder than yesterday! Three layers didn’t even cut it! But….omg I never seen so much turkey movement. I mean I had them on all three sides of me, could’t get my chair turned fast enough! Wasn’t able to get one of the big boys away from the ladies and in close enough for a good shot. Had a few jakes close. Tried to get a few pictures, but there was more pleasure in the moment. A day in the books I wont forget anytime soon.