Some of you will appreciate this... So I get a wild hair up my ass and decide to crawl out to the blind super early this morning before anyone woke up. I don't tend to do this often, because I work fairly late every evening. So I'm sitting there, and there's clearly something hanging around the corn pile. It's too dark for me to tell if it was a buck or a doe, but it was definitely a deer. I'm waiting patiently for the sun to slowly creep up over the treeline and I hear my truck roar to life. Nice brisk morning cold start, sounded like a ******* 747 preparing for take off. Needless to say, whatever was out there was gone as fast as I could realize that my wife just screwed me. Tonight, I take a late lunch and head on out to see what pops up. Right as I walk out, there's 4 does lined up like it's a buffet. Two of them with really thick bodies on them. I decide that I'm dead set on at least trying my luck with this wide headed buck so I let them eat in peace. I've got a solid hour left of sunlight and an hour lunch to burn, so time is on my side. Especially because the wife knew I was out there this time haha. I have my electronic muffs on and I hear an oh so familiar sound coming through the speakers. It's a ******* diesel engine...I look out into the field next to mine and there's a guy that decided that prime hunting time was the best time to cut hay. Again, the deer are gone faster than I can give this guy the finger. I called the owner of the property and the guy he's leasing the land to can't come at any other time so I'm just screwed until he's done baling. Tomorrow's another day, right?
Yeah, that would be enough to piss me off lol. Honestly though I would have stuck it out. I've seen deer ignore some crazy things. Especially this time of year.
Today was the first day of antlerless season. It’s the first three days of our “split season”. I had the choice of going afield with bow or firearm. Antlerless only with gun, either sex with bow. Of course for the third year in a row I took a rifle and saw bucks. Three with antlers and one little fellow wandering around alone who probably was run out of the herd for having testicles. The oddity was the one huge bodied buck with thick main beams but no tines. Looked like an African impala or nyala with the horns leaned forward a bit. Haven’t seen him before in person or on the game cam.
Weird. I have one little buck that literally looks like he has candy canes stuck to his head. No brow tines, just two main beams that go up and curve right back down lol. He's an oddball for sure.
Good luck man. Went yesterday evening but saw zilch. Rain and gail force winds was all i saw. Gonna try it again this evening. Supposed to be turning cool
Well spent all day in the rain. Cold as **** now. My buddy got a decent ten point. I saw a bunch of does. Not my action so far. Hopefully the temperature dropping and the rain going away will get things going for tomorrow.
We just got Sunday hunting on private lands in WV. Rain and cold tomorrow my overstuffed carcass is sleeping in.
I went out for some coyotes last night. As soon as we headed out the winds really picked up making it a little tough. I called in three on the first stand but with the wind they circled way out and I missed a shot around 275 yards. Second stand blank. Third stand I called one to 175 yards and my buddy shot her with one of my loaner rifles. Ar15 in .556 with a Photon XT digital nv scope. Tried one more stand but it was blank too. Had to call it quits after that. Its always fun calling in coyotes for others and watching them shoot em. Here's a bad phone pic. Hosted on Fotki
What's the best route to take if you don't have fancy stuff? I have a ground blind, an electronic call and a flash light mounted on my rifle lol. A member loaned me his Bushnell digital NV which is weapon mountable, but I don't have anywhere to zero my RDS after moving it forward enough for the NV to sit on the receiver. I'm not willing to spook my deer away to zero an optic for Yotes just yet. Maybe later into the season. Anyway, so my other rifle with a 1-4 Leupold and flashlight are about all I'll have available for night time Coyotes. I can use the NV as a handheld so I'm not sitting there with my flashlight on the entire time. Would I be okay with white light or should I really consider a red filter? It's a fairly bright light and I can see my steel targets well past 100yds with it. I've actually successfully shot my steel plates at 120yds standing with my white light and my optic zoomed in to 4x before. So I assume this setup would be sufficient for Coyote at the same range as long as the white light doesn't spook them.
Luckily we don't have that law in Ohio anymore. Changed a few years before I moved here. But you're right. If you work for a living, it screws up trying to hunt weekends.
Isn't that what sick days are for? Sorry I'm calling in sick today boss, I came down with opticalanalitis
You sure don't need fancy stuff to kill coyotes at night. I've killed plenty with lights. Just scan with the NV and when they're in range for your light just turn it on aimed high above the coyote. Lower it down on them and be ready to shoot as soon as you can line up the shot. Sometimes the light will spook em no matter the color. Sometimes not at all. I always used red lights and I know plenty others that use white. I think either will work. Just shoot em as soon as you can get the crosshairs on em!
Well tomorrow came and no such luck. They just weren't moving much this weekend. Two solid days of hunting and only saw seven does. But after checking trail cams I got this bad boy again. Better angle. And one of my spots he was in during shooting hours. Now I'm officially on the hunt for him. This is gonna be a long month coming up!
