Thursday, November 30, 2017

My son killed another nice buck this evening

Thankfully, the "extraction" wasn't nearly as rough as the buck he had harvested last week. This evening my son called me right before dark and said he'd killed a "goodun" and needed help getting the deer out of the woods and loading it onto his jeep. Anticipating that I would think he was "pulling my leg", he emphasized that he was not kidding and that he had indeed killed another deer and needed my assistance. I could tell in his voice that he was telling the truth. He was somewhat excited as I would have been too.





12 comments:

  1. My son shot an 8 point here in MI yesterday. Today was the last day of rifle season. Still have some bow hunting and a muzzle loader week or so. Your son did very well this year.

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  2. That is a good looking deer. Congratulations to your son.

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  3. OK, jeff - Now he's just showing off. ;-)
    That's what we call a slammer up here.
    Nice buck, congrats!

    Leigh
    Whitehall, NY

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  4. Thanks to all. He really is not showing off, he just said he has been "lucky". He was stalking/still hunting on the ground with both deer (wasn't using a tree stand). He was on public lands both times (National Forest). The bucks are chasing does here. He was using some type of doe piss in aerosol can. He was hunting scrape lines. He also used a doe bleat call yesterday (sat down, sprayed piss into the air and around where he was sitting, bleated twice, buck showed up and is shot dead less than five minutes later). Technically, his permit has room for several more before it is filled. The state of Alabama has really complicated deer season in the last few years using a tag and electronic (or telephone) recording/reporting system. When I was growing up it was one antlered buck per day and 0 does. Back then a fellar could hunt all season and not see a buck. There were not a lot deer in those days. In those days dog hunting with buckshot was legal. Those regs were changed about ten years ago here (hunting deer with dogs is still legal in some parts of the state such as the far western side of my county. Further complicating matters, the land is divided into two categories, open permit/public lands and private/leased lands. Different regulations apply and at different times. In addition to those complicated rules, Alabama is broken into three zones with different seasons for bow and arrow (crossbows and spears), muzzleloader, and gun hunts. Our season for years ran from around Nov. 20-Jan 31. Now, on private/leased lands it is possible to hunt until Feb. 10. I know this is getting long, but on top of all of that there are sometimes different/overlapping days for antlered and unantlered deer. So, technically my son can kill one more antlered deer on public land or private land anytime. He still has five doe slots on his permit for does or antlered deer at select times. Here is the link below to Alabama regulations and limits. In that anyone can click onto the zone map.
    http://www.outdooralabama.com/season-and-bag-limits

    Here is what the permit looks like:

    http://www.outdooralabama.com/sites/default/files/2017-18%20Game%20Check%20Handout%20rev%206-14-17.pdf

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  5. Don't you guys gut the deer before you take it home?

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    1. Here in MI, we typically gut the deer in the woods, with most hunters not keeping any of the guts, but some will keep the heart, and a hearty few keeping other organs as well. This year, for example, we had some nights that the temps only dropped into the mid 40's, so you really didn't want to leave the deer overnight without at least gutting it and getting the cavity opened up, and perhaps dumping a bag or two of ice inside to speed cooling. And with the coyotes making such a return in numbers here in the middle of the state, if you don't find your deer, there is a distinct likely hood that they will find it overnight. And the cougar/mountain lion/panther are certainly here in increasing numbers, as our DNR has been forced to admit against their will, due to camera's catching images of them. The DNR didn't want to say there were any cats here because of political/tourist reasons. But my son almost walked up to one stalking a turkey near Hesperia a couple of years ago, he came within 10 yards of it. He went back inside the place he was staying, got his gun and his wife, came back out and walked back and it was still there. He walked almost to the same spot and the turkey spooked and the cougar took off. I scolded him and told him to never do that again, of course. And the black bears are also being spotted in the same area, with increasing frequency. There were a couple hit by cars this summer in that area.

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    2. Sorry guys somewhere there are two replies floating around in cyberspace. Yes, we gut deer in the woods, but this one was close enough to a log road we could get his jeep in a position to load the deer onto it without much work.

      We have sightings of big cats too. The F&G folks with the state and NFS deny their existence too. I think some that old folks call "black Painters" are Pumas. I, along with my son and daughter, have also seen an eastern cougar a few years ago about seven miles from my house.

      More bear sightings as well. One passed about a mile from my house 3-4 years ago. It even got it's picture in the local paper. It was chipped and according to the F&G folks, it was from MS. It had traveled to NW GA and then back across north AL and then to it's home in east central MS.

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  6. Fresh natural protein!!

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