Hunting

Last Saturday, I opened the season right next to my “Corner Blind”, not in it, but within 50 feet of it.  No turkeys sounded, in fact, I didn’t see anything but my decoy, that’s pictured below.

Saturday afternoon was much different, jakes galore!  Two jakes, young gobblers not a year old, came around my decoy, not quite gobbling, but wait till next year!  The jakes were stretching out their necks to see where the clucking was coming from, but the pics didn’t turn out, all I got was clumps of grass.

Monday was taken up with a doctor visit, to treat a stupid mistake on my part.  Three weeks ago I’d applied the wrong medicine to an impending fever blister, then played 5 games of Senior Softball (my performance was great) with the wrong meds on my lip, not reading “Don’t Go Into The Sun” label on the tube, resulting with a “fried” lip!  Having been to the docs on March 20th, he started treating me on that day, but finally, today, the lips healing

Tuesday morning things changed.  Coming back from San Saba, around 9:30 AM, I passed my neighbor’s place.  In November two years ago, Randy had shot a nice buck in the “Corner Blind” and we called the neighbor to see if we could go on to his property to look for the buck.  See my post “Deer Season, November 27, 2011, (Perseverance)”.  

Anyway, in the back of the field next to the tree line, there stood a hen turkey, having the windows rolled up I couldn’t hear her, but she must have been clucking.  Then, from the other end of the field, running as fast as their short legs could take them, 3 small turkeys were running to the mother bird.  Thinking that she must have been bred in mid January, really early, with a 28, day gestation period for wild turkey eggs, the little ones must have been 3 to 4 weeks old, wow.

As I continued my drive, still watching the small turkeys, I noticed movement in front of my truck, then a gobbler nervously hopped over the fence on to my property and scurried into the thick stuff!  Another wow, but lightning was popping around and it looked like rain and I had work to do and couldn’t mess with turkey hunting, but by Friday the rain should have abated and I should be finished with the work!  

Then it started to rain and by Wednesday PM we’d gotten over 1-1/2 inches, more rain the end of this week so, maybe, the current drought will be broken!

This past Sunday, I drove down to metro Houston, Tomball, Texas to be exact, and attended a going away party for one on my grand nephews, Jarred Buck.  Jarred has enlisted in the U.S. Army and leaves next week for Ft. Jackson, S.C. for his basic training.  Brad was a big influence on Jarred and his decision to enlist, Jarred, an Eagle Scout, is super qualified for this job and I wish him well for this endeavor!

After the going away party I drove on in to Houston and spent the evening with Chuck and Linda Towne and Monday at 1:00 PM I went on one of the most eventful doctor’s appointments of my life!  The doc, who I’d been to several times with my right knee told me right away, “Jon, you don’t need a knee replacement because your right knee is basically strong, just a cortisone shot, (which didn’t hurt at all), some (inhuman) exercises along with heel inserts and within a month or 2 you’ll be fine!”  Those were welcome words to my ears because the doc knew me and my love for Senior Softball he was willing go the extra mile for me and rehab my right knee and not resort to a very painful surgery, Praise The Lord!

Eighteen days to turkey season and this one should be fairly good, (they all look fairly good two weeks before), but we’ve had some good rains and very cool nights, maybe the drought is broken and maybe the big birds will be moving around!

Toward the end of quail season, Rob Haney called saying that he had a free Saturday and it looked like the expected, big “norther” wouldn’t hit his area until Sunday night.  We, the we being myself and Sonny, my Brittany Spaniel, hurried up to Rob’s ranch, only a 6 hour drive in my Company’s Suburban, arriving just as night fell, for a go at the quail the next day.

Low clouds greeted us Saturday morning along with a medium, south wind that offered us wonderful scenting conditions.   Sonny found the quail and we scored heavily during the day.  As shooting time ended, our limits stuffed in our game bags, we decided on something different for our evening meal.

Instead of our usual steak cooked over mesquite logs on Rob’s “old timey”, fired brick, bar-b-que pit, we grilled 8 quail halves. They were spiced up with a half of a jalapeno pepper, then wrapped with a piece of bacon and grilled until the bacon was done.  We added a baked potato, along with chopped, green, Ortega, chilies and onions and we had a feast!

