Up North Journal Pro Staff Kevin

Goosed!

2010-12-13T09:25:00.000-08:00

I finally got to go on my first Goose hunt! My friend Mack called me Friday and asked if I wanted to join him and a couple other guys in the morning for a layout hunt in a local field. After a quick check with the Boss…YES! After a quick inventory, I had to make a quick run up to the local big box store and grab some appropriate steel goose feed.

6:30 in the morning we meet up and headed to the farmers field with practically a train of trucks. Mack had his trailer hitched up and I started learning that goose hunting requires a LOT of equipment. Tons of goose decoys, of several varieties, placed in patterns I have yet to grasp but were debated over by the other hunters and 6 layout blinds went into the field. Raking the corn stalks and debris to cover our set up as well as help in the illusion that the decoys were looking for food, was all part of my learning experience. Then we parked the trucks out of the field and waited.

Like duck hunting, I enjoyed this hunt because you got to talk and shoot the breeze until someone spots or hears geese coming in. Mack had the blinds laid out so that he was in the middle to call the shot. I was towards the left end next to the last guy in the row.

At 8:30, 2 low flying geese were spotted heading right for the left end of our group…that’s me! Mack called out to let us have the first shots and we got ready… They got closer and closer and I was waiting for Mack to call the shot…. They cupped for landing… no call yet…they dropped their landing gear…no call yet….HECK WITH IT! Time to shoot!!! I missed. By that time, the rest of the group opened up and 2 birds quickly hit the corn. I think I hit the lead bird on my second shot but by that time with everyone else shooting I could not be positive and I was having so much fun I didn’t care anyways! How would have known that laying in a tent like sleeping bag thing that opens up on the top, in the middle of a corn field in 20 degree weather could be so much fun! (Btw- Mack just figured we’d open up when they got close….got a bit of a ribbing for waiting so long to shoot.)

2 birds in, 2 birds down, not a bad way to start the morning. About 30 minutes later another flock came in and we all hunkered down. This group didn’t like something though as they circled us twice and then headed across the road to another field. But they didn’t land, they circled back again for another fly over of our set…but still no landing gear coming down and they headed back.

Mack told us that things would explode when the geese really got moving and around 9:30 he was right… a group of 4 circled and dropped their landing gear only to be meet with a hail of steel and tungsten. 4 more down. While Mack and a couple others were running out and picking those birds up, another flock came in and circled the decoys! Half our group was just laying in the corn and the other half were sitting in their blinds trying not to move! No shooting though as that group moved on. A couple minutes later though and several hundred geese were coming in from what seemed like every direction! We had a group land just to our left while a couple other groups came in for landings in the decoys. 6 shooters, 6 birds down so we had 6 more birds to go…and 10 seconds later the hunt was done!

So, you’re asking when did I get my bird? …well, after the second group my feed tube on my pump shotgun jammed! And nothing I could do in the field would free it up. All this was happening while being circled by hundreds of geese! So, it was down to a single shot and I waited until I had a perfect line on a single bird about 35 yards out….one shot was all I needed!

We grabbed all the birds for a quick shot and Mack got his truck and trailer out so we could load it all up and get out of the field as quick as possible. We then went to Mack’s were I’m fairly certain I was the but of a joke as Mack convinced me to pose for a picture not with just my birds, but with eight that he put in a neck carrier…at least he told me it was to carry them around my neck. I really didn’t think about the fact that I was going to have 8 birds hanging around my neck only…at 10 to 12 lbs a piece…that’s close to 100lbs of “dead” weight! Oh well, I still couldn’t stop smiling!

Mack, thanks for introducing me to ANOTHER addiction!

PSE

2010-12-03T07:38:00.000-08:00

Well, I recently made a trip up to Chico’s neck of the woods for our annual PSE team meeting. Since you’re wondering why a company selling hunting products would have a meeting during the peak Whitetail hunting season, I’ll fill you in on the excitement…

Our annual meeting is scheduled around this time as it allows our Regional Manager, Paul Penix, a chance to get back from Arizona (PSE’s headquarters) and hopefully have a full delivery of the new 2011 products for us to not only review but SHOOT! We get a hands on technical review and then an opportunity to run each and every product through its paces. Paces, sounds like a horse race, I should have said “down the ¼ mile”!!!

Each year we see improvements in the Archery industry by all the competitors but this year, PSE has made a quantum leap! While there’s a lot of stuff I’m privy to as a staff member that I can’t tell you about, here’s what I can…

First, check out the new website! WWW.PSE-ARCHERY.COM It’s totally redesigned with lots more information and it currently has the new line up…and it’s accepting orders! New technology animation videos, Pro shooter interviews and much, much more.

Next the bows…

If you’ve read some of my journals in the past, you know that I’ve been shooting the PSE Omen for the last year and a half. Are the cams aggressive? You bet! Does it have a super shallow brace height? 5 ½” …you bet! Is it faster than Superman with a sugar high? Sonic booms don’t have time to even start! Does it shoot smooth as glass? You could cut a diamond on it! Could PSE improve on that? YOU BET! The new Omen Pro is not only faster and smoother, PSE has re-designed it to pull back so smoothly you’ll take it to a pro shop just to have someone else tell you you’re really pulling back 70lbs even if it feels like 60lbs! or less! I shot the new Omen Pro with 60lb limbs, dialed all the way down it pulled at 63 lbs and it felt like I was pulling 50 lbs! How did PSE accomplish this you ask? …well, I can tell you a couple things. First, they re-engineered the riser, called the new Planer Flex Riser, thickening it while at the same time milling down some areas to keep the weight down. This helps change the vibration and flex in the riser from side to side on a shot, to forward and back. By changing this vibration and flex direction it provides a more stable launch and a more accurate shot. Next, they introduced the new Centerlock Limb Pockets. They’re wider and longer. By widening the split limbs and lengthening the pockets, PSE has increased the stability and power all at the same time. From 50lbs to 80lbs and 26” to 30” (in half inch increments!), its draw length specific and ready to knock down anything walking the planet! (I’m not sure about setting this monster killer up for bow fishing…but Moby Dick had better stay on the bottom!)

The Drury brothers Dream Season has been the pinnacle of speed, smoothness and hunting for years. This year, PSE introduced us to the Dream Season EVO (yup, that’s for EVOlution!). Incorporating all the changes in the Omen Pro, the DS EVO uses the new AXE Hybrid cams. Smooth? Time to add the butter to the glass cause you’ll be cooking some backstraps before you know it. These cams are not draw length specific and can be adjusted from 25” to 30” in half inch increments with the included module (which stores in the cam!)

What other bows are in the line up with the new technology? Well, you’re going to have to go visit the web site cause otherwise I’d be writing for way more time than I have available. Don’t miss the new Dominator series and the Supra One Cam…. And that’s just the Pro Line!

The Bow Madness still leads the way in the main line and that’s a bow that out performs the top of the Pro line competition for half the price! It’s a monster sleeper for sure! Zzzzzzz BOOM!

There are improvements to the Chaos and a new youth bow called the Mini Burner (and boy does it burn!). The Chaos is now offered in only 2 draw weights, 30 and 60lbs…why? Because you can now adjust them down in weight by 50%! 60lbs all the way down to 30lbs!

Ok, I gotta stop now or this will turn into a book! Go check out the web site!

Did I mention that a number of the bows even ship with America’s Best bowstrings
installed?

Don’t forget about the Crossbows either! TAC15 or TAC10…..William Tell would not only shoot the apple off his sons head, but at way past a few paces and he could do it if his son was on the opposite side of the tree!

Ok, Ok…till next time, put some gloves on cause the new PSE’s are SMOKIN HOT! (guess you’ll have pre-cooked venison shish kabob for 2011!)

Deer Camp 2011

2010-11-22T08:24:00.001-08:00

Well, deer camp 2011 has come and gone and the “buck” pole (an old swing set minus the swings) remains empty. Even so, deer camp is always a time to remember. This year I once again concentrated on getting my daughter an opportunity to kill her first deer. We even pulled doe tags for that area to increase her odds.

With Opening Day on Monday, we ran into a lot of traffic heading north on Friday afternoon but we arrived at camp with just enough time to get changed, grab our bows and run to the stands I had set up weeks before. I’ll just say it was a nice evening to take a nap with all the deer action we witnessed… The next morning was a command performance of the previous nights. So far it was looking pretty scare at deer camp.

My buddy and his son arrived shortly after we had lunch. Deer camp is at his Mom and Dad’s place in Northern Lower Michigan. They’ve been taking care of me, and now my daughter, for over 15 years and it’s a tradition to spend the opener enjoying their hospitality.

After lunch we took a walk to an area we haven’t hunted in years called Cone Head (small hill looks like a cone head…). To get to this area we have permission to cross some private land we’ve hunted in the past and boy are there some deer sign there! As soon as we crossed into the state land, WHAM! Trees, not saplings nor twigs, all rubbed up… and right in front of my old blind, a nice fresh rub. …tempting but its a couple miles hike and getting a deer out would be a night mare… maybe next year.

Anyways, we all got geared up and headed out to the treestands for an evening bow hunt.. same song, same dance…deer someplace are having a grand ol’time.

Sunday started out with high winds and rain so we called off the morning hunt and caught up on some sleep (no complaints here). Did I mention the food served at deer camp? I brought a roast and my buddy brought steaks and chicken for the grill….even if we didn’t get any deer nobody was going home hungry!

Opening day;

Well, opening day was a new experience for my daughter, she got to find out what it’s like to sit in an open stand during a hail/sleet storm! I can only say I’m very thankful it was sleet and hail and not rain…wow! After the storm passed the day improved a little but our luck was still not changing. My buddy and his son saw a couple does and “claimed” the does headed straight for us…likely story (LOL)

Unfortunately, my buddy came to deer camp with a pretty nasty cold and his “drugs” were pretty rough on him. His plan was to hunt Monday night, Tuesday morning and then pack up and get back home as his son needed to be in school Wednesday. He decided that he wouldn’t be able to drive if he stayed any longer so he packed up and headed home. (he’s doing better which is good news since he’ll be hunting in a couple weeks in Michigans Elk season! Drew a Bull Elk tag!!! Lucky dog!)

Since he’d seen some deer in the morning, we decided to switch stands and see if we could improve our score card…

After sitting for a couple hours my daughter quietly says “dad! Deer!” I turn the camera on and look over her shoulder, sure enough, I can see a nice wide brown body coming through the trees. It angles to her right and I can see it’s a large basket spike. She get’s the gun ready and the buck stops broadside at about 25 yards. He still standing and no boom…at this point I’m in the whisper mode of “…shoot, shoot, shoot him, shoot, shoot……” etc. I think my daughter was about to smack me in the head. After what seems like an eternity the buck walks away. By this time I can see his belly is coated in red, he’d been wounded earlier. Since we’ve heard all the local shots, I know this buck has traveled a long ways and while it looks like a lot of blood, it could only be a grazing wound. He’ll be back.

Back to my daughter….After the buck walks away she turned to me and explained that she could not see the deer in the scope, it was just a little point of light… I know exactly what the problem is and explain that by having to turn her upper body a full 90 degrees and then try and hold the gun for the shot, it would miss align her head and the stock and prevent the proper alignment necessary to view through the optics. I am very proud she decided to not pull the trigger on a marginal shot even though that would have been her first deer!

In a future blog I’ll be going over how to train your self to shoot from the opposite shoulder. I’ve been shooting left and right handed for as long as I can remember and it’s natural for me to simply change shoulders when an animal crosses to my off side (even if it drove my coach nuts while on the rifle team! Sorry Sarge!)

After my daughter explained why she didn’t pull the trigger, she then proceeded to explain her thoughts about my repeated comments over her shoulder…so I get excited when deer are around…shoot me. She also wanted to know why her “seat” was shaking so much. I explained that it’s called “Buck Fever” and the day opportunity knocks like that and you don’t shake, is the day you need to stop hunting. Heck, I only had my camera going and my legs were shaking to mix paint. Oh, and in regards to the camera…note to self, make sure camera is ready before you press the record button. Oops.

We finished out the evening seeing 3 more does skirt though the woods behind too many trees and one other deer sniffing around our drag line of Mikes Magic…but he didn’t come in. A lot of talk that evening was about shaky behinds and opportunities…Excitement!

Tuesday morning was almost back to our first day except one lone doe trotted through the field where we could not get a shot through the trees at her.

Stories are made, New experiences are remembered and Deer Camp 2011 shows a win for the deer and great memories for my daughter and me!

A few more pictures from my Duck hunt with Mikey and crew

2010-10-26T10:36:00.000-07:00

"Mojo in the Mirror"

"Duck, duck...GOOSE"

One of the other groups out that morning, retrieving a duck they knocked down.

"Perfect Morning"

Ducks, Ducks and More Ducks...

2010-10-26T10:25:00.000-07:00

...and maybe a Goose or two.

Well, I’ve finally gotten out and gone Waterfowling a couple times this year….so far the Geese and Ducks are safe even if a few tail feathers are missing.

A couple weeks ago Mikey invited me to join him, Randy and his friend Logan for a Saturday morning hunt at a near by lake. This would be my second waterfowl experience, period. I got all my gear ready, made sure I had the appropriate licenses (including my duck stamp) and ammo. Friday night I got about 3 hours sleep before I needed to get on the road and drive the 45 minutes to Mike’s house. I slept right through my alarm! Luckily, I had set it early so I could stop on the way north and pick a couple things up …skipped that and got there on time…WHEW! Anyways, I got to Mikes and we loaded up his truck, got loaded and headed out. While Mikey has his driving permit, Mike had me drive while towing the boat.

We arrived at the State Park boat launch around 4am and there was one hunter already waiting to go out. We got the boat off the trailer and loaded with most the gear. The plan was to take Logan and Randy over to an island, drop them off to start setting the decoys and come back to pick me up with the rest of the gear. The only problem we had was that Mikey couldn’t get the motor started. All joking aside, Mikey pulled that rope enough times to start about a hundred or more motors. He called Mike, made some changes and BANG! It started. (See Mikey, Dad knows best! LOL).

Once we all got to the island, Mike and Logan made sure all the decoys were set in some pattern only known to them…looked like decoys on the water to me but I’ve been told there is a way of placing them that makes them work. You just can’t throw them out any which way. We “brushed” the blind in more and as Mikey and Logan were finishing up, more hunters started to arrive and soon there were another 4 groups out. The night was clear and warm so sitting and waiting for “shooting” hour to commence was a great time to relax and enjoy being out side. A bit of comical relief was thrown in as Logan seems to be still in the learning stage of applying camo face paint. Black paint (compliments of Dead Down Wind Color Wheel), applied in a heavy pattern that leaves ½ an inch of white skin around your mouth and eyes creates an almost Holloweenish type look....it’s not going to hurt getting it on your mouth or on your eye brows, lids and under your eyes… Once Mikey, Randy and I had stopped rolling around on the ground laughing, we took pity and provided a bit of advice on finishing up what Logan started. Sorry Logan, it was just too darn funny. Oddly enough, after the “paint” session was completed, the two “kids” laid down and fell asleep while the two older (barely!) guys stayed awake. What happened to youthful energy??About 20 minutes before legal shooting time, Mikey and Logan woke up and got ready to go.

