Seasons winding down

 Yep already, deer season closed, pheasant closed jeez seems like they just opened. I still have plenty to hunt but it's just the start of the end.

Duck season comes in next week for a couple weeks. I am going to be trying real hard to get a couple ducks, I have yet to shoot one this year.

This week I went muzzleloader hunting for deer on Tues and today, neither day did I see a deer. I did see every variety of squirrels but no deer. 

The only critter I got in my traps this week was a couple rats and a massive grinner.

Wednesday I did some goose hunting, but when I got there I noticed the farmer had VT'd the field. Which means they knocked the corn stalks down and made it harder for me to hide. So I got down in a low spot and set my spread for a ENE wind. Boy when I got done I was sweating like a w......... crap the wind just switched to NW, hold on let me change the whole spread again..... Now where was I??? Oh yeah I was hhhoottt damn hot, and I forgot my water, dang hot and thirsty in 30 degree weather. Well, good thing I wasn't in the field long....

Thank goodness I was done and out of the field by 10:30 am, for such a bad start it turned out to be a super day.

Well wish me luck for next week really want to get into some ducks. 

Really.... again

 Well, as promised I have cooled alittle from last week and have decided to put up the video. This was last week...

So as you can see I messed up...

This week I did wait until the flock came around and was going to let them come around again... the bad thing is they didn't (I accidentally deleted the video). I should've shot and didn't just because I wanted them to do it right. I think I would rather shoot holes in the sky than not shoot at all..... Dad always said if you don't shoot, you get nothing... 

Anyways, I've been trapping a property East of town in the hopes of eventually getting on it for deer, turkey and waterfowl, but right now just collecting critters.

So far I've made $9 with 3 rats and 2 coon, which is a good thing cause my license was $28. I can't wait for this week, I've got 4 rats 3 coon and 1 grinner.... 

I'm going to be rich... 😎

Temps are going back up next week so I'll set the line again for fur. Not sure what I'll be hunting but I'll let'cha know what it was and how I did.

Oh yeah one last thing... Here it is the Twelfth of Dec. and Egg Nog isn't out yet??? What the heck??? Are we just skipping Christmas this year??? Walmart set for Thanksgiving after Halloween and they can't get Egg Nog in early???

Thinkin' 'bout writing my Congressman, who's with me????

Missed a week

 Well, it looks like I missed last week so lets catch up. 

Last week I went to a field without scouting it on Sunday, I went for ducks but only shot a couple geese.

I had a flock come from in back of me right over my head. As usual I took my first shot inside of 15' so there was no pattern and I missed. I connected on the second and third shot though.

 

This week a buddy and I went pheasant hunting, it was clean up at the public areas. He got one and I got to carry it for a while. Nothing else was seen, he didn't have long to hunt as he had to go to work. I went blind to one of my goose spots, it was forecast to be 28 degrees with 30-40 mph gusts from the SW. Well, it was all of that, and the geese were using a field that I don't have permission on. I did have one flock of 25 that kinda did it, but instead of giving them another pass to set down I crapped the bed and whiffed all 3 shots at a marginal distance. I have video but I am still alittle upset about hitting nothing but air, so maybe next week.

Speaking of next week it's suppose to rain Sunday and be warm until Thursday.... this is what it looks like now.

We just get some good weather and within a couple days is goes away..... 😪

half way done

 2nd cold snap of the year and this one came with some snow. I knew it should be a good day to tag a deer or at the very least see a deer. So once again I got up before dawn had some coffee and off to a winter wonderland deer stand. It wasn't too long after sunup that I began to see movement... so I watched the squirrels until something else caught my eye. A decent buck was up and walking towards me, I think it's that same 8 that I told him to stay away. Well, he kept getting closer but he always was covered by brush so I didn't really have a clean shot. It took him a while but after he was done making a rub he headed into a little clearing.... The borrowed 243 roared and the bullet found it's mark, the buck did a bronco kick and headed straight back towards me (that's always good) before expiring. I sat in my stand until 9:30 hoping to double up, and almost thought I could but the doe's were too small. So I got down got some pics and got to work.

This is where he died

I've drug many deer up this hill, I now employ a rope at the top and pull myself and the deer up

.

It's not actually the finish line but it is where the ground flattens out, all in all I would say this is about a 100 yard drag.

Turns out it wasn't the 8 which made me feel better.... maybe I'll see him next year.

I keep forgetting my tripod so I can't get some good pics, but my phone does a pretty good job. 