Up early on Sunday, Rick went to church, and Sonny and I headed out for a quick repeat at the quail.  Parking the Suburban along the main ranch road, we were greeted by more low clouds and a steady, light northwest wind.  Uh-oh, it looked like the “norther” had arrived early, beating the forecast by a good 8 hours!

An hour later, we were hunting into a strong northwest wind with large flakes of snow blowing all around us. Sonny, mostly white, with a few reddish brown spots, was getting hard to see as he worked 50 yards to the front.

We bumped into 2 coveys, I knocked down 4 birds, but the balance of both bevys just melted away into the falling snow.  We soldiered on for the next hour, fighting the wind, snow and poor visibility, until we were “whited out”. No Sonny out in front, one mesquite tree, out of the thousands on the ranch, close by, nothing but white, up, down and around me! Stopping in my tracks, I whistled for Sonny to come in, sat down in the snow and surveyed my situation.

As I debated my options, Sonny and I huddled together in the snow for nearly 10 minutes,. Those minutes of debate and indecision, along with never having, or dreaming, that I would be caught in a situation like this, caused my psyche to race from panic, to fear, until logical thought took over. Then I used my head for something other than a hat rack, and figured out what to do.

No compass, of course, since I was ONLY hunting on Rick’s 2,000 acre, ranch. I knew northwest was to the front, since we had been hunting into the wind. I knew the ranch road, where I had left the Suburban, was behind me. So, I decided to try to walk back to the truck.  Even if I missed the truck, I could stay on the ranch road until I got back to the main ranch house.

Always carrying a check cord for the dog, I snapped it on to his collar, he heeled along with me, and keeping the wind to my back, carefully walked the mile back to the ranch road, guessing correctly, turning right and. it turned out, that I was within 200, yards of  the truck.  Of course, it was white too!  Before heading back to Houston, I waited for over an hour for the snowstorm to break, then for the next 8 hours (normally an easy 6 hour drive) slowly drove home.

All of my life I have tried to beat nature and weather forecasts, and, one more time, I lost!

Well, the final count is in, Tim shot a nice buck, a 9 pointer, I shot the big one, a 10, Tim added a doe and a spike to his tally and Sean shot a spike.  Colton only hunted once all season, college you know, so there was no massive kill of doe and spike, just kidding!

At legal shooting time this past Sunday, the Special Doe and Spike season ended, there were no hunters at my ranch, period, for the entire special season and December 30th was the last time that I went out!  My big buck will be ready today, I’ve called Mickey with no response and, when he responds, I’ll go right oven and pick it up, otherwise, not much going on around here, the season is over, the hunters have all gone home and our “honey hole” isn’t providing any duck shooting, poor me!  With the very dry spring and summer there’s no food and ducks are really scrambling.  

Getting ready for the upcoming season, no not hunting season, Senior Softball starts in March, Mickey and I will start working out in mid February.  However, he’s really stumping around with an Achilles tendon problem.  It pained him last year, but ibuprofen enabled him to play for the entire season, but who knows this year, maybe an operation for him is in the future?

It rained on January 8th and 9th, a signal event because we’d only had sprinkles since June!  Here’s a picture of rain puddles “shot” on the 9th.

Last week I spent in Paris, Texas taking Suzanne for her treatment in Dallas.  Things went fine and she’ll be back at work on Monday, then another treatment on January 28th.  This will be the 8th treatment, only 4 more to go!

It looks like only one of the bucks made it to next season this is the “fighter” that tried to pick one with the buck that I shot on November 7th, see my post on November 8, 2012, “Challenge Unanswered”.  This buck made it through the 2012/2013, season.  He will be 4-1/2 next year and notice his main beam, on the right, is broken and both brow tines are broken off.  He’ll live to fight another season!  A rabbit is also shown in this "shot", it's been a tough year on rabbits with the drought and all.

Here’s a fox that came up to the water trough on the early morning of the 16th.

Another “shot” of the “fighter”, I believe that will be his name from now on.

This special spike and doe season ends at 5:59 PM tomorrow, we’re having company so for sure, I won’t go this afternoon, but who knows about Sunday?