TIME TO ROCK! Legal shooting time had arrived and immediately we had two ducks paddling in towards the decoys. As Mikey was telling us to get ready to flush them up, Logan jumped up and opened a rain of steel on them. Guess they brought their umbrellas cause they lifted and flew away unscathed. A few minutes after that, a truck pulled into the boat launch (we were positioned on the island were we could see the launch site) and dropped a bass boat in the water. The two guys proceeded to fish through out the zones of several hunting groups. Not the smartest idea and I’m sure it effected the flight patterns of incoming birds. As the sun started to rise more, several small groups of ducks flew past but none were interested in our decoys or landing and having a chat so several misses later the group was still birdless.

About 9am, I notice a boat heading across in front of us that looked like it had a model plane on the bow…weird until I watched it beach on the public beach area and meet several other folks all carrying planes. Oh Crap. Sure enough, they soon started flying RC Sea Planes back and forth in front of us. Now, while I can’t say without a doubt that they were engaging in hunter harassment as its all public park, there was a section of lake that is off limits to hunting that they could have been on with the same access and facilities…go figure. While I was tempted and while I did pull up on several occasions and put my bead on the planes because they were certainly in range, I never pulled the trigger. First, at times, there was a family on the beach in the direct path of any falling steel and that would have been not only dangerous but irresponsible. Other times I just didn’t have the lead time get a decent shot off. Probably a good thing as I just should have called the DNR to have them ticketed for harassment. This harassment went on until after we left for the day. Then again, I could have been distracted by the couple canoeing that paddled directly at us until they were about 35 yards away, took some pictures of us and paddle around the island…directly into the middle of another hunter’s decoy spread!

Well, while it was a beautiful day and we did get to throw some steel at some ducks, we decided to load up and head home. While Mikey and Logan were gathering the decoys, Randy and I cased up our guns and got the blind area cleaned up. Suddenly I heard a honk! I yelled “Geese”! Randy looked up and yelled “Treetop”. Luckily, Mikey and Logan had not cased up their guns yet and grabbed them quickly. Mikey opened up and missed but Logan got on a goose and knocked him down! Packing up and opportunity knocks! Go Figure. Logan got his first goose. Congratulations Logan.

All in all a very interesting day. I think that if we were not harassed we would have had a ton of opportunities to drop some ducks and geese but at least we had a good time, got a bird and everyone got to go home safe.

Next: the Birthday weekend hunt.

Caring for Concealed...

2010-09-27T11:28:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to write a quick blog to remind everyone who has a CCW/CPL not to neglect your carry firearm. I today’s hectic environment it’s easy to come home in the evening, take your firearm off (locked up or secured) and forget about it until the next time you take it with you. You might think, “Hey, I haven’t had time to go to the range and practice, so I know it’s clean…” …WRONG! Carrying concealed, whether you fire your gun or not, is active service. It will get dirty. While I would never say pocket lint or light rust will cause your firearm to malfunction, would you bet your life or the lives of your family on it?

There are a couple of ways you’re going to carry your firearm, against the body or just under a layer of material. If you’re going to carry against the body, like in an IWB rig (Inside the Waist Band), one of the biggest concerns you should address is moisture. Whether you are exerting yourself and sweating or simply carrying all day, your body releases moisture. With the firearm trapped between your clothing and your skin, even with a holster (and especially with a Clip carry), steel components will start to rust. Even well oiled, body moisture can still get to spots internally and start the process of oxidation. You are trapping the moisture in your firearm.

For all methods of carry you should always be aware that dirt, lint and the like can and will find its way into your firearm one way or another. Fibers from your shirt or pants can get wedged into small areas…like behind the trigger, the safety lever or decocker, etc.

It should be part of your habit/routine to not only check for function and load every time you pick up your firearm, but also for dirt and moisture/rust. Make sure you break your firearm down and give it a light cleaning and a quick oil once a week (Dead Down Wind odorless oil is an excellent example). This is for pistols and revolvers…

Protecting our families and our lives is not something that should be neglected.

Rinehart R100

2010-09-14T05:58:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, August 7th, the Rinehart R100 was in Saginaw Michigan. I thought this would be a fun day to take Mindy and let her have a good time shooting at different targets. I recently bought Mindy a new PSE Bow Madness XS and put some new Americas Best Bowstrings in her favorite color, purple and white, on it. The week before the R100, I finally got her drop away rest tuned in, her sight set, loop installed and served her G5 peep in. I know, a week to practice after not shooting for months…it was just a fun day. I had Mindy sight in and tune her groups for 20 yards and a few at 30 yards. Thinking about what distances she would need to shoot at for the R100, I had her take a couple shots at 40 yards (4 shots). Time would dictate that we would not get in any more practice before Saturday.

Well, Mindy had to get up at 5am (during her summer break! Oh my!) and we made our way up to Mike’s house. We loaded up his truck and headed north.

We arrived shortly after the course opened and it was already starting to fill up so we all got our bows out and sent a few arrows down the practice range before we started. The R100 offers two courses, the North American and the Exotics. They both have 50 targets (hence the R”100”) and if you’re planning on attending next year, plan for two days. We started around 9am and didn’t finish the North American course until almost 2pm. We chose the North American course because we knew the targets would be ranged more to practical shot distances for actual shots.

The biggest mistake I continuously made all day was in not trusting my gear! I recently installed a G5 Optix XR2 sight which is one fixed and one floating pin. I’ve never used a floating pin before and while I marked ranges for both elevated and ground level shots I continuously over corrected and my scores showed it. For some reason I just could not get used to the sight working the way it was designed and I was making high and low shots because of it. When I set the pin as marked and trusted it…boom! Spot on! That is why practice, practice, practice is so important, especially with new gear.

Now, on the other hand, Mindy with her new bow, with very little practice and 4 shots at 40 yards with none longer….was smoking ME! Everyone in our group ended up missing a target some time during the course. With targets ranged from 18 yards to 53 yards can you guess which on Mindy missed? …the 18 yard target! She was smoking the long range shots! PSE Bow Madness INDEED! I will add a little advice if you’re shooting one of these fast PSE bows…I’m shooting a PSE Omen with Carbon Express Aramid KVs…lubricate the arrows with a little bit of Scorpion Venom, otherwise they melt the targets and are extremely difficult to remove! Then again, if you miss like this I don't think Scorpion Venom is gonna help...

Here's Mike on his 50 yard shot that he missed... and here's his arrow!

It was a long morning with lots of shooting but boy was it fun! My arm was tired and we didn’t get lunch until after 2pm but I’d do it again in a heart beat! I think Mikey gave Mike a run for his money and I know that I could not be prouder of Mindy BEATING her dad’s score! Michigan’s deer heard had better watch out cause there’s a new Sheriff in town and she’s called Mindy!

Hunters Safety, Day One:

2010-07-20T05:39:00.000-07:00

Well, Monday night was the first night that my daughter attended her hunter’s safety class. I’ve been introducing her to her outdoor heritage the last two years through Michigan’s Hunters Apprentice program. Through this DNRE program, “The apprentice hunter program allows individuals to hunt without the required hunter education course if accompanied and closely monitored by a licensed hunter 21 and older who is mentoring them in the sport. An apprentice hunter may participate in the program for two license years before being required to take a hunter safety course.” Now that her two years have passed and she’s still interested in hunting (wahoo!), it’s time to take the course.

I signed her up at the Livingston County Wildlife and Conservation Club for their 4 day course. The DNRE mandated minimum class time is 10 hours, LCWCC is providing 14 hours of instruction to better prepare and educate these new hunters. Also, while the state allows for up to a $10 fee to cover materials, LCWCC provides their classes for free (donations excepted).

The first night over 50 new hunters were in attendance and LCWCC had close to 10 certified instructors present. The new hunters included boys and girls as well as a few adults. Parents were encouraged to stay (and most did).

One thing I noticed from the first night was the amount of interaction the instructors maintained with the students. They not only used charts and demonstrated safe hunting and gun handling but, brought students up front and included them in their demonstrations.

Different types of firearms were discussed (break open, pump, bolt and Semi-auto). Ammunition types were covered as well as why you do not mix them up. A bit graphic, but pictures were circulated that showed what could happen if you don’t pay attention and load the wrong ammunition in your gun. The kids thought the exploded gun looked cool…until they looked at what was left of the shooters hand…yuck. (We’ve all probably seen those pictures, taken in the ER…and I agree, yuck). The instructors had a nice segment were they had the kids demonstrate the safe fire zones and carry types in a group (they made sure they had a left hander in the group too). All in all, an excellent first class.

As a parent, knowing how bored and rambunctious a group of young children can get, I was very impressed with the attention and respect these youngsters gave their instructors. An excellent sign their taking this class seriously and paying attention (and a miracle they did it for 3 ½ hours!).

Next; Day Two.

Tight Lines for Troops

2010-05-28T08:01:00.000-07:00

Several months ago, while attending a local outdoors show, I met Captain George Peplinski of Netminder fishing charters. While chatting with George about the Up North Journal and what we do, he told me about an event coming up called Tight Lines for Troops. Tight Lines for Troops is an event (this being the inaugural event) that gets charter boats together with Michigan veterans to honor their service and sacrifices with a free day of a Great Lakes fishing tournament, activities and a banquet. During our conversation George asked if I’d be interested in putting a UNJ cameraman on one or several of the boats to video the event first hand. Gee, after a long internal debate (about .000001 seconds) I agreed! So we exchanged business cards and George said he’d pass on my information to the necessary folks.

Within a day we had been contacted by Bob Guenthart, Captain/owner of Renegade charters in Manistee and organizer of the event. Talking with Captain Bob I learned that his idea started with hopes that he could get twenty charter boats to volunteer their day to take up to 60 Michigan veterans out fishing. Preference would be given to wounded veterans first. Not one captain he asked told him no and his efforts quickly grew. By the time the event kicked off, 38 charter boats had donated their time and crews and 160 veterans were signed up to go fishing! Sponsors quickly came on board with the Little River band of Ottawa Indians and Little River Casino signing on to be the premier sponsor. They provided banquet facilities and a fabulous served dinner for the veterans, their families, the captains, their crew and the volunteers (in addition to financial support). Viewing the long list of sponsors quickly highlighted the phenomenal support from the community and local businesses in honoring our Veterans.

Unfortunately, most of the UNJ staff had prior obligations and the only staffer able to attend was yours truly…oh, darn I have to schedule a day out of the office so I can ride along on a fishing charter in Lake Michigan. Somebody had to do it.

When the day finally arrived, I pulled into the Manistee City Marina parking and unloaded the camera gear. 5:30 am and it was already almost 70 degrees out and the start of a beautiful day. I made my way down to the docks and immediately was greeted by Captain Bob (whom I’d never met yet). Captain Bob’s boat, the Renegade, was parked at the gas dock were there was a lift unit to assist in getting wheel chairs onto his boat. Next to the Renegade was the Sandpiper III and Bob introduced me to her owner, Captain Kevin Hughes (at least in this huge crowd of wonderful folks there was one name I didn’t have to worry about forgetting!). Captain Kevin had volunteered to allow me to ride along with him and his crew to film the event first hand. I was quickly introduced to Kevin’s First Mate, Glen and their 3rd crew, Pat.

Around 6 am our first veteran arrived. David Peck, a wounded and wheel chair bound Navy veteran from Vietnam. Luckily, the layout of Sandpiper III allowed David to be hand lifted in his chair down to the fishing deck. In no time at all I was chatting with David and found out that he is the Vice President of Paralyzed Veterans of America, Michigan Chapter. David told us that he had lost his leg when a 750lb bomb was exploded under their boat while on patrol and this was his first time on a boat since that incident. Shortly after David was on board, our next veteran arrived. Ike Eickholdt another Navy Veteran who served on the USS Bainbridge as a EWT Second Class Petty Officer.

With a 7 am tournament kick off, the other boats were starting to leave dock and we’ve yet to load our third veteran. Seems the loading ramp for the bus had stuck in the down position and we were waiting for a second bus to arrive. When the backup bus showed up and Glen is bringing our third veteran down to the docks, we’re the only boat still tied up, the rest had left the harbor. Our third veteran is another Vietnam wounded Navy man, Russell Stewart. Russell is quickly lifted down to the deck in his wheel chair and Captain Kevin gets us on our way. Even though we’re late getting started, everyone is all smiles and good cheer and if there is an award for that, I’m sure Russell would take the prize…I don’t think he stopped smiling the entire trip.

Figuring we’d missed the tournament start you can imagine our surprise to find every single boat waiting for us just outside the mouth of the harbor! This event was not going to start off without every vet present and accounted for. As we came to a stop we received a call to shut down our engines…

Silence on the water, a light and eerie fog floating as a shallow mist, centered in the circle of charter boats, at the heart of all these veterans, from the bow of the US Coast Guard vessel came the sound of Bag Pipes honoring our troops, our fallen, it sang across the waters for all to hear. I can only imagine the thoughts and feelings our veterans were feeling as more than one eye was teary as the pipes completed their song.

A moment of silence and the announcement to get under way. Time to FISH!

One thing I’ll note is that every time I said “just tell me if I’m in your way”, every single one of these gentlemen would immediately tell me the same thing. They went out of their way to make sure I had access to film from what ever angle I needed to. Captain Kevin even told me he’d turn the boat if needed (as much as he could) to change the sun angle if it was interfering with filming a fish on. I can not express my thanks adequately enough to them for going out of their way to accommodate my activities while they were working.

If you’ve never had a chance to go on a charter boat, you don’t know what you’re missing! The Sandpiper III is a 36’ Tiara open and perfect for fishing Lake Michigan. While Captain Kevin was heading towards his location to fish, Glen and Pat were getting the rods rigged and ready. David, Russell and Ike all had that look of excitement and I felt part of a special group, heading for an incredible day.

Dipsy divers, lead core, ten color, 4 color, blue dolphins, planer boards, down riggers, clips, monkey shines, bumble bees, superman, down speed, top speed, temperature…. Ok, I’m lost… let’s just say that these guys knew what they were doing and seeing everything that was going on was fun and informative.