Just hate the selfie look.😠

Well, I got one more week of rifle and I'm hopin' to drop a decent doe, as of these last couple weeks all I'm seeing are fawns. 

I should be able to get in a duck hunt next week too, I'm really missing me some duck hunting.

same thought as last week

 I would love to say that I went duck hunting this week but that would only be wishful thinking. What I did do was.....

Wait a minute... just 1 question.....

What is the definition of insanity????

Yep, doing the same thing again and again, and hoping for a different result..... Deer hunting.

Need I say more? 

And to top it off, I'm going again next week. But, I got a secret....

My buddy loaned me his 243, shhhh don't tell the deer. 

Puttin' brown down next week.

This week, the weather didn't help as much as I hoped it would but I did have some encouragement.

New on Friday 4 rubs 80 yards from my stand, on the trail to my stand.

New on Friday 60 yards from my stand on the trail to my stand

Saturday 80 yards from my stand, culprit spotted... nice little 2 year old 8, if he stays away from me and everyone else he will be really nice next year.

I went out to Jake's last night and sat the evening there were a couple deer that came out but nothing was in range. 

Next week they're calling for rain on Tues and Wed and I hope they're wrong I really want to put 2 deer down and get on with duck season.

I shoulda went duck hunting

 Well lets see...

Monday it rained, so I did my Monday things.... Moe's, shopping, and a nap.

Tuesday was really windy, so I did Tuesday things..... clean gutters, get everything loaded into the decoy trailer, and a nap.

Wednesday was the first non wet, non windy day so I did deer watching things. I was in my stand and decided to try some calling. So I got on the grunt tube and grunted then I picked up my black rack to do some rattling, and scared the crap out of a deer that was 30 yards behind me. I don't know if I would've shot him if he didn't haul out, but I surely would've taken the safety off... After I got home, I got all my Thursday things done so I could go out today.

Thursday morning was the coldest morning this week, so I did Thursday things and went deer hunting. The only deer I saw a a 1yr old spike that showed up at 8ish and didn't leave until 12:18. 

That was the extent of my hunting this week, next week however is suppose to be awesome from the 11th to the 13th.

Hopefully I'll be able to put a deer down. 

To everyone else going out to try and put some meat in the freezer..... Good Luck! 👍

🎶 Havin' a heat wave.... a tropical heat wave..... 🎶

Yep, with the high heat last week until today I mostly just got some projects taken care of. I had to align my headlights and replace my seat covers in the car. I put a onboard a noco genius battery maintainer on the truck that mounts under the hood to try and extend the life of my battery.... (I've been through 2 already.) And then for the big project that didn't turn out to be a big project, I replaced the taillights on my decoy trailer. 

The reason I said the "big project" is I didn't know how to change out the taillights so I watched a YouTube and he went in from the back of the light. Which meant taking out 7 screws that didn't want to come out. Then bending back the aluminum to expose the back of the light and pulling it and putting the new one in.... 

I put this project off for 2 years. My neighbor Bill came over to see what I was up to and told me all I have to do is pull the old seal and the old light will come out. Damn if that didn't work, we had both of them changed out in around 10 minutes. 

So now that I had that "big project" done I went for a ride with my buddy while he was discing a field. It was pretty fun but after and hour my ass got pretty sore from the little jump seat in the tractor. Anyway he invited my out this morning to sit in his blind with him. He was itching to put his new doe decoy to use and see what he could call in. We only had a fawn and a buck respond but he hung out for at least 15 minutes.

 If he would've been a year or 2 older he would've been given a ride in the back of my truck...

With wind hitting the low 30mph and rain moving in we only stayed until 9:30ish which was fine with me.

We really only went out to use the decoy and because it is Halloween, which has usually been the start of the rut around here.

So with that being said I will probably be deer hunting next week and on and off until gun season when I'll hit it hard again.

First two days of waterfowl season

Day one of waterfowl found me on a field I know all too well. I got set up way before daylight, with only 4 dozen decoys, 3 doz of them being silhouettes. With the first flock flying so low they passed only 10' overhead, and I missed all three shots. The next had 5 geese land just outside of my decoys. So, I had to change out choke tubes from Mod to Full. I snuck up on them best I could and when I was close enough I let 3 shots go. I hit one of the geese so I put the 2 back up shots into the gun. I walked up within range and fired the first miss, then the second. Then the race was on and here comes old guy after the goose. After 75 yards I dropped my gun, not needing the extra weight, and I knew it would be easy to find. After 100 yards of chasing this goose we were both really tired and slowed to a fast walk, I made one more push and was able to tackle, and dispatch him. Whew was I tired. So now all I had to do was find my gun in a cut corn field, laid cross-ways to the rows. I had geese flying over, around and landing in my decoys and all I could do was laugh and keep walking the 75 yards back and forth then moving West 5 yards and walking it again. After 21 minutes of looking for my shotgun I finally found it, (I'm a really good rattlecaner) I camoed it. I snuck around the back of where I was hunting, with the sun in the gooses eyes I reloaded waited for a flock and dropped 3. That is the start of the video.