The Christmas Holidays and New Year celebrations have passed, the world didn’t end on December 21st and everything is relatively normal except for the cold!  It’s bone-chilling cold around here, the high today is a whopping 38, it was 22 this morning and the forecast is for a winter storm to come in this evening.  The weather forecasters are predicting rain changing to snow so tomorrow we might have a white January 4th, (that’s a pun on white Christmas).

I went over to Mickey’s house today and found him hard at work on his taxidermy business, today he figured he was half way through with this year’s crop of heads.  My big one will be ready on the 25th and the final results are in, it was 5-1/2 years old and scored on the B&C 142.5.  Bragging, it was the biggest one out of the over 120 he had to finish!

Randy came up from San Marcos on Monday, hunted Tuesday morning with Rebecca with no luck then took Sean out in the afternoon and Sean shot a spike.  Due to a miscommunication with ‘Becca he had to be home on Wednesday so she could attend a drill team line, dance lesson.  Wednesday morning it was 24 degrees, the spike was frozen almost solid so I loaded it in the back of my pickup and took it to the processor.

Here’s the spike he shot, it’s the one in the background.

Randy and Sean looking for the spike that had run about 50 yards into the thick stuff.

The season closes at sundown on January 6th, then on the 7th a special season, running for 2 weeks, for spike and doe begins and, maybe, I’ll go out and get me the other spike!

Well, the world didn’t end on the 21st there weren’t any cataclysms, in fact, nothing unusual happened, around here at least, but deer season moved one day closer to its end.  You know, everyone got their pants in a wad over the Mayan calendar and its predictions, as usual end of world predictions were baloney, the only end we’ll ever see is when Jesus Christ returns and what a wonderful day that will be!

Back to deer season, Tim, shot his second doe yesterday morning. He and I talked for a while, and no, I didn't get a picture of it, because my camera was at Patrick's house, I left it there after our very unsuccessful duck hunt!

Last week a friend of ours wife, hunting on a neighbors place right down the County Road, bagged a nice buck that scored 140 B&C points.  That made me to scurry through all of my deer pictures and “shots” from the game cams to see if I’d ever recorded the buck.  No, I never did and no, I don’t have a picture of it to post, but I’ll call the paper tomorrow to see if I can get one.

Then, there’s a 10 pointer, minus brow tines and 2 points on his left main beam.  Theses were broken off sometime prior to the 12th of this month because here’s a “shot” of him on that date, then another on the 18th.

There’s still a couple of nice bucks running around looking for doe and the following shows the ones that have come by cams.  This buck, on the 18th visited the water trough around 9:30 PM then almost midnight swung by the feeder.  From the looks of his horns, no points broken off, he's won all of his fights!

Then, on the 20th this 8, with short brow tines, the same on that tried to pick a fight with my big 8 and was kicking up dust all around him, maybe enticed another doe at the water trough.

Two more weeks of the season and I sure hope these big ones make it to next year!

Our norther came in hard on last Sunday, dropping temps Monday morning to 19 or 20 depending on where you lived.  Tuesday wasn’t much better, 24 and no wind, I’m surprised that as hard as the wind was blowing on Monday morning that the temps got that low!  Our drought continues though, the front came through dry, but thankfully we had dew the past few mornings (ha-ha).

Colton and I went deer hunting this past Tuesday, the 11th, I went to a stand that Tim had helped me to move last Saturday.  It was cold and the wind was blowing, of course, I saw nothing, way too soon after moving it, but I did scope out all I all the limbs that I would have to cut to get some fields of fire.  Colton, on the other hand, saw 7, a mixture of yearlings, doe and button bucks, shooting neither.  It appears that the doe have cut last years crop of young and have concentrated on running with the bucks.

However, there are still some good bucks running around, some really good ones as these “shots” from the game cams show, the last two show “Big Daddy”, he’s still around, in fact, I saw him at lunch today.  It was “buck city” around my ranch at noon and as I was going to town to eat, one was running down the road, then a buck, not 2-1/2 years old ran across the road, jumped the fence and as I looked to the left, there was ‘Big Daddy”, standing in a clearing, his rack was pristine, no points broken off, deciding that I was a threat, he wheeled around back into the thick stuff!

Hopefully, these bucks will make it to next season!