It took a little while but Glen decided to give a couple solid “come on” fish claps and WHAM! FISH ON! Russell was first up but unfortunately the first fish of the day decided that he’d rather stay in the water… At least the excitement factor was working! Shortly after and another rod starts screaming out drag…. David is up and the hook is set. Glen and Pat get a couple rods out of the way and David soon has the first fish in the boat! While the day ended up being a bit slow for fishing, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. We all learned about each other, the veterans and myself learned a lot about fishing in the Great Lakes and we got to spend a lot of quality time with new friends.

As the weigh in time approached, Kevin informed us it was time to start bringing the lines in, so if we were going to say a prayer for a last fish, now was the time. I doubt the final Amen and been silently uttered when one last rod started running out line and Russell brought in the last fish of the day. As we entered the harbor we were greated by flags all along the pier, presented by the Rolling Thunder riders.

Here’s the group with the day’s haul…

While our fish didn’t win the tournament, they certainly won the enthusiasm of our veterans.

The awards banquet that evening started off with a repeat of our mornings bag pipes and the traditional warrior and honor songs by the Chippewa Band of Indians Warrior Society. The opening ceremony speech was given by Brigadier General Carol Ann Fausone and a special presentation was given to our attending Medal of Honor recipient Cpl Duane Dewey. It was amazing to see Cpl Dewey, almost 79 years old, walking past me when you realize that while being treated for wounds to his feet from a grenade, he threw the medical corpsman out of the way as another grenade landed next to him and jumped on top of it…he not only survived but recovered. President Eisenhower was right when he told him, “You must have a body of steel.”

Following the welcome, singer Kelly Trudell sang the National Anthem and we followed up with the Pledge of Allegiance. After a wonderful dinner, the awards were presented for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place of best fish weighed in and for best catch boat division (won by Trout Scout). In addition, a Governor’s Cup Award was presented to the best team (Navy, Army, etc…) along with a congratulatory letter from Michigan’s Governor Jennifer Granholm.

After the evening closed with Taps, I was able to sit down for a few minutes with Captain Bob and talk about the event. I’m looking forward to next year and plans are in the process of looking to a couple of close by cities like Ludington and Frankfort to add to the boats available for Veterans. I hope those plans include inviting the UNJ crew back up for some more video opportunities.

Thank You to our Veterans, our service men and women and to all the armed forces that protect our freedoms and our families.

It’s a bit long, but I’m going to list the primary sponsors because they really went out of their way to honor our Veterans.

Sponsors:

Little River Casino Resort, Manistee County Charter Boats, Luna Entertainment, Design Comfort Heating and Cooling, Blarney Castle Oil, Ted and Pam Arens, Bonnie and Joel Kenny, Michael Nauta, Onekama Marine, Paul Downs, Pro Seal Service Group, Ridgeback Rattler Custom Awards, Riverside Taxidermy, City of Manistee, Customs-N-Classics Car Club, Michigan Dept. of Natural Resources & Environment, E-Coolers, Grand Rental of Manistee, Lake Bluff Bird Sanctuary, Little River Band Warrior Society, Manistee County Convention and Visitors Bureau, Manistee County Sport Fishing Association, National Association of the Physically Handicapped, Northern Spirits Gift Shoppe, Pepsi, Phyllis Hanna, Rolling Thunder, Seng Family, Showspan, Sports Ink Screen Printing, Steven MacNeil, Tournament Trail, United States Coast Guard, United Veteran’s Council Manistee

And that list does not even include the 40 different Prize Donors!

Turkey Season Blues

2010-05-13T15:04:00.000-07:00

Turkey Season Blues…

Well, my turkey season has come and gone. No bird is in the freezer, no bird ready to sit next to a serving of corn bread and stuffing…. It’s called hunting for a reason, that’s for sure. However, every time out is an exciting adventure. A time to learn and a time to have fun. I used my slate call for the first time. While I thought it sounded pretty good, listening to it on my video tape kind of points out a few things I need to practice on….a lot of practice… I can almost see why I heard a lot of Toms but couldn’t get them to come in for a shot. Honestly, would you want to get any closer to a screaming, drunken, angry, crying “hen” than you had too? I think they only talked back as a way to feel better about themselves for attempting to talk to the “crazy lady” ..then ran as far and as fast as they could! I did use the box call a few times but I think that just added to the confusion for those Toms…. TWO of THEM! YIKES! Run Boys! Four years now that I’ve been trying to get a turkey and I can't say I’ve not been having a riot. I have to blame Mike cause it’s his fault he got me started in this. Here's a picture of him and Mikey from my first turkey hunt.

Time sure has flow (along with the birds), Mikey is getting close to only being called Mike now and Mike is already past being called something else (LOL!). Me, I’m looking forward to taking my daughter out for her turkey hunt. She’s got a couple weeks of hunting and I’ve got a couple weeks of memories to build.

Some say a Turkey is an ugly bird. I say, it doesn’t matter what they say…look at all the beauty it brings into my life.

Kevin – 0

Turkeys – 4

2010.

Diabetes and Hunting; Journal Episode 3

2010-03-02T12:01:00.001-08:00

Well, I’ve talked about going through the discovery period and the changes it created in my everyday life. Now I’ll give you a little insight into what I go through with my outdoor activities.

First and foremost; have an emergency plan. For a local hunt or a trip far away, an emergency plan should be in place….just in case. The first part of the plan is to make sure someone knows where you’re going and where you’ll be. Provide them with a time table of what to expect. Even when I’m hunting the public land just down the road, my wife knows that I’ll be out of the tree at dark, it’s about a mile walk and 5 minutes driving. She also knows that I will call her if I’m running late unless I’m stuck in the woods waiting for game to clear out… then I’ll call her. When I went to Colorado for a hunt, I mapped out the travel plan, contact numbers for my hunting buddy, the local Sheriff, Police, State Trooper contact number and the local Hospital(s). Does it sound a little intensive getting all this information? Yup, but every minute counts and since I know were I’m going to be, if something happens, I might need to be found. Once I’ve established the hunt plan information the next step is to make sure my hunting partner (if any) knows what to do and what to look for. I make sure he/she has a bit of candy or something to eat that is mostly simple sugars in case my glucose drops to low. I then tell them what to do if my glucose is too high. I tell them the signs to look for, like changes in moods or disorientation and the shakes, or exhaustion/tiredness. Hearing or understanding problems or problems regulating my temperature could be signs of diabetic emergency. Even if I seem to be using the “facilities” too much is a sign that something might be wrong. I make sure they understand they might need to be patient with me incase I’m having problems but don’t realize it and if I realize it things need to happen immediately. An example is my recent trip to the ATA. I made sure everyone in the group knew I was diabetic and what I would need to pay attention to throughout the day. I warned them that if we got busy on the floor with interviews and such I might forget to eat lunch which could be very bad. I also appraised them of when I had taken my insulin shot and what I would need to do to make sure my glucose did not drop too low.

So, the first step is to provide an emergency plan. The second step is to communicate with those around me. The third step, a plan for myself.

This is the plan that will do the most work to keep me enjoying the outdoors for many years to come. First, I need to figure out if I have the right gear. Choosing the right gear is very important. For a diabetic, the wrong gear is not necessarily a mistake that can cause discomfort but one that could cause injury or even death. With diabetes I start with my feet. My feet are the farthest part from my senses and can easily cause a great deal of problems. I need to make sure I have socks that not only cushion and allow air circulation, but also socks that provide the right level of warmth or coolness. Over the socks go boots and the right kind of boots are vital to a successful time in the outdoors. If I went on my Colorado trip with a poorly fitting pair of boots, unlike most hunters that might get blisters or sores on their ankles/heals, diabetics could develop infections. Infections could quickly lead to life threatening damage to your feet and then to your internal organs as the infection spreads through your circulatory system. Have you ever jumped off a stump or ledge and bruised your foot? What happens to a diabetic if they bruise their foot and it causes a decrease in an already poor blood flow through your toes? How about a possibility of loosing your toes or foot, yikes! So a good boot is critical and a good broken in boot is vital for any long range hunting. Take care of your feet, they need to carry you back out of the woods and mountains.

Next, I need to make sure I have the right clothing for the adventure. It can be hot or cold and I need to make sure the cloths I plan on are adequate for the trip. Overheating can tax the body and being too cold can really cause organ problems as the body gathers heat from your extremities and shuts down. Cloths need to be comfortable too, don’t wear cloths that constrict too much and watch out for buckles and straps that might cause bruising. This includes your packs too. Watch out for straps and make sure the weight is balanced and not prone to cause rubbing or abrasions. I’ve found that as a diabetic, injuries are very slow to heal and scaring is very common from the littlest of things.

Now, it’s time for the “what if” game. What if I get cut? What if I fall down and sprain or break a bone? What if I….get the idea? When I plan my medical kit it’s always a little more comprehensive than most. I make sure I have extra syringes, bandages, needle and thread (sutures). Do I have any other medications I might need? I make sure I have matches and a lighter for fires, an emergency blanket, compass and gps. Lots of water! Diabetics can dehydrate very easily so water is extra important and so is the right food. I love the newest gadgets that make my life easier in the outdoors but I always make sure I have the means to provide my safety at the most basic level within easy reach. The toughest part of writing this journal is trying to remember all the things I’ve trained myself to do without thinking about it. Those are the things that can make your adventure a great adventure. I will probably update this journal as I remember those “things” . For those with diabetes, I hope you take care of your health and have a safe and successful outdoors adventure. For those who don’t or those who hunt with someone that does, I hope you’ve learned a little bit more of what diabetes means to a hunter and outdoors person.

Is my pack a little heavier than normal? Yup. Do I put more work in to planning a hunt? Yup. I figure it’s a small price to pay to make sure a hunt of a lifetime doesn’t turn into a memorial on a stone.

Hunting with Diabetes; Episode 2

2010-02-19T09:50:00.000-08:00

Blogging about Diabetes and Hunting; Episode 2

A little bit more on my “history” and then we’ll get to how it effects my hunting and the outdoors.

After I was diagnosed as a type II diabetic, started taking a couple of different medications and was instructed on how to eat…life really changed. First, being told how to eat as an adult and actually adhering to those rules are two completely different things. It is extremely difficult to break habits formed from over 35 years of eating. Finding out that when I was trying to eat healthier by drinking lots of juice was actually really bad for me….yikes! I need to count my carbohydrates and make sure I don’t exceed my limits, as well as what types of carbohydrates!?! I had to learn the difference between complex carbohydrates and simple sugars. I had to learn how to balance my eating and what to expect every time I eat. I had to learn what to do if my blood sugar was too high or too low.

On top of all the food issues, I had to learn what to expect from my body. I was more prone to get colds. Colds and flu’s were now much more dangerous to me. I healed slower, my circulation was in danger and worst of all…my organs were in jeopardy if I couldn’t get my blood sugar under control. Even then, I should expect complications as I get older. Eye sight, foot problems, fingers…Wow. For something I never gave a thought to, all the people who have diabetes, this is no little problem.

It gets worse…

For the first few years I worked on getting my life in control. I was on a new medication that was really helping me not only get my blood sugars were they needed to be, but keep them there. I had my own successful company but I found out that stress is a major issue with blood sugars and the stress of running my company in a high stakes arena put me in a position were I needed to re-evaluate my goals. I did not see an avenue were I could reduce my stress and keep the company going, so I decided my life is more important than a job. I closed shop and went back to work for someone else. Hard decisions are only hard when you make them hard. Live, life and my family vs. money and a quick death…. Easy choice.

Leaving a dream was hard enough but the next event in my life was out of my hands and one of my nightmares. The medication I was on was pulled by the FDA, the replacement meds were rejected by my body…results: Insulin injections. My one worse nightmare: needles. I hate them! When my daughter was born I stood and watched the C-section with no problems. When they injected pain killer into the IV I had to leave….I don’t know why I’m like that but I am. It’s just needles and now I had to give myself 2 shots a day…for the rest of my life.

First stop, insulin class. They taught me how to give myself injections. Seeing what happens to me with needles they told me to return the next day for my first real insulin injection to make sure I actually did it. Nightmares! I had a lot to think about that night. Another one of those “hard” decisions that should be easy. Injections equal life, no injections equal a widow and two children without a father, Parents without a son, Friends looking down at a grave stone. Doesn’t sound like so hard a decision now does it. I made my decision. The next day I walked into the doctors office, looked at the doctor and told her that I had made a decision. I needed shots to live, so shots I would get. I told her to just sit and watch, only tell me if I’m doing something wrong. I took my first shot of thousands, feels good to live. Just a note; even after 10 years, it’s still a decision I make every day. At least now I don’t turn white as a sheet and fall over anymore. The nurses are happy about that when I come in for my blood work…they all seem to be about 5 feet tall and 100 lbs dripping wet….yeah, catch me like a lumberjack catches a falling oak tree!

Hunting:

The first thing I noticed about having diabetes and hunting was that I started to get cold a lot easier. I used to be one of those guys that just never got cold. No longer. On top of the getting cold, I now had the issues with being cold. Cold fingers and toes equates to circulation issues and that’s bad for diabetics. I had to re-evaluate all my hunting gear. Heavier boots with more insulation, warmer gloves and coats and pants well insulated for the temperatures I would be hunting. Have you ever priced out those quality pieces that can really keep you warm?...OUCH! talk about a pain! It’s taken a few years to really balance out the equipment I need from what I had. I’ve learned what really works and what does not and how to avoid getting cold from the get go. I’m always looking for new technology that will let me stay out longer and in colder weather.

The next thing I noticed is that while I was never surgeon class, my ability to stay steady was rapidly declining. Even when I was on the rifle team at college I was more of a movement shooter than one that tried strictly to hold still on a single point. Now I’m glad I’ve had the practice. Diabetes not only effects the circulation but that circulation is what keeps things like nerves and muscle control functioning. If I try to stand still and make a bulls eye shot, I might come close. If I just point and shoot or draw and release, then the chances are I’ll make the shot. I just can’t hold steady anymore and if my sugar gets too low I could get a job at a paint shop as a “mixer”. Add in the issues with the cold and you can see there is a lot of concern about ethical shots when I’m hunting in the cold. More practice so I don’t even think about the shot anymore. My Colorado mule deer was shot without trying to put the pin on a specific point. I had practiced enough that I knew where the pin would be. If you watch my video you can see my shakes and then the shot. Diabetes, my practice coach. Right through the heart.

Blood sugar levels can also effect your eyesight. I wear glasses now but if my sugar is off, my vision is off. Having your vision change during a hunt is always a challenge. In my next episode I’ll talk about some of the ways to help vision management as I discuss pre-hunt requirements and planning.