The birds flew like crazy Monday, not as many on Wednesday but I should've had limit. There's always room for improvement.

Deer season on break

 Well, I hunted Monday Tuesday and Wednesday, Wednesday I didn't even see a deer, which was odd. I've seen deer on every hunt so far this season, which is awesome, but with the open of duck and Goose this weekend my deer season is on hold until the week of Halloween. When I will go back out and try and get a deer. 

Still beating myself up

 I went deer hunting yesterday and the deer were really moving. I was seeing alot of yearling bucks 

and a couple small does. At 9:13am I shot a really nice wide 8. When I watched him move off on the neighbors I text him and let him know. He text me back letting me know his son just shot one and asked if I would hold off. His son wanted to give the deer a little time, after checking, his arrow looked like liver partial lung hit. I agreed and thought it would be good to let mine also have some time. Well, long story short I got the green light after he found his. So I started down to my bolt which I could see from my stand. I found some belly hair and some blood that dried up after a short track, there was virtually no blood on the bolt. I just screwed up the nicest buck I've seen and the chance to be done this year. In hindsight I ranged him at 47 yards twice, so I used my 50 yard dot and just dropped it a little. I should've used my 50 and held on the heart. 

 

Crap

On the upside this guys been hangin out 20 yards behind my stand 2 of the 4 days I've hunted....

I've wind bumped him out both days when I get down and start back to the truck.

Answer from last week and what happened this week

 The answer to the question last week was...... Preying Mantis.

Corey texted me first then Reggie (from work) was the second to know. 

I was heading to work on Friday and this little guy wanted to go. Since I knew it would be too much red tape to have him work the day, I decided to give him the day off. I stopped on the roadside, helped him off the car and put him in some grass.

Good luck little buddy.

Monday was not deer opener so I did some bank fishing.....

And got my deer gear together and shot my X-bow...

Ready 👌👍

Tuesday was the opener, as per the opener and first couple weeks of season..... I was late to the stand.

I was just getting into my stand at about sunrise and had a deer blow 20 yards from me. I got to see him run away as I was getting situated. Counting him I saw 4 deer on the opener, him, a 7pt yearling a doe and a fawn. I could've shot the 7 but passed on him..... Why?  young deer and opener.

After he rubbed that tree he followed his doe and I thought they were gone.... 5 min later I heard something behind me. I turned to see the buck walking down the trail I walk in on and was within 15 yards. He looked right at me... and moved off to my left and stared at me for another 5 min before walking back up the way he came and disappeared in the brush.

Pretty good opener...

Day 2 found again late to the stand, I had to get different clothes on since it was 20 degrees cooler than the previous morning. All in all I had another stellar day. I saw 9 deer, 2 of which were small bucks, one Michigan 11 point (spike) and a six that I had inside of 20 yards. That little guy strolled up my hill, went in behind me and bedded down 20 yards in the brush.

He had me pinned down for 3- 3 1/2 hours, which put me past my leave time but I didn't want to just bust him out. So, I carefully and quietly gathered my gear and eased down the ladder and crept up the trail. I did end up wind bumping him but he didn't blow so I don't think he was too freaked out.

I knew I wasn't going to be able to do anything today (dentist appt) and getting ready for the week so I did a little bank fishing last night. The conditions were good but the wind was bad. The West wind had pushed and was continuing to push all the weeds from across the lake into shore, which made this fishing trip a cursing event..... I was able to catch one.

The one thing I've noticed about the bank fish.... they are all about the same size. 

Aah that's OK they were fun to catch.

The temps stay low for next week so maybe I'll be able to punch my tag. 👍

Just a quick question

 Who can tell me what this is.....

I had to take the boat out 1 last time

 Let's start with Monday which was suppose to rain off and on. I decided to do some projects around the house that needed done. Including filling my new/used "gun" safe with my ammo, thereby making it an ammo safe. With bow season opening on the first I thought it might be a good idea to go out and look at my stand. So I waited for the rain to stop and headed over. 4 hours later I had the saplings all cut, overhangs cut and new pipe insulation on the shooting rest. Ready for season..... 👍

 

As you may already know I was having engine issues on the boat. When they all started my "buddy" said he would get it tuned and sell it, as it really isn't what I need. When I built the boat I made it to cast and troll and what I have found out is I do alot more trolling on big water. So I followed his advice and got it stripped and tuned. I had to take it out to test the motor and see how it ran.... it ran great. 

When I was thinking about where to go I decided on someplace close just a run out and back kinda place. I went 15 minutes from the house on Jimmerson lake which connects to Lake James. James in a big lake with alot of 3-5 foot humps to fish, and I hit a third of them.

I didn't catch any big fish but I caught A BUNCH of them, and it seems for every fish I caught I had to stick myself with a hook, not past the barb but it still stung. 

Here's a couple of the "bigger" one's.

Anyway it wasn't about the fishing, which was a blast, but more about the motor. Now I gotta get my gear out of it, vacuum it, clean the hull and get some pics to list on Facebook.

As promised

 Last week started with a little goose scouting that ended up looking like this.

Yep, all Tom turkeys.

Tuesday ended up a little better, I found 60 or so geese in the front yard of one of my landowner's brothers.  After a text session between the brother and myself, he ended up giving me permission to shoot it the next morning. 

There was only one safe way to shoot this and that was to literally put my head up to the driveway and only shoot South.

I was a little worried the geese would be a no show, only because they are not very patternable in early season. They however did not disappoint I had a flock of 10 or so come in first of which I dropped 3.

I had my camera all set up but missed the first flock, and when the next started in I didn't want to miss them. So, I tried to get the camera going from the time I first heard them til they started landing. Since I couldn't get the camera recording and I had geese on the ground I decided to fill my limit. I shot 2 out of that flock, however I sailed one into the beans that I couldn't find.

So with my "limit" I packed it in and headed for the house.

This is the only goose hunt I had during early season but it was a really fun hunt.

 

 This week I got some much needed work done around the house, got my boat cleared out and had the motor worked on. I also made time to do some fishing.

Next week I'm going to test run my boat.... and do some fishing. Put the boat up for sale and get my decoy trailer pulled out and ready for season.

October 1st starts deer season and then turkey comes in on the 16th with woodcock coming in on the 15th and duck and goose opening on the 19th. 

Lotta goings on next month.

Running out of time

 Running out of time this week. I will catch up this week with next week, and will be a double episode, see you next week take care, love you.

Sept. 1st until yesterday

 Since neither I nor Cliff got drawn for the dove hunt, we decided to go to a friends property. Now he doesn't farm for doves and didn't say he had them in abundance, but if we wanted to get out beggars can't be choosers. So, Cliff and I went out on the opener, got to the field, started setting up and promptly watched the first dove fly by. Needless to say I felt pretty optimistic, long story short we saw more birds than I thought we would, but only had a handful of chances and only put one bird down.

Yep all morning for this little morsel. Cliff said he had a good time regardless, so I guess it was a win.

 

Tuesday I was feeling a little sick so I stayed home and slept. Wednesday the public property opened up to everyone so I rolled out picked a field and had a pretty good time. There were still alot of birds around and my shooting was pretty good.

Yesterday I went back to the same field and didn't shoot near as good. The couple of good shots made up for all the misses. I only got 3 birds but I'm well on my way to a dove dinner. Already know what will be for supper that day.... dove and duck poppers with some turkey tenders all dropped in the grease.

Man does that sound good, I'll send pics....

dove count: 9

If it weren't for bad luck I'd have no luck at all.....

 Who else remembers that Hee-Haw skit??? Gloom, Despair and Agony on me.....

Before we get into what happened fishing, lets turn the clock back to Sunday when I got home from work. I had a decent day at work and was looking forward to a good day fishing on Monday, which was the day the weather was most cooperative with. Well as soon as I got into my house I knew something was amiss. It was a little hotter and muggier than it should of been. After a very little bit of sleuthing I found out my A/C fan wasn't turning and the top was fire hot. So, here I was 4pm on Sunday with no A/C and the only good news was I was going fishing Monday. With Monday and Tuesday looking to be the hottest couple days of the year I figured I would still be able to survive. 

Sunday night wasn't too bad, I turned the blower on my furnace to suck up the cooler air in the basement to keep the air cooler. I woke up at 2:30 got ready and headed off to go to Erie. Made it there by daylight, set up the boat, launched and attempted to start my big motor.... notice I said attempted. Yep that's right my big motor didn't want to start, I thought that might happened and I already resigned myself to just using the kicker to get out and troll all day. 