Diabetes and Hunting; Episode 1

2010-02-12T07:27:00.000-08:00

After talking to Mike, he told me that Chico and him were talking about my diabetes and how I should blog about it. Living with it for this long it’s kind of second nature for me to make sure I’m prepped and prepared for any of my outdoor activates. I guess that after those guys had to get the “prep” talk when we were at the ATA, it might have opened their eyes that Diabetes really is a life changer.

For this first episode, I’m going to give a little back ground on how I discovered that I was diabetic and some of the initial changes that I had to make in my life. Then we’ll chat about how that changes your hunting and out door activities.

I, like so many others, simply missed the first signs that my body was trying to tell me that something was wrong. All through my school years I was always a “bean pole” as my mom called me. At 15, I was 6’2” and 135 lbs… High winds just went right around me. Growing up with horses and hunting, I was always extremely active. During those teenage years I ate constantly and drank enormous amounts of pop and juice… never knowing I was showing the first signs of diabetes. When I got married I had finally made it up to 165 lbs, which still didn’t help my final height of 6”3” look any bigger than a cedar post with cloths on. My appetite was still voracious and I drank like a fish (what a ridiculous euphemism). It wasn’t until 1992 that I started to wonder about my health.

In 1992, with assistance from Mike, I decided to build my own house. After 8 months of using up vacation days at work and working late into the night, the house was done. However, during this whole exhausting process, I noticed that opposite of what you would think, my weight ballooned up! Huh? I never changed my eating habits, I was continuously exhausted (no time off work, working on house, new baby….yikes) but I put on over 45 lbs. Then, within months of completion, my weight dropped back down, losing all the weight I gained. Again, my eating habits never changed. I was still drinking constantly…and what goes in must come out…a HUGH sign of diabetes that I did not know about.

Over the next few years I constantly dealt with living with a bottle of pop in my hand and a restroom close by. Then there were the changes in attitude…I was moody and angry, I snapped at people and was overly aggressive. Another sign of diabetes I knew nothing about. Around about this time, my eye sight was getting off. I’d always had perfect vision so it was something that really concerned me. So, I went to the eye doctor for a full check up. Since I went to an Ophthalmologist instead of a general Optometrist, my exam was more medically oriented than corrective. During this check up, the doctor asked me if I’d had any blood work done lately. No?, then let’s just send you over to the lab and have it done, just because. Later that night I called the lab to find out what the results were and what the doctor was looking for. The lab tech sounded a bit concerned and was surprised I was home…. Huh? They instructed me to call my doctor, asap, after I got to the ER.!?! What had shown up on my blood work was a fasting glucose level of 333. Since a healthy person’s glucose level should be between 70 and 115, I was just a tad bit high…to say the least.

The nightmare begins:

Unfortunately, I’ve been a bit accident prone and I’m quite familiar with hospitals, quite. After hours of waiting and finding out that I was severely dehydrated (How? I drink constantly!) and after receiving 3 bags of saline solution to rehydrate me, I got the bad news;

Welcome to the world of diabetes.

I guess one positive thing was discovered… I did not have diabetic retinopathy. My eye’s were just getting bad naturally. So, I guess I should be thankful for getting a little bit “fuzzy”, it saved my life. I found out that the excessive drinking was my body’s way of trying to flush the over abundance of “sugars” out of my system…before my kidneys gave out. It explained the weight gain while I was building my house… I was so active that my body was starting to store more sugars as fat. Stress was shooting my sugar storage to whole new hights. Most diabetic discoverys of type II diabetes, is found in excessively over weight individuals. The first step in taking care of yourself is weight control. Some diabetics even stop being diabetic after they’ve lost the excess weight. My being so active all the time was what kept me alive. I had enough activity to keep burning those carbohydrates enough that it prevented me from going into a comma, for years.

Changes:

After I was release from the hospital, I had a string of appointments already scheduled. First, with my primary care physician, then an endocrinologist, a dietician, and a diabetic specialist and training center. Let me note that I am very needle phobic. From all the blood testing done I’m surprised the floor didn’t jump up and hit me in the face….oh yea, I was laying down each time…. Whew. Anyways, from all the blood work done the “crew” of doctors decided to put me on a pill regimen. The dietician then opened my eyes on what was ok to eat and what was not. Imagine my surprise to find out bread of all things is really bad for diabetics… it’s full of carbohydrates. Those quarter pound cheese burgers and large fries……pull the buns and the fries and it’s closer to being ok to eat. The list of changes I had to make immediately is a long one.

For this episode, I just want to point out that something like diabetes can really sneak up on you if you let it. That’s the key, if you let it. Your body will tell you there’s a problem, we all need to learn how to listen. For diabetics, here’s a couple of warning signs that might indicate something is not quite right; mood swings, excessive thirst, excessive urination, vision problems, weight gain, injuries slow to heal and minor cuts and abrasions scaring easily. High blood sugars can cause you to be tired all the time or sleep a lot. Your fingers and/or toes tingle at times for no reason. Low sugars can cause you to shake and stumble. Get too high and you can go into a comma and your organs shut down. Get too low and you can go into a comma and your organs shut down….no, I’m not repeating myself. Think of blood sugars like cotton candy...what happens when cotton candy gets wet? That's kinda what happens when you have too much sugar in your blood stream....things clog up and circulation is destroyed.

Next episode – Changing my life and making a decision to live.

Benefits 4 Kids

2010-02-01T11:51:00.000-08:00

Benefits 4 Kids

Saturday night several members of the UNJ team attended the 6th annual Winter Pig Roast fundraiser. This is the second time I’ve taken my family to this event and it will not be the last. Many folks are familiar with the Make-A-Wish foundation, the B4K foundation (a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization) focuses on the same type of support but while Make-A-Wish does not provide “Out door” type adventures, B4K does. It has granted the outdoor wishes of dozens of children with life threatening and/or life limiting illnesses since it’s creation in 1998.

The Annual Pig Roast it one of B4K’s biggest fundraising events and is usually sold out well in advance of the event. This years tickets were sold out in early December, shortly after they were announced.

While the Pig Roast is a great time for everyone with good food, door prizes, raffles and auctions, it is also a time to reflect on who the event is for…the kids. When you look at the list of kids you need to remember that these brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, grandchildren, these children, these growing young folks, are all part of this program because they face lives complicated by such things as sever burns, cystic fibrosis, tumors and Cancer (to name a few). They are sometimes restricted because they are unable to get around and even sometimes unable to survive without the support of a wheel chair and life support equipment. But they are people too and have the desire to experience activities we take for granted but B4K takes for a cause. We need to recognize these children and the struggles they face as they grow into young adults and eventually to adulthood.

We also need to recognize that sometimes they don’t even get that opportunity. Life.

The B4K event is also a time for tears. A time to remember and rejoice in the lives of those whom God has decided he has a need for by his side. For them to join him, in peace, without pain and for some, even to walk in his gardens once more. Saturday was an event that showed what B4K is really about. Dozens of supporters attending the event are the parents and family members of those children who lost their battles on earth, yet ascend to their “adventures” eternally. This event was even more so. I would guess that at least 30 attendees, if not more, were there for one child. His parents were there, his family was there, he was not. He had passed away on Monday. Monday! Six days before, yet his parents and family were there. If you would ask what a single adventure could mean to a child, ask this family. Ask all the families of these children. Sometimes, it means everything.

http://www.candgnews.com/Homepage-Articles/2009/9-09-09/Cancer-patient-Alaska-doc.asp

We can all help. Some by donating and giving to organizations like B4K, some by giving their time or their fields or boats, as guides, as mentors or just as friends.

Attend one of these events, you won’t walk out as the same person, only God could do that and he’d just look at you and say…. I told you so.

I know, He told me.

Benefits4Kids.

Pheasants.

2010-01-22T09:16:00.000-08:00

I’m not sure if I should call this my first pheasant hunt or not. See, I went a couple of times… 28 years ago! … never since. I got a call from my buddy Ned that he was going out for his birthday and wanted to know if I wanted to join him. DUH, you had to ask? OK, now to make sure I have everything… field vest, orange hat, small game license, box of #5 pheasant loads (Winchester) for my Khan O/U 20 gage (don’t laugh, you’ll see why in a minute…) and my cameras. For this trip, I was going to try out the Epic clip on video camera and see how it works.

This was going to be a “paid” hunt. At BT Joe’s is not like hunting ground animals behind a fence, it’s more of a pay for a bird and hope it stays in the fields your allowed to hunt, type hunt. The owner drives out to the fields we’ll be hunting and while we’re in the club house, he places birds throughout the field. They are now free birds. They can stay, run or fly away…and some do. The benefit to us, as the hunters, is that anything in the field is fair game (birds, that is). Even if we only bought 20 birds, if we flush 40 and drop 30….we keep them all, no extra cost. Even if we flush quail or chukars.

So, after a round of introductions for the 5 hunters and the owner (Bruce Tobias) and a round of Happy Birthday’s to Ned, we gather the dogs and head to the fields. Needless to say, I’m just to darn happy for my own good! All the hunters are full of good advice and the walk out is spent listening and learning…every time you go out is an opportunity to learn.

The dogs are a little too excited and full of energy…I think they just about knocked me down half a dozen times! In fact, they’re so excited that when we get to the start of the field one of the dogs starts hunting and just plain refuses to turn back on command….yikes. It just happens that it’s Ned’s dog, Bentley….loves to hunt! So Ned loads up quick and jogs out to Bentley (while getting a little irritated…) who promptly flushes a nice hen, which Ned promptly drops to the ground. Happy Birthday Ned!

Now that the game is on, the rest of us get loaded up and spread out. I’m walking next to Mike V. and his camera, who just so happens to own a couple of the dogs working for us. While we’re walking he’s helping me to learn how to read the dogs as they work the field. When he say’s “get up there” cause the dog changes attitude….get up there! I no sooner got to the dog when she pushed the bird and BLAM! My first pheasant ever! Don’t let anyone tell you that you have to have a big $$ gun to hunt birds with! Not only that but after knocking down 3 birds with 4 shots (missed the last one, changed to my left hand cause my right arm was getting tired…didn’t practice left handed enough) those guys were all over checking out my little $200 Khan O/U. Later in the afternoon, Sal (one of Mike V’s dogs) flushed a beautiful rooster right in front of me. It exploded flying to my right.

It just so happened that since I had switch to my left hand (ambidextrous) he was flying in a good line for a shot. Unfortunately, I haven’t been practicing left handed wing shooting and my shot was just a tad bit behind him….ever see a pheasant with no tail feathers? Seriously, just like a knife he had absolutely no feathers on his tail. I couldn’t follow up with my second barrel because he flew between me and the end hunter… who missed 2 shots at him. Got to watch the tailless bird fly high over the woods…and keep going. Good thing they grow back.

By the end of the day, everyone had dropped some birds. Out of 20 birds bought (a mix of hen and rooster pheasants), we’ve bagged 16, plus a nice little red quail who thought she could out fly the birthday boy. One of the birds I dropped was a real nice looking black pheasant. The neck colors that are normally a bronze/brown color were black with gold highlights. If the dogs didn’t decide to get all competitive about who got to carry it, it wouldn’t be missing a huge chuck of neck/breast feathers and I would have got it mounted…oh well, just means I have to get out there and try it again! Darn!

We headed back to the club house were Bruce had the grill going and was getting a round of potatoes and steaks ready for our plates! Yum! While he was working on the grill, Ned and Pete got going and breasted out all the birds. I tried to get in there but was told he was in the grove…just keep the birds coming. All in all an excellent way to spend a nice 30 degree day outside. The Epic cam lasted about 30 minutes on regular AAA batteries which created a 30 minute recording. I’ll be posting some of the video later…as soon as I figure out what is good and what just makes you dizzy watching me walk…

A little Bull...

2010-01-05T08:13:00.000-08:00

Recently I made a trip to Cabelas, it was a fight to make myself go but I just felt I needed to do a little shopping. Seriously, I headed down to Cabelas with my good buddy Mike (Adams) to look at some firearms. He was down looking at a new Bushmaster .223 and I was in the market for a new Conceal Carry Pistol. Earlier in the year (2009) Mike and I had picked up a couple of the Ruger LCP .380’s for a comfortable carry pistol for summer time when shorts and t-shirts are sometimes the most you have to hide your gun and my “compact” Sig .45 was just a bit too big to hook to my shorts (besides, it’s heavy enough to drag my drawers down and that’s another legal problem!). I carried the little LCP around quite a bit due just to its size and not because I was comfortable shooting it. Time to start listening to my own preaching… If it isn’t comfortable, you won’t use it… The reason I decided it wasn’t comfortable shooting it was due to its size/trigger. It’s just a tad bit too small for me and with the small size the long double action trigger pull was just a bit to long for my comfort. I felt like I was trying to touch the base of my hand with my trigger finger to put it into action. I carried it because it was small and I had no problems feeling proficient enough to utilize it if events required, but it just wasn’t a “good” fit for me. The LCP is a great gun so don’t get me wrong, it’s just not a great gun for “me” to use. So, with a little time on my hands and a phone call from Mike that he was heading to Cabelas and wanted to know if I wished to go….silly question… I decided it was time to look for something else.

Expecting huge crowds at the gun counter we only had to wait about 30 minutes to get waited on. Mike went first and was soon “evaluating” the AR of his dreams… A few minutes later and it was my turn. With the large selection of firearms I had been looking for something in the .380/ 9mm or 40 cal that would have a better fit in my hand without empting my wallet (figured the .45 compacts that fit the bill would be rare). Unfortunately, that meant the Kimber, Baer, and Wilson customs were not on my list. Nor were the new Sig’s or the custom S&W’s. What I was looking at were options from Taurus, Kel-Tec, Styer, CZ, Bersa, etc… My preference is for a semi auto which would keep the frame as narrow as possible. I was looking at the CZ and the Taurus Millennium Pro series when I noticed a Taurus PT709 Slim…. In the used guns. So I quickly asked for a look-see and knew as soon as it hit my hand that this was the one for me. I have owned and shot many different models of Taurus and have never been disappointed. While considering the Millennium models my only negative was that I was looking at a double stack which would keep the width a bit wider than I was looking for. The PT709 Slim was Taurus’s answer to that problem. The 709 also let me step back up to a 9mm from the .380 while keeping the size easily concealable. With its ergonomic grip with built in finger and thumb indents to help maintain proper form, the 709 felt like it was made for my hand. It’s a nice hammerless double action with the double strike capability. If the round fails to fire you can pull the trigger again without having to slide the action for a second attempt. It even has adjustable sights which is very rare in an ultra compact size pistol. The trigger pull, while long, no longer felt like I was trying to touch my wrist.

While talking to the gun assistant I discovered that while this was a used model, Cabelas normally sells them new. I asked about the new price versus the price on this used one and found that the prices were identical! Further checking discovered that there was one more in the stock room...some where. After a brief look it was found and my decision was finalized after a quick take down and inspection of the new one. Used versus a New in the box, 2 clips, lock key (built in lock) and cleaning rod…no brainer. PLUS, I had my coupon for employee pricing for the day! ….$350 was perfect and I had enough left over for a box of JHPs and a new 4-1 Waterfowl jacket (Mossy Oak Duck Blind of course) that was on sale as well. I blame Mike and Chico for the coat… they just had to take me duck hunting! LOL

One thing to note for new shooters (as well as some experienced shooters) is that with the weight design of the PT709 it is very important to maintain a solid grip. A weak grip, or limp wrist shot, can result in a failure to feed the next round. It is not a problem with the gun but the form/grip of the shooter. It is a common problem when shooting light weight pistols and just requires practice, practice, practice. Also, make sure to completely clean all the shipping/manufacturing grease from the PT709 before you fire it. A good cleaning and an application of a good gun oil will prevent a lot of problems down the line.

Range report soon!

Holidays...

2009-12-22T07:48:00.000-08:00

No big story today…

I just want to thank everyone who has been visiting the Up North Journal, Beyond the Wild and our blogs. Thank you for spending your time with us and enjoying our discoveries and adventures.

Here’s wishing you and your families a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Be safe this holiday and enjoy time together with those you love.

To my Talk Hunting family, I’ve set the dinner table with places for every one even if it’s only in my heart and mind. (I think the tables so crowded I’ll be sitting at the kids table!)

-Kevin

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009: Part 4

2009-12-17T10:24:00.001-08:00

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009
Part 4:

Well, once again we’re all up at 5:15, heat up some beef bacon on toast and some orange juice, finish getting ready and out the door we go! The morning was quite and chilly with a light wind. Shortly after day break (around 7:30 or so) CamoGirl was glassing the fields and spotted a nice looking doe at the edge of the tree line. She stood there for quite a while, often looking back behind her. I though for sure she was watching a buck heading her way… Get ready CamoGirl! While we were watching her, a few comments were made about not getting a doe license for this area…hint, hint, hint. That hint was quickly changed to “boy am I glad you didn’t get a doe license for me” when the doe turned back to the wood line and gathered her little one with her… and another nice doe with a second little one. We watched them casually travel across the field about 40 yards in front of us and safely reach the next set of woods. I even got them on video tape.

Around 10 am, Ned and Mitch got down from their treestands and took them down (Their orange vests went on their backs for the hike out carrying stands). We met up and headed to the house, time to load the trucks.

It’s always a bit sad when we have to leave but we’re already planning on the next time we come up after the snow is down and it’s time to scout some more.

So for now, it’s Deer Camp 0, Deer 10. It’s kinda weird to spend so much time hunting and not doing the hunting my self but I would not trade it for the world. I had the time of my life enjoying some bow hunting and the opening of Michigan’s gun season with my daughter. A lot of laughs and a small amount of frustration but that’s why it’s called “hunting”. Look it up in the dictionary, I’m sure it’s defined as “…spending time in the outdoors, enjoying friends and family, learning and being a part of our American Heritage…”

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009 : Part 3

2009-12-08T09:53:00.001-08:00

Part 3:

Once again we got up and ready around 5:15 in the morning. We added some new Mike’s Magic but no deer were in the neighborhood this time. We did see some more Partridges again, been seeing a lot of them lately. A few squirrels and that was it. It’s all good though, a beautiful morning in the woods watching the sun come up with my daughter, can’t beat that. Oh, I did remember the crossbow cocking string this time…. 10 am we headed back to the house.

Since we were not going back out that night we had a few “chores” to do…. Jack’s mailbox has been the victim over the years of the local snowplow. A neighbor, a retired engineer, had designed a new mailbox post and precut most of the wood to help out. After Ned and Mitch had the post set (they started before we got back from hunting) we drove down to the neighbors place to take a look at his design and just chat a bit. After committing to memory his design we drove back to Jacks… guess what, the design did not match the precut wood we had…engineers, always trying to improve. No problem. Thirty minutes later, a new mailbox with space for a paper box on the cross posts. Jack made sure to put his 2 cents in…from the folding chair he brought out and sat in, on the edge of the road… this ain’t the city folks! Heck, a couple trucks drove by and didn’t even blink at Jack in his chair. LOL Lunch Time! Football Time! (hate roughing it! LOL). After a nice dinner of grilled chicken and pie, and a couple stories or two… it’s off to bed. Opening day is only hours away!

Opening Morning!

Well, we’re all up and moving practically before the alarm clock goes off! Coffee for Ned and orange juice for the rest of us, some toast and fresh beef bacon (if you’ve never had beef bacon you’re missing out! , but slice it very thin!) We all take care of getting ourselves ready and dressed, grab our guns (unloaded of course) and head out. It’s a nice crisp and cool morning, one perfect for some deer to be moving around. Not too many clouds in the sky which helped get the temperatures down more.
Anyways, we get to our popup blind and while CamoGirl is getting our chairs set and our gear inside, I walk about 20 yards in front and apply a liberal amount of Mikes Magic to some small trees and a scent wick. Then, it’s into the blind and zip up the door. Before we open the windows we get settled. I get the camera set up on the monopod and we load up the guns… well, we load up CamoGirl’s Marlin 30-30 since I’m only carrying my 454 as a “support” just in case and it’s already loaded (I have a CCW). Then we turn off the flashlights and open the windows just enough… I love being outside and experiencing the world waking up. I am so lucky that I get to share that with my daughter!

It’s now around 8:20, the sun is just coming over the trees and light is streaming in through the window next to me. CamoGirl, for some reason is getting something out and has handed me the 30-30. As I’m scanning the windows I first notice a patch of white that wasn’t there a minute ago. Then I realize that patch of white is the throat of a real nice buck about 35/40 yards directly in front of the blind… watching us! It takes a couple intense whispers before CamoGirl realizes what I’m saying and then it’s an intense moment or two as we get the gun back into her hands and I’m trying to get the camera (the cold camera) going! By this time, I think the bright light coming in from my side has allowed the buck to see us (probably me) moving too much and he decides to trot off…just before CamoGirl can get the crosshairs on him! She was excited and depressed at the same time! He was definitely a shooter. I didn’t stop to count the points but his rack was at least to his ears wide with a nice long main beam. I also didn’t get the camera on him in time… Needless to say, we were ready for some more deer now! But Murphy’s rule was in effect…one chance and one chance only it seemed. It was interesting to note that normally when daylight breaks we hear literally dozens and dozens to hundreds of shots. This day, by lunch I think we’d only counted less than 60. An unusually quiet opening day.

Do you see him?.....

........Nope, still not there.... but he was! Guess you'll just have to "imagine" him in the picture! LOL

After a nice lunch and a quick nap (ok, a little football watching too….) the whole gang headed out for the afternoon hunt. CamoGirl and I were ready this time! So we settled in to wait for that big buck to wander back in (thanks to Mike’s Magic!)…and waited…and waited…and waited…till the sun went down. Not a thing. Ned and Mitch saw a big coyote but didn’t take a shot as it meandered past there stand. Mitch thought it was a doe at first and buy the time they realized what it was it was too late to get ready and take the shot. Oh well, we’ve got lots of stories to tell about opening day, dinner is hot and the company couldn’t be better!

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009: Part 2

2009-12-02T04:32:00.000-08:00

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009
Part 2:

Friday Morning;
Morning came early at 5:15 but I don’t think I actually slept very much anyways…too excited! I don’t think CamoGirl slept either. After a quick breakfast we geared up and headed out. It was clear, quiet and cold. Even the Partridge we spooked settled down quickly again. I always give my daughters the choice of how long they want to hunt. It would be a mistake to have them get too cold or have to sit longer than they really want to and I want them to enjoy the experience. So, when CamoGirl said that she was cold and wanted to go in at 9 am, I said fine but reminded her that I took my 9 pointer around 9 … she still wanted to go in. No problem.

I packed up the camera and we lowered her bow. Next, I had control of her safety strap while she got herself off the stand and onto the ladder. Since the strap is not quite long enough to secure to the tree above me, I needed to bend over my stand while she was getting to the ladder. Just about this time I hear a “crunch, crunch, crunch” in the leaves behind me… Here comes a young doe right in to our stand. Great, CamoGirl is on the ladder, her bow is on a rope hanging just above the ground and I’m bent over my stand guiding her safety strap. All I need to do is drop my drawers to moon the doe and we’re all set! LOL. Did I mention that the doe walked right up at 10 yards from the stand…and stood there nibbling leaves…for 20 minutes! My back is starting to hurt, CamoGirl is literally hugging the tree and I’m trying not to laugh cause this has just got to be too funny! (thank goodness the camera was packed away!). Eventually the doe meanders away and CamoGirl looks at me and asks if we could stay…”just a little longer….” Back into he stand, pull the bow back up and reset the camera. Just in time. Here comes a nice little 4 pointer straight at me. Unfortunately, he is coming at me, just a little to my left…which makes him just too far to the left for CamoGirl. He walks within 15 yards of me and continues around the our tree. We’re hoping he’ll continue around and present a right side shot. I’ve been filming him but since he is around the tree now I move the camera and try to re-position for a better angle. Busted! I think he heard me move and he bounds off…right back past me! CamoGirl gives me the “look”…sorry… I must not have made him too nervous because he didn’t spook the next deer to approach! A nice big mature doe was walking towards us threading her way through the trees. Unfortunately, she never moved to the trail to present a shot and shortly moved back out of range and back into the deeper woods. So much for getting out of the stand at 9am! Wow, what a morning.

Time to do a little shooting;

We always make sure our guns are sighted in once we’re up north. Also, since CamoGirl asked, I was going to let her us my Marlin 30-30 this time and she needed some practice with it. We loaded the guns into the Bronco and headed down to the local gravel pit were everyone spends a little time doing the same thing we were planning. When we arrived, there were about 5 cars there already but some were packing up and we were able to pull up to a nice spot were I could use the Bronco as a gun bench. To start with, I put a small pumpkin out at 25 yards (we brought a few 6” to 8” pumpkins to shoot at) and got out the 30-30 for CamoGirl to shoot. I’d been trying to locate some managed recoil loads but they have been impossible to find. So, I started her out with some 150 grain loads. I showed her the loading and the way the Marlin safed. Then I set her at 25 yards and get her positioned good, told her to shoot at the top of the little pumpkin and let it fly… She looked at me once, looked through the scope and BLAM! The pumpkin was flat on top! Oooookay, let’s move the pumpkin out to 100 yards and let her get some practice in. Same routine, safety, load, form, ready… told her to aim at the top again…. BLAM! Another flat headed pumpkin! This girl can shoot! I let her run a few more rounds though the gun… on target every time! I told her WOW!, take a break and let dad get some shooting in! Since I brought up my Tikka T3 in 300WSM to carry as a backup incase I needed to “assist” her shot (I didn’t want her to have to track a long running deer or have one go too far….) I needed to check it too. Since she had left me the bottom half of the pumpkin at 100 yards…. Gee, the 300WSM sure does make pumpkins vaporize nice…. There was one piece left so I just had to make sure it was more “biodegradable”…. Hehehe. Ok. Back into the case for that gun. I also brought up my 454 Raging Bull. I had just put a new Leupold scope on it and I needed to sight it in because I would be using it for the season back at home. I started with a pumpkin at 25 yards…out of the box that scope was on and the pumpkin teleported to who know’s were! So I set up on a paint can someone set out at 100 yards… within a few shots I had the scope adjusted for the longer range shots. I ran through 20 rounds just cause I love shooting that gun, it’s my favorite to shoot! The other guys shooting looked a bit nervous though….. Next, a couple rounds through CamoGirls 20 ga autoloader just to get a pattern on the new slugs (in case she changes her mind on the 30-30). I can’t shoot that gun in form because the youth stock is too short and I keep punching myself in the nose with my trigger hand. Geez, she’s bugging me to let her shoot some more through the 30-30 again! Finally, I have to call it quits only because we’re about to run out of ammo for it! (and I even loaded a few 170 grainers and she didn’t notice). She did shoot my Ruger LCP .380 but didn’t like it. I warned her that the recoil is nasty because the gun is so small. She’d probably like shooting my 454 better….couldn’t quite convince her to try it though. Time to head back to the “camp”, what a blast! (sorry, pun intended!) One note: Just as we were packing up, and you wouldn’t know if we were starting or stopping at that point… a truck drove up and pulled around my Bronco and parked sideways right in front of our shooting, 10 yards away! What an Idiot! Since I was already getting set to leave I let it drop but talk about stupid! I should have continued on with my 454 a bit….bet he would have moved his truck….

Bow time!
After we got back, had lunch and a little rest we geared up again and headed out. This time CamoGirl took out the crossbow for a try. It’d give her a little more range (honestly they don’t have a whole lot more range) and she wouldn’t have to worry about the cold. We freshened up the drag line with some more Mike’s Magic and headed into the stand. Once we got there I realized I had forgotten the crossbow cocking string, which I had mad a point not to forget… Now, if you’ve ever cocked a crossbow, a compound crossbow, by hand…I’m impressed. They have 175lbs of draw and you have to get the string into the safety lock and balanced correctly… I took one look, decided I was not going to mess up her hunt by going back for the cocking string and got that string cocked so easily I felt like I could have done it with two fingers… and got it balanced! (thank goodness!). We got settled in our stands, CamoGirl with her crossbow and me on the camera…and waited. A few squirrels and a couple of Partridges made appearances. It got late enough that I put the camera away…just as a little doe came in under our tree. Too small to shoot but it was fun watching her for a few minutes. Time to go in and this time I remembered the flashlights! We got in just as Ned and his son Mitch, arrived. Perfect timing to help them unload and get ready for dinner. I wanted to show them the video footage of the big buck and the 4 pointer but realized I forgot the RCA cords to hook it to the tv. After dinner and a few stories it was off to bed. We decided that CamoGirl and I would hunt the morning in the Trail of Terror and then let things be until opening morning on Sunday

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009

2009-12-01T06:36:00.000-08:00

Deer Camp with CamoGirl 2009
Part 1:

Well, after that exciting first duck hunt with Chico and Mike I had to put my deer cap back on (but I did hang that nice leg band from the rear view mirror) and get everything loaded and ready to go north. This was going to be a big hunt for CamoGirl (my daughter) and me, she is really looking forward to doing some serious hunting. I’ve got so much stuff to load that I had to pull the back seat out of the Bronco just to make room… Not only will we be gun hunting but we’ll be doing some archery hunting the first couple days (including getting out with a crossbow). Since plans fell through with getting up last month to set up, we need to get up as early as possible to get a couple stands placed and the pop up blind set up so the woods will settle down and get used to them. So, in go the climbing sticks, the hang on stand, two pop up blinds, two bow cases, a cross bow, two gun cases (4 guns), ammo bag, gear bag, back packs, heater, fuel, water, food, cloths, boots…..etc, etc…good thing it’s only CamoGirl and me in the truck! The Bronco is packed and parked in the garage ready to go! Now, we just need to try and get some sleep….right.