The kicker started right up I put it in forward and went to the steering wheel to steer with the big motor. This is the first time I've used the kicker to power the boat and steer inside the harbor. Needless to say it doesn't turn like the big motor and I was heading straight towards the dock. I freaked out went back grabbed the throttle arm of the kicker and turned it manually. As the boat started to turn I kept seeing the back get closer and closer to the dock.... dammit I hit the dock with the side of the boat. No damage except for my pride, as I motored out of the "harbor" I looked back to see one of the old guys standing on shore was just watching me in amazement. 

Well I thought, if that's the worse thing that happens today.....

Once again I fished from sun up until almost sun down and caught......

6 gaspergoo's

file pic

and one short walleye..... all day?..... yes all day....

Did I mention it was hot??? like melt the rubber off my tennis hot??? Yes that hot, it was miserable out there. I ran through many lures and only managed one small walleye. I did have a couple fish that hit and got off that I kinda thought were walleye's. And oh yeah, I almost forgot, when I was trolling in and only a block and a half from the launch I had a rod fire in 23' of  water and I immediately thought it was a goo. But then it started fighting like a walleye, I wasn't sure it was a walleye until it got to the back of the boat. Where I saw it was at least a 22" walleye, 

the pic in my head when I saw it was a walleye

so as calm and in the moment as I could, while acting like I've been here before I grabbed the net and ...... promptly  knocked the fish off with the net and hooked the lure in the net.....😱😢😩😢😱😭😭.

After that all I could do was laugh, so I laughed all the way to the launch, loaded my boat, and headed to the house.

Hunting starts on the first of Sept for dove and geese..... That has to go better doesn't it????

By the way fishing done for the year, I'm going to clean the boat out and set it up on marketplace. After I get the big motor tuned.

 New set of problems for next year.... hopefully.

Down but not out

 The NE winds didn't want me fishing Erie this week. 

The rollers started on Monday

and continued Tuesday

my first evening fish

and Wednesday

The best day to get out would've been today, but today is a rest day, as we all know. With nowhere to go and the reluctance to run the big motor, I stayed home and took my boat out on my lake. I went around most of the first basin under trolling motor power and did catch enough fish to consider it a good day.

I'm hoping to get the boat looked at next week, there's a guy in my neighborhood that works on outboards. I'm hoping he can look at it Sunday afternoon so maybe I can get out next week... we'll have to see. 

It runs just not as good as it should.

Erie is kicking my ass

 Alright before I get into what happened this week I have a couple addendums from last week.

1. First thing I did last week when I got to the launch was slip on the landing and almost end up in the water. Ended up hurting my left leg mid thigh and it just stopped hurting this week.

2. I worked on my motor until it's not running great, so I gotta have someone fine tune it. That brings me to the second, I've gotta slam the motor in forward or it will die. When I was trying to load it I got a little too close to the dock and I popped my corner trim off.  

 Already got a new one and will install soon.

There, now let's talk about this week.

I got to the launch pre-dawn and got set up to launch, really started out to be a great day. I motored out 3 miles and as soon as I laid off the gas I was covered in little moth flies. I mean as soon as I motored down they were all over me 

I know it doesn't look that bad, but they were EVERYWHERE

they didn't bite but they were constantly flying around and just being a nuisance. 

Now whatever I have said in the past about "how easy it is to catch on Erie" or "Erie isn't fishin' it's catchin' and if your not catchin' you're doin' something wrong". Well, this is the first trip that I've been able to put more than 2 fish into the box. The thing is I had to go all day to do that, I mean from sun up to sundown and I only boxed 4 walleye. 

That being said I did also catch 4 shorts that went back, some trash that went back.

I didn't weigh this gaspergoo but he was a beast

And this 26"er that went back.

He also was a beast, very healthy fish.

I made it in with a half hour or so to spare, got the boat broke down, fish cleaned and home by 12.

almost sunset

That was my day on Erie.... Oh yeah almost forgot... the eel grass was terrible, every 20 mins I was pulling lines and cleaning it off. It's amazing I caught any fish.....

 

Bank fishing Chronicles....

Wednesday I took the kayak out on my lake and realized one thing.... I couldn't straighten my back for 2 hours. I am going to get a better one for next year.

It was a good time 'til I tried to get out of the kayak and my body revolted. I went out this morning for a couple hours from shore and caught this guy. 

He wasn't that big but he hit as soon as my lure hit the water and fought all the way in, good times.