Thursday Morning;

I got CamoGirl up at 7:30…she sure got up faster than on a school day… We were already packed up except for the cold food so we got on the road fairly quickly. We were on the way North! It’s about 180 miles to Jacks place and I only had to reset the cruise twice the whole way. Jack’s place is the year round home of my buddy Ned’s mom and dad….Sandy and Jack (see, I Know Jack! Lol). I’ve been going to Jack’s place for about 16 years now with Ned. It’s more of a tradition than it is a deer convention. It’s one of those places you go to get away from the office and the noise to spend a few days with friends. In those 16 years I’ve only harvested two deer… a 9 ½ year old doe (DNR aged) and our camp record 9 point. The last few years Ned and I have started bringing our kids up as they showed interest in the trip and interest in the hunt. This is the place were stories are made and tales are created!

Anyways, we get to Jack’s just before noon. Jack is waiting for us but Sandy is in town shopping. So, it’s a quick hug for Jack and we’re off into the woods to set up the Trail of Terror. The Trail of Terror has been the all time producer of the camp. It’s the personal location of Ned and he has taken many nice does and a nice selection of small bucks from this spot. It’s also the spot were I harvested my camp record 9 point! … the first time he let me hunt it… since he had to hunt on the private land when his son first hunted before he was old enough to legally hunt public land. (His son hunted it the next year and got a nice little 3 pointer for his first northern deer) So, CamoGirl and I carry out two hang on stands and get the Trail of Terror set up. We use two stands since this is were we can sit with the kids in the same tree. It’s a split trunk, we put a ladder on one side and stagger the two stands on the primary trunk, one offset and just above the other. We’re setting this spot up first since Ned has given his blessings to CamoGirl to hunt it the first couple days with her bow… we want the stand up and settled as quickly as possible. 40 minutes later we’re back at the truck to pick up the next stand.

Our next stand to put up is called the Leaning Tree. This is a spot I set up a number of years ago on the edge of the woods over looking a small open field… in a leaning tree… I just have to add blocks to the bottom of the hang on stand to level it out. This is a great spot and I experienced one of those…”just one more step” opporunities a few years ago. Nice big buck heading for the field but stopped up behind a branch that was in the way of the bow shot…. One more step was all I needed, but he winded me and was gone. I also saw a couple of bears from this stand a couple years ago. I’m not planning on using this stand but it’s were we can put Ned’s nephew if he decides to come up this year. Done and back to the truck again.

The last task is to put up a pop up blind for CamoGirl and me to hunt out of for gun hunting. It’s a quick walk and within minutes the blind is set up and we’ve brushed it in. Time to get out of the woods.

This year we decide not to hunt our other two spots… Cone Head and the Hill of Horror… I’ll save those stories for another day.

Sandy’s back so we get in the next round of hugs, get the Bronco unloaded and grab some lunch before we gear up for some bow hunting.

First Night Bow Hunt;

After lunch and a rest, CamoGirl and I got ready for our bow hunt. Even though I had brought my bow (and guns) this was CamoGirls hunt so my bow never left it’s case. We got dressed, grabbed our gear and headed out. When we got to the edge of the woods and the beginning of the trail to the Trail of Terror, I got out a scent wick and some string and gave it a good soaking of Mike’s Magic. We quietly walked to the stand while I created a drag line with the scent wick and got up into the tree. With the stands set one above the other, I got into mine first and then had CamoGirl climb the ladder and hand me her safety strap before she stepped towards her stand. Once she was in and all secured I set up the Gorilla camera arm and got my camera ready for some action!

It was a beautiful afternoon, no wind and just cool enough to have the deer moving. Every 30 minutes or so, CamoGirl would check the area and then draw her bow to make sure she was not getting cold muscles. Unfortunately, after a few hours her arms got cold enough that she was going to need a rush of adrenaline to get that string back…just as the doctor ordred, we heard leaves being stomped into the ground. It was just getting dark enough that I was concerned that the camera would not be able to see anything and here he came… right down the drag line with his nose buried in the Mike’s Magic! This bruiser was doing his best to stop the leaves out of his way! We could hear him sniffing and snuffling as we watched him follow our trail right towards us! It was just dark enough that you could make out his rack but not count it easily…but I didn’t need to, this guy had a huge body with a thick neck and there was no mistaking that he was looking for a girl friend. He stopped about 25 yards out and eventually walked broadside across the trail heading away. Now I know that CamoGirl really, really wanted a shot at this big boy but she know’s her range with her set up at 35lbs is 20 yards. She could take the shot but it wouldn’t have the penetration she wants. So she just watched that buck walking away. A few grunt calls got him to stop but not walk back… he eventually bounded a few strides away so I tried the doe bleat. He turned right around and headed strait back! Unfortunately, by the time he got back in range I had to shut the camera off and CamoGirl had to turn off her lighted pins….it was just too dark. Now we were stuck! That monster was now within 15 yards of our stand and sniffing away…not showing any desire to leave now! We ended up spending another 30 minutes in the stand past shooting light waiting for him to leave without spooking! I can honestly say, you don’t need to have a bow in your hands to get buck fever! I think I was shaking more than CamoGirl!

We finally got down from the stands and I realized that I had forgot one thing… a flashlight! Oops. It’s not that dark and we’re not that far from the house so we start walking back. I don’t remember that many little trees in the field but I’m sure we found them all, the hard way. CamoGirl did make a comment about being glad she was not a boy with all those waist high thick tree/bushes we ended up walking “over” … gee thanks. Remember me, walking behind you….thanks for the warning.

Well, the first night has been a success as far as I care. We made it north, got our stands set up and had a very exciting first night of bow hunting…and my daughter is really excited about the whole thing!

Foggy Ducks!

2009-11-17T07:37:00.000-08:00

Ok, It’s Tuesday afternoon and I’m ready for work to let out so I can finish packing for the grand trip north for deer season with my daughter! Just then, I get a call from Mike, from Chico, from Mike and then again from Chico…. Some how I have now thrown packing to the wind because I’m going DUCK HUNTING! Wahoo! ….I have to be at your house at WHAT TIME?!? …and I thought the ducks were the Quackers! OK, ok, I’ll be fair… I’ve been after Chico and Mike all season about getting me out duck hunting. I’ve been slowly gathering the necessary gear and had everything except waders, shells and a Duck Blind camo coat. Also, after talking with Chico, Mike, Mack and George Lynch (!!!) Sunday, I was really aching to get out and whack some quacks! So duck hunting is on and deer packing is on the back burner. Chico has some waders for me and Mike has a coat! They said something about a boat and sitting in water… sitting??? Must have heard wrong, they said boat too….

I get home and tell the wife the “good” news. The look she gives me when I tell her I need to get up at 2 am is censored (go figure). We have parent teachers conferences tonight and voice lessons after wards. Then I get to load up my gear, have dinner and grab a couple hours sleep. I guess I’m just a little bit excited since I don’t fall asleep until about 11:30 and I wake up at 1:15…wide awake. That’s ok with me, I need to stop on the way to Mikes and get gas and then swing by Meijer’s for a box of shells. (I also grab some long johns since I couldn’t find mine…) Now, at Meijer’s they have 3 ½” steel shot in #2 and BB size…hmmm… Chico said #2, Mike said BB… BB is on the top of the stack so that’s how I decided. I have since learned that for ducks, I’ve just load up like driving a tank at a tracker pulling contest… just a little on the heavy side. …and Man, are those shells big! (should be fun!). Off to Mikes!

Ok, since I got up earlier than planned, Meijer’s had everything I needed and no lines (2 am is a good time to shop!), I get to Mikes at 2:40. He did say we had to leave no later than 3:20…so I’m good. Instead of banging on the door I decide I’d better just sit a few minutes and look at the stars (and put on my new long johns). Around 3:00 I decide I should turn on my headlights just in case Mike looks out the window. He did, and gave me a funny look too when I said I was there, awake and ready to GO! It did take him a few more minutes to get his coffee and put his pants on. We loaded my truck and were on the road by 3:20, just as planned! (Mike stilled looked a little sleepy though) The drive up to Chico’s took about 40 minutes, or so… fog is starting to set in pretty good. We park in front of his house and dump all the gear by his truck while Mike knocks on the door. A quick load and we’re ready to go…. Except that Chico can’t find his license…! Yikes! I’m thinking to myself that this guy duck hunts like mad and he lost his license…o k. (just kidding Chico!). Eventually it’s found in his duck bag and we climb in and start driving. Chico puts in his lucky sound track of country hits and tells us he’s worried because we don’t have time to stop and get his lucky coffee… We’re going to the Shiawassee River, Shiawassee Federal Waterfowl area and have to check in at the St. Charles office for our hunting spot draw by 5 am. We get there in time and Chico gets the second choice for our blind area. Now, we can stop and get Chico his lucky coffee. (every thing we can do to increase our luck, I’m all for it!).

We pull into the boat launch area and I’m starting to get a better understanding on the waders part… we’re going to be taking the boat to our location and then “sitting” in the corn rows of a flooded corn field. Might be wet. Should have said, might be deep! We load the boat, get it started and head down the drainage canal to our spot. Did I mention that it’s foggy and the gas line has a vapor leak…? Did I mention that it’s a 14’ boat with three large men in it…? And I’m in the front, watching the water running awfully close to the top of the boat… I’m thinking “light” thoughts…

Even though it’s just under 30 degrees out, it’s crisp and cold, foggy and I don’t have a clue what we’re doing… I am having the time of my life! And the ducks and geese are making tons of noise already!!!!

Anyways, we finally make it to our area. We pull the boat over the canal edge and walk it to the corn rows. Chico picks a spot and starts setting out the decoys while Mike starts to set up his camera and I help (what little I do) were I can. Now I understand what they were talking about sitting in the water, in the corn. The water is just to the tops of our knees. Chico had told me the day before to take a couple of 2x4’s and make a seat. 30” with a short piece “T’d for the seat part….hmmmm sounds a little iffy… I decide to make my own since Chico was a little vague on the height vs. water part. In 30 minutes I have a steel tube with a detachable support arm and a 12” adjustable seat, swivel seat. Turns out to be a good design. I “plant” my seat in the second row of corn, between Chico and Mike and adjust the seat to put me just above the water (after it settles in the dirt). Chico walks the boat back a ways and into the corn, covered it up and once he’s in his seat we load the guns. Mike’s got the camera ready, Chico is asking for minute by minute calls for shooting time and I’m sitting in 30 degree weather, in a field of corn/water, listening to a zillion ducks and geese, holding my new Remington 887 and happy as could be! And I haven’t even shot anything yet!

It’s shooting time. We see a few ducks and geese flying up from the sanctuary but nothing coming our way. Around 7:20 Chico calls duck, take’m! there is a solo duck flying in from Chico’s side across in front of us. Chico shoots, misses, I shoot (not even sure if I had the gun all the way up I’m so excited!), miss, Mike shoots, misses, I shoot again and watch the duck just fold right up and drop! I got my first duck!!!! WAHOO! Mike goes and retrieves the duck out of the corn row, so we can’t see him until he gets back. He asks, “now, who actually shot this duck?”.. I said, I pretty sure it was me…. A little hesitantly because I’m not sure if I did something wrong or not…. And Mike holds up the duck…It’s got a BAND! My first duck and it’s banded!! WOW!!!! A beautiful Mallard drake with a band! ( and I did not even feel those 3 ½ inch loads!) I tuck his head under his wing and set him right next to me in the water. Cool, Cool, Cool! I can hardly believe my luck! Maybe after I’ve put in a lot more hours of waterfowl hunting I’ll really understand how lucky I am to have dropped a banded bird! Chico’s lucky coffee and CD really work!!!

After that, we’re not really getting any birds flying our way. A couple come cruising in but we can’t connect. 8 am rolls around and I mean Rolls…the fog rolls in and we can hardly see the decoys! Chico spots a hen mallard fly in and she lands just out side of the decoys. He calls a few times and she gradually comes a little closer. Mike is the only one who can see her at this point and he tries to put the smack on her but she’s too hard to line up on and she takes off… in front of Chico and me. I can’t hit her, Chico can’t hit her and she swings around Chico. He still can’t connect and I try one more time. Unfortunately, I’m still a little to close to Chico’s zone and he gets a little “powdered” by my last shot… Chico, can you hear me? Chico? Chico, I’ll use hand signals…? (I think Chico wanted to use a “hand” signal to me….) Sorry buddy, at least I was not the first one to get you… “sounds” like you’re everyone’s favorite powder point! I do feel bad about not opening my zone more and deafening Chico that way.

That hen was the last bird we saw until about 10 am the fog was so thick. You could hear birds flying by, low, but you could not see anything! Speaking of hearing birds, when a whole flock takes off the water….WOW what a sound it makes!

Once the fog moved out, we did find out were the hunters in the area we wanted were…. Twice we watched ducks on “approach” to our decoys, only to watch them fold up over the corn in front of us as they flew over that group of hunters. Oh well, that’s how it works.

We decide to call it a morning and gather up all the decoys, case the guns and load up the boat. We push it back to the canal and get in only to find that we really have a gas line problem. Chico figures out he can keep us moving if he keeps the speed down to prevent the vacuum from choking the line. Back to the truck with my banded mallard and we load up and head back to the DNR station to drop of the hunt card.

I think Chico has a thing for bands… he kept trying to get the one off my duck for some reason…!

Mike, Chico, I can not possibly thank you guys enough for getting me out on my first waterfowl hunt. It was new, exciting and I actually got extremely lucky with my first bird being banded! Thank you!

Chico buddy, thank you for getting everything together and getting us out! You can shoot the next one with a band! Anytime you need someone to hold down the line, give me a call!

Oh yea, the Remington 887 performed flawlessly!

I've been Lynched!

2009-11-09T08:29:00.000-08:00

Well, this weekend sure was an interesting one. First, instead of getting out and doing any bow hunting I was down in Dundee at the local Cabelas working for Mossy Oak at the Deer Classic show. Kind of a tough weekend to be working, the weekend before Michigan’s Whitetail gun opener. Business was a little slow and it certainly seemed like there was almost a 3 to 1 ratio of women to men in the store. Business looked a little brisker on Sunday, the day I got Lynched…

Now, if anyone has been listening to the podcasts you know that Mike has been working on a project for George Lynch, you know, Lynch Mob Calls. George was stopping in to meet up with Mike and Chico on Sunday and I happened to luck out by having lunch with them when he stopped by. Our listeners (and readers) will also know that Mike and Mikey and Chico have all been trying to get me out waterfowl hunting this year. I’ve bought a new Remington 887 and even bought my waterfowl license. Besides that, I’ve been serenaded by Mikey and his variety of calls time and again… I even think he’s now called the “Bling Master” or something like that. To actually meet the man responsible for Mikey’s “vocal” obsession and a large proponent of many of the waterfowl conversations, I’ve listened to was very exciting.

To see George walking through Cabelas, you’d never know the man behind the product without realizing he’s one of those folks who just does not need to be anyone other than who he is to do what he loves doing. He looks like anyone’s country neighbor, laid back, friendly to a tee, welcoming and I’ll bet someone you could sit on the porch with over a beer or two and talk until the air ran out. Now, don’t get me wrong, he’s not one of those folks who’ll talk your ear off and bore the saints out of you. George just has so much information, ideas and stories worth listening to, he’ll never have enough time to get them all out. I’d love to sit on that porch, listening and talking until the air ran out, I’d just be ticked that I’d have to pass out from lack of sleep and miss something. (I don’t think George would sleep, he seems like he’s got too much energy).

Telling myself that since I’ve never waterfowl hunted I probably will get totally lost talking with George, I sat and listened and did my best. I got lost on a few points in terminology (heck, I can barely tell a mallard from a wood duck…sitting still) and a few discussions on decoy placement had me wondering what those guy’s had been eating, but I sure started to get fired up about getting out. Hunting ducks and geese is really starting to sound like a great time to get out with friends. It sounds like it’s really a social hunt, the best type of hunting if you ask me. I used to wonder what was so much fun when you see pictures of waterfowlers in the rain and snow, freezing and wet… then I thought of what I’ll go through to be in the deer woods with a bow or gun… Time to get off my behind and go sit in the water or the fields and look up, instead of down.

So George, I just need to pick up some Duck Blind camo and I think I’m ready to go. Mike, Mikey and Chico had better watch out cause I’m probably gonna start buggin the duck snot out of them to help get me out. I might even ask Mikey to teach me a few tunes on a call or two. (Yikes and sorry to anyone in range when I try…) ...Also, my daughter has already asked me to take her Goose hunting... Guess I can make it a family outing!

Some day I hope to have the proficiency to use one of George’s calls and do it justice. He’s put his heart and soul into them and I’d be ashamed to do any less.

Thanks for shaking my hand George, hope we can do so many more times down the road. Honk, Quack and a story or two.

Building a blind for Up North

2009-11-04T07:31:00.000-08:00

With today’s economy, building a nice permanent deer blind (or shack as we call them) can get a little pricy. But, as luck would have it, I was helping my cousin out at his building when they had 8 new roof top A/C units delivered, delivered on pallets. Now these are not A/C units you’d have by your house, these are units about 8’ long and 6’ wide…and the pallets are just as big. When I was asked to break the pallets apart for trash pickup light bulbs began to flash and I carefully disassembled them instead. Loaded them in my truck and brought them home, visions of deer shacks in my mind.

Deer shack time. I now had piles of 2x4’s, 2x6’s, 2x8’s and tons of 1x4 and 6s from 6 feet to 8 long (much to the dismay of my wife). Now that I had all the lumber, I needed to design the shack. One of the first considerations I had to plan on was how to pre-build a blind so as not to spend too much time disturbing our hunting area. Then I had to design the shape and how high it needed to be. I figured it needed to fit two hunters (daughter and me) and allow me to go to full draw on my bow, standing…so…about 7’ 6" in the front and 6’ 6” in the back.

With the pallet boards being 6’ long I figured they were already cut for me! So the blind is 6 x 6. I built the platform/floor out of the 2x6 and 2x8’s framed out in two 3’ x 6’ sections that would get bolted together once in the woods. I used the remaining 2x6’s for the flooring. This would be one heavy but very solid blind. I built it so that once the two sections were bolted together down the center, a center floor board would be finished in and two 2x8 frame boards would be bolted to the sides to complete the structural re-enforcement. Hey, I’m a big guy and I don’t want to fall through the middle….especially with my daughter there (she’d probably be ok and would just laugh at me…)

I built each wall in two parts, the primary (bottom) being 6 wide and about 3 tall, and the upper which size would depend on which wall it was on. With the frame being made of 2x4’s I used all the 1x6 and 4’s to make the exterior sheeting. To help prevent rain and snow from coming in, I ran all the boards across my table saw and put 45 degree angles on all the edges. I built the primary sheeting with the boards running horizontally and the 45 degree cuts let them lock up perfectly. I built 3 primary sections and temporarily attached them to the base. I then built each upper wall section, leaving the window areas open until we set the blind and decided the best shooting lanes. I ran the 1x4’s horizontally above the windows to provide a good drip edge for rain. With the 3 uppers built and attached to the primaries, I built a frame for the back that would include the door. The door would only be just wide enough to allow me to get through without making noise. The “back wall/door” section is the largest piece since it needed to have the door frame. I once again attached the 1” stock vertically for the lower portion and left the rest open until we set the stand. A couple of 2x4’s notched for roof support and a couple sheets of ply on top that would be covered in roofing paper and shingles later… and it’s done!. The daughter and I use some spray paint to make dark breakup lines on the blind and she paints the inside a bit in red " A Team" ... Up north it's pretty much me and my buddy against the kids and his dad. We're the B Team and they're the A Team. I think we're ahead in points but the A Team seems to have their own point system ... age, gender, age ...who knows. We're still ahead.

I mark all the boards for location and within 15 minutes the blind is in about 12 pieces and ready to haul up north. It’s late Sunday night so I clean up and head to bed.

The wife is happy all that lumber will soon be out of her driveway too…

The first thing next morning I get a call from my hunting buddy… He threw out his back Sunday.

Today, I’m ordering a Smart Air blind from Gorilla Blinds (http://www.gorillablinds.com/). It’s tall enough for me to shoot my bow out of.

I'm holding off on lots of pictures for now. We're still going to haul the blind north, just not set it up until after the season is over. We've got a new 30 acres that is being timbered over the winter and it will open up new shooting lanes so we might change were we're going to place the blind anyways. When we set it up, I'll take pictures of all the pieces and the finished blind and post them... like I was going to do this week.

Still, the blind only cost me some time and a box of bolts/screws. I can't complain...one mans trash is another mans treasure!

My First Buck with a Bow.

2009-10-26T07:26:00.000-07:00

Finally I got to go hunting! Wahoo! Saturday was out because I had a house full of CamoGirls friends sleeping over for her “friend” birthday party. Yes, I know, it was an excellent excuse to LEAVE the house… but it was also raining like Noah was building another Ark. So, Sunday morning, light rain, cool, no kids in the house (besides my own)… I loaded up the Bronco and off I went. Even overcast and misting it was a beautiful morning to be in the woods, with 10,000 chipmunks and a couple squirrels. But I am not complaining. When I came down from my stand I saw a couple kids up on the ridge behind me playing… oh well. I went home got some lunch, napped (needed after the other night). I headed back out around 3:15 and the sun had finally decided to peek out once and awhile.

Around 5:30 I watched a nice buck walk past at about 60 yards. He seemed to be on a mission. He came out of the same trail I walk to my stand but he didn’t turn towards me, he just kept going up the ridge towards the private property behind me. In case you haven’t read my other blogs, I hunt public land just a few miles from my house. Needless to say, my adrenaline was up a bit and I was really watching for movement now. About 70% of the leaves are down so I can see from one swamp to the other, it’s just a matter of looking in the right direction at the right time.

Not too long after the buck disappeared I heard some noise behind me that could have been a bow shot. Then nothing for a few minutes. Then, CRASH. I turn around and see the buck cruising down the ridge right towards me! I stand and get ready but he’s hit a flat spot on the ridge behind some brush were I saw those kids and disappeared. …waiting….waiting… I hear some thrashing and finally see the head and shoulders of the buck peeking out. Something doesn’t look right though. He dips down and back up a few times… then he comes a little farther out and I can see that he is thrashing on his front legs while his hind quarters is still down. Well, a few thoughts race through my mind at this point. I’ve been watching him for a few minutes through my Leupold range finder (first time I got to use it…very clear!) and I have not seen a wound. So, could it be the kids were setting leg traps? Did he get caught up in some barbed wire from an old fence line (lots of those in the woods)? Or is he wounded in his hind quarters and unable to move? I watched him run down the hill so the wound theory is iffy because I’ve been waiting to see if he expired and while he’s struggling, he’s definitely not going to be laying down for the long sleep any time soon. I wait another 10 minutes to see if a hunter makes an appearance…no such luck. By now, it’s been about 20 minutes and I’ve got to make a decision.

My hunt is not and never will be worth sitting there watching an animal struggle like that.

I leave my gear in the tree and quietly climb down. He’s about 60 yards away, up hill but there is no way I can sneak up on him all the way. I creep slowly up the hill using trees and brush as much as I can to try and avoid upsetting him further. I make it to about 5 yards away before he will be able to finally see me. I have decided that if I get close enough to see he’s been wounded, I’ll finish the job. But, if he’s caught in a trap or fence I will call for assistance and see if we can cover his head and get him freed… not something to try by myself with an animal carrying all those sharp points on his head!

I’m standing behind a large tree so to mitigate his stress and struggles. I go to full draw in case he’s wounded and step out. He’s on his front legs and immediately throws himself in the opposite direction when he sees me. That’s when I see the arrow wound directly over his spine on his hind quarters. He spins back immediately and I gently squeeze the release, sending 400 grains of carbon and steel that drops him instantly. Within seconds the woods are quite again. My first buck with a bow, a shot for the soul not the sustenance. I stand staring, knowing that I have achieved something that gives me no sense of accomplishment in the great hunt, but rather a sense of peace.

I hear a shout from above.. “did you get him?” The hunter had been tracking his wounded deer and finally caught up. I felt a sense of gladness that the hunter knew his shot was bad and was doing what he could to find the buck if he was down. An ethical hunter. He made his way down the hill and I introduced my self and shook his hand on such a nice buck he harvested. He offered me the kill but I simply told him I was just helping out to recover his deer, his shot, his deer. A beautiful 7 point 3 year old that I would guess ran to about 175 lbs.

We chatted a few minutes and by being there I got to meet the property owner from the ridge above. He tells me that he’s been watching five bucks running around were I’m hunting and this one is the smallest of the group…the smallest… hmmm. He tells me about his shot. The buck was at 18 yards when he released but turned, thus the bad hit. The broad head snapped off the end of the aluminum shaft. Pete (the hunter) is using a bow that looks about 25 years old. An old laminated wood, small circular wheel compound with aluminum arrows. If there is one example of a good reason to move up to more modern equipment, then this shot could justify it. From the details and looking at the wound it is easy to see that the buck jumped the string. You can also see that the kinetic energy was just a bit too low to push his broad head through the spine all the way and stop the deer at his stand. From our best guess, it looks like the buck slipped running down the ridge and that slip cause the final damage to his spine that prevented him from continuing on. Now don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with an old bow but it is an example of problems that can be fixed if not avoided with newer equipment. BTW; I guess I can say that this is the first deer shot from my new PSE Omen. Even given the circumstances, I can say I’m impressed. Well, Pete and I exchange thanks again and I offered to help drag it up the ridge but he had an ATV. So I walked back to my stand to sit out the remainder of the evening… you never know. Besides, the deer in this area are used to people and noise. Pete quickly hooked up and as a final courtesy, he dragged the buck off without dressing it out first, just to make sure I had as much time in a quite woods as possible. Thanks Pete.

The woods remained quite the rest of the evening. Once it got dark I climbed down and headed in… only to hear several crashes in the swamp as deer spooked from my movement. They’ll be there next time.

Now, anyone that knows me should realize that there was some opportunity here once I got home….. so… I walked in the door carrying my bow. CamoGirl said I looked tired and was all sweaty. I said it was a long tough walk out tonight…. CG: did you get something???? I showed her the quiver and as her eyes saw the arrow completely painted in red…. You Did You Did!!! I said yup, a nice 7 pointer. She asked if she had been there could she have shot it? … I thought for a minute and said… Yup. Then I showed her the picture… she looked at it…looked at me… who is that? Pete, I said, the guy who shot it first! I quickly related the story. Then I told her to text mom… (she was taking my eldest back to CMU). I think the phone had barely finished sending the text when it rang! …Who is that? (in the picture). Story time again!

Asides from the fun at their expense, there was one question, asked by both CamoGirl and mom… Was I glad CamoGirl was not there to see that. I thought for few seconds and said no. It’s part of hunting, it’s part of what we sometimes have to deal with and something that CamoGirl might have to experience first hand some day. I told them both that it was a good lesson in Ethics, and a learning experience on the differences in deer physiology and our own. Mother nature has different rules for her animals and what they feel. The buck was obviously stressed but showed no indication that he was in any major pain. You will know if a deer is in pain, it is something that you will not forget. I was a positive meeting of two hunters who until that day did not know each other. If that buck had not been claimed by the hunter, I would have tagged it myself even if that is not the way I would ever want to harvest a deer, it would be the right thing to do.

My first buck with a bow: Pete and his 7 pointer.

My weekend deer.

2009-10-12T06:26:00.000-07:00

Well, if you’ve been following my blogs and my posts on the Talkhunting.com forum, you know I’ve been struggling to get out for a hunt yet for this year since the youth hunt I took my daughter on. …well, this weekend was no different. I guess it’s all a matter of opportunity because my wife said we have an “opportunity” to get a weekend alone since grandma is heading back to Alabama next weekend and she can watch the critters and my daughter this weekend, if we want….It’s been raining all week and the weather is supposed to be cold and clear on Saturday. I’d been thinking that would be perfect for getting the deer moving for my first hunt…anticipation…chopped at the knees.

Now, don’t get me wrong, a weekend with my wife is a wonderful idea, it’s just tough when you’ve been itching to get into the woods for some hunting and the season is here and you’ve still seen no “opportunity” to get out there. I get to read all the other pro staffers blogs on how much fun they’re having getting out hunting the geese and ducks and the adventures in the first week of bow season…. I need my doctor to call in a prescription for hunters itch ointment. Forget the cortizone, get me some huntizone!

Well, if I couldn’t get out hunting I at least got to enjoy an absolutely excellent weekend with my wife. We headed up north for the fall colors along the west Michigan coast line. It was cold, it snowed and the wind was ferocious…basically, it was incredible. The colors are about half way out and the only downfall was that lack of full sun to enjoy them more.

We stopped just north of Frankfort at the Betsie Point Lighthouse (http://www.pointbetsie.org/ ) and walked the beach a bit.

I took a few pictures.

The one I missed was of my wife bent over looking for Petoskey stones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petoskey_stone ) and completely missing the large wave coming in…. I didn’t know what to do, keep laughing or grab her before she did a nose dive into the lake…. In a life saving decision (mine!) I grabbed a hold of her jacket before she had to start swimming…. That would have made an excellent picture to remember! At least she had another pair of shoes in the car and the heater took care of the cold feet fairly quickly.

(This petoskey seeker was a little bit more aware, he stayed a little higher on the beach and didn't turn his back on the Lady of the Lake!)

On the way south from the lighthouse, wouldn’t you know it, I got to see what I was missing…

My Weekend Deer.

I’m still not sure if that is just salting the wound, just punishment for my out burst from the lighthouse “incident” or a message that good things are waiting for me in the wonderful woods of Michigan.

So, whether you’re out in the woods hunting, sitting in a duck blind calling in a green or two or just enjoying the colors of Michigan’s fall, it’s all good. Get out side and live!

Opening Weekend of Bow Season...but not for Me.

2009-10-05T06:34:00.000-07:00

Well, the first weekend of Michigan’s bow season arrived to find me unable to get out and hunt. Now before anyone get’s worried, no injuries are involved unless you count the one to my patience.

As luck would have it, the power steering on my Expedition, ok, my wife’s Expedition, decided it was time to blow a line and scream about it. Now, my dilemma is this, I can fix it myself for less then a $100 or save time and get into the woods by paying the shop over $500 for the new lines and pump installation…. My next thought is …gee, what could I buy for $400….a new gun, new camo…. Hmmmm. I explained this to the wife and “my” decision was to fix it myself since she could go shopping with $400 extra… My next thought was…the way my luck is going I’ll get into the job and something will go wrong…down vehicle until it’s fixed. OK, my solution is to get my Bronco running, which has been down since it’s power steering box decided that steering was too much work… I’ll fix my Bronco and then we’ll have a vehicle to drive while I’m working on the Expedition… besides, I’d rather drive my Bronco any day! So I get the right tools to pull the steering box and pitman arm and get to work, and work, and work, and work…. How come a part with 15 years of service just don’t want to come off! I hate having to take a torch to a vehicle but there’s no helping it…time to burn off a little grease! And burn, and burn, and burn…talk about stubborn! After about an hour of heating I finally get things separated (with the exceptional help of my step dad!) . I get the new steering box installed and find that the steering shaft bolt is toast and the pitman arm nut is toast. You would think two little parts would be easy to find…. Right. After a day of running around hunting down a nut and bolt …INSTEAD OF DEER!... I get the beast put back together and turn the key….tic, tic, tic…. Guess I left a light on or something…. Jumper cables and turn the key….I love a V8!

While it rained all weekend and I would have hunted anyways, some times you just have to buck up and get your chores done…. Now, I have to get the Expedition fixed or my hunting privileges might be revoked! But at least my Deerhtn machine is ready to prowl!

Here's a picture from last year with my daughter and the "old" UNJ logo!

Sight problems... again.

2009-09-28T07:43:00.000-07:00

Well, as many of you know, my daughter recently had some issues with her sight on her compound bow. Getting to a competition and opening the case to find it broken…and dad had to make it work.

Round Two: This weekend was the Youth Deer Season here in Michigan. My daughter decided that she wanted to hunt with a crossbow for this two day only season. Great, I picked up a crossbow for her to use and she jump right in on practicing. Practice, practice, practice she did… While practicing, I found out the hard way that the foot stirrup was in upside down and the locking screws were only holding it in by pressure. Not enough pressure to prevent the crossbow from slamming me in the gut when I was cocking the string (lucky me my gut was there to stop it on it’s way to my jaw!). I then started a system of checking all the screws and bolts regularly. We had some issues with the scope not staying locked in as well. So we checked it each time we shot. 20 yards was dialed in and since her stand was set up in a 20 maximum zone, she was ready to go!

The first day of Youth Season left us with seeing zero deer and a zillion squirrels but we did hear a few deer and kick one up on the way out. The second day found us in the stand again when my daughter whispered…..”Dad, there’s something wrong with my scope…” She handed it up and to my dismay the locking nut on the rear ring was gone! The ring was also loose on the scope!

Well, I had to pull a MacGyver and I used the lanyard from my range finder to get the scope tied down until I could get it replaced. Luckily, the scope ring was a fixed side and a clamp side, so I was able to tie it with enough pressure to one side to lock up the fixed side and get the scope correctly aligned.

We finished up her hunt without see anything but a hoard of chipmunks taking over where the squirrels left off….

When we got home I found that all the scope screws were loose and the whole thing was basically being held in place by my jury rigged tie down! Yikes! I had checked all the screws before we went out! Well, I had an extra set of Millet rings so I swapped the whole thing out for them (I just need to paint them black to match up) and they lock up a lot better than the original ones.

One important lesson that I learned with crossbows… they have a completely different shock/vibration oscillation than guns and compound bows… treat them accordingly. You need to add a little dab of loctite to all the connecting bolts and screws!

I certainly don’t want to see disappointment on her face…..

Setting up the Tree Stands.

2009-09-21T12:02:00.000-07:00

Well, I’ve been putting off setting up my treestands because I’m not supposed to be putting that kind of strain on my foot (which is another story…). I decided that the weather on Sunday was nice enough that I could take my time and get my stands set up and not over due it. Right. I put on my rubber knee boots, made sure I had my Rocky Scent IQ shirt on and a good coating of scent killing spray, including a pair of light gloves. I then packed up the truck with the Gorilla ladder stand that my daughter will be using, my hang on stand, the climbing sticks, cable locks (it’s on public land), my video camera and some water and headed over to my hunting location. I unloaded everything at the trail head and got set to go. I’ve got the 3 sections of the ladder stand tied together with my hang on stand and chains, cables and ropes holding it all together. I positioned a couple shoulder straps to carry it all… My climbing sticks are bundled together with one of the straps set up to carry them in a sling. I’ve probably got about 100 lbs strapped together on my back so I plan on taking a couple breaks on the hike in. It’s about half a mile in, up and down hills and through a bit of swamp to boot. I’ve also decided to video my setup so I’m carrying my video camera and a mono pod. What I didn’t realize was that to video my walking to and from the camera, I would need to walk and set it up, go back and then return…repeat… carrying everything…So, I just added quite a bit of walking to my work. There is one other vehicle at the trail head so I’ll be paying close attention on the walk in to make sure I don’t walk into some body else’s hunt. Then again, it is a hiking, riding trail so it just might be a mountain biker or walker.

After what feels like way too much exercise, I make it to the swamp portion of my hike in. I’ll have to make this in several trips because I won’t be able to carry the ladder stand on my back and I will have to only carry one thing at a time to make sure I don’t end up head first in the mud. It proves an excellent idea to wear the rubber knee boots, as the mud and water was just about up to the tops. It’s always fun trying to carry a 100 lbs worth of ladder stand while having to pull your feet out of each step and not fall over… but, I made it. The last part of my hike is through a trail that is narrow and tight. So, I’ll have to carry the ladder stand and the climbing sticks in each hand an maneuver them around trees and shrubs for about 150 yards. After talking with John Eberhart last weekend, I can see I’m going to have to look into the Tree saddle for next years swamp hunt. I can’t believe that when my girls first started going out with me I actually got a double tree ladder through all this stuff! Whew!

I’ve finally made it. There are a few more trees down but this year I’ve lucked out and they did not change any of the funnel paths, they might even help. I quietly set up my daughter’s ladder stand, keeping in mind her early crossbow hunt. I do not trim any new branches this year as the shooting lanes are all fairly clear. I then set up my hang on. I scouted the area to make sure that my placement is optimal since last year (I do this each time as the best sign happens after last season on deer movement). All the sign confirms my post season scouting so I hang the stand only about 30 yards from my daughters location and in clear sight, about 16 feet up and 120 degrees from her left. This should also give me an excellent opportunity to catch her hunts on video.

Once I’m done I make sure everything I brought in is picked up and nothing with my scent is left behind. Then, I have one more thing to do, I spray a cover scent over everything I’ve touched, including any brush or trees I may have bumped on the way in. This time, I’m using a young buck spray from Buck Bombs. I did a product test for them a couple years ago and was impressed at the delivery method of the scent. I did verify with a company representative that since the scent was package as it was in a pressurized can that it would have a shelf life of several years. Yup, I could tell it was still good…

Well, the heavy work is done and we just have to be patient for a short while more and my girls and I will be looking to fill the freezer with some wonderful venison! Plus, you never know, I’ve seen coyotes, turkeys and foxes from the same spot….

And I might even post some video of this adventure...as soon as I look at it first! LOL

Cobra, a nice Snake...

2009-09-11T06:34:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, back when we had the Talk Hunting Anniversary Northern Campout, when CamoGirl was getting ready to shoot her competition she found that her sight was broken. She pulled her bow out of her case and it was minus the sight! Upon inspection, we found that the lower jaw on the main arm was broken off! A little (a lot) electrical tape and a little luck…and CamoGirl’s skill with her bow… and she was on target and actually won! I usually carry a spare sight in my bow kit (identical to her sight) but another shooter had recently run into problems and I had given him my sight then promptly forgot I was short a backup…

Well, her bow sight was a Cobra Archery Bantam. Since she now needed a new sight and I was working at Bass Pro for Mossy Oak the next weekend, I picked her up a new Cobra Sniper sight which she really liked. I liked the all metal arms and the small details (like vertical/horizontal adjustment marks) in an very affordable sight. However, while I was setting up the new sight and adjusting the first pin, the fiber optic broke at the glue point of the pin. At this point I’m thinking a black cloud is following me around with getting a sight working for her. I figured, no problem right now, she’s not going to be hunting past 30 yards and she can do just fine with 2 pins. I’ll order a new pin later. I get the other two pins set and start to tune the sight to her previous specs for a starting point when I notice the vertical adjustment clamp is not tight and doesn’t seem to want to tighten…hmmmm. I pulled the sight apart and found that the nut is only being held on by the locking ring built into it. The bolt threads are not contacting the matching threads in the nut. ….The cloud is getting darker… Easy fix, I grab a new nut out of my tool box and a new bolt and we’re good. I hope.

The cloud has left the area! The sight is working great and the Sniper design gets more light to the pins with longer fibers and CamoGirl is stacking arrows in no time!

Now, it’s time to get a hold of Cobra Archery and find out if there is a warrantee (wish) on the Bantam sight and if I can buy a new pin for the Sniper sight. I gave them a call and spoke to Marie Higgins in their warrantee customer service department. When I explained what the problem was to Marie she immediately told me that she would get a new support arm out to me and a new pin. She even talked to a service manager while I was on the phone about the problem with the bolt/nut and found that they had one other complaint of the same problem. They would include a new bolt/nut if I wanted (I declined). She even threw in a new hat for CamoGirl. I called Marie just before the holiday break so imagine my surprise to find a package from Cobra Archery at my door when we got back from up north. A new arm, a new pin and a very nice waxed canvas Cobra Hat! That is the type of service we all hope for.

So, thanks to Cobra Archery and Marie, CamoGirl is back out practicing for deer season. I could only wish all service calls ended so well.

http://www.cobraarchery.com

Talking to the Kids...

2009-08-26T12:28:00.001-07:00

Last year, working for Mossy Oak, I did a seminar at Cabelas for their Fall Classic show. I spoke about getting kids into the outdoors hunting and the changes that have taken place since we were that age. It’s been almost a year and I’m still getting folks asking questions and once again I’m giving a seminar on that subject. This year it will be for a local sportsman’s club gathering. If you would have asked me a few years ago if I could imagine myself talking to others about how to get their kids into hunting, I would have said you were nuts. Today, I wish I had been doing this years ago.

With the changes in our economy and the changes in attitudes on hunting and firearms in general, getting our kids involved is more important than ever and more endangered. When I was a kid, if I wanted to take grandpa’s old muzzle loader in for show-n-tell, no problem. Today, if our kids want to use a gun “shaped” prop for a play or presentation they get arrested and removed from school. The pressure is on to move our children away from our outdoors and hunting heritage and we need to understand what it takes to steer them back successfully.

Not to long ago, it was mostly the “boys” that had an interest in hunting that was approved of by their parents. It was grandpa’s gun or dad’s old bow that was our first introduction into the sport. This was great if grandpa’s gun was a .22 or a 20 gauge. At that time we bucked up and learned how to shoot to make our dad’s proud… no mater if we had to shoot that old 30-06 or try to draw back dad’s 55lb bow. We’re lucky we have the number of hunters today that we do based on those experiences. Today, we have computers and video games, texting and “networking” to contend with. We also, I’m happy to say, have a lot more young ladies interested in the sport. Grandpa’s old gun and dad’s old bow are now the wrong answer. They are great to hand down, when the time is right, but they’re more liable to push the child into those “other” entertainments than draw them in. Hard hitting rifles and shotguns, heavy draw weights on bows and the wrong equipment are quick deciding factors our children will experience to go back to those computers and video games. However, unlike when we were young, there are now products in the marked designed for children interested in the hunting and shooting sports that can grow with them and help encourage them to continue. Moms and dad’s can be happy that they will not have to buy new equipment every year.

Most gun manufactures produce firearms designed for shorter arms and lighter frames. They can be easier to use and less painful in the recoil department if parents do a little research before they spend any money. Now that there are firearms designed for children, parents need to pay attention to a few details before making any decisions. Look for those firearms designed to grow with your child. They will have changeable or adjustable stocks and fore arms of one design or another. Remember, lighter is not always better… the lighter the gun the harder it kicks. Look for firearms that have recoil reducing parts and are just light enough for your youth to handle without being awkward. Muzzle breaks and recoil pads, semi-auto versus pump (load one round at a time if you have to) and wood versus synthetic to keep the recoil absorbed. A bad recoil experience will shut down interest faster than anything else. If it hurts, why do it.

With archery manufactures, most companies have seen the need for lighter bows that have more value and useful life than the old fiberglass “kiddies” bow. Kids want a bow that looks like dads (or moms). Most of these companies now have models of bows that have draw length adjustments of 10 or 11 inches and draw weight adjustments up to 30lbs on a single set of limbs. There are even programs that allow for limb changes for vary little cost to move the bow up in weight as the child develops. This lowers the cost by keeping the child in a modern, working and proficient bow for many years, growing with them and not against them. They even have “Pink” bows to appeal to the young female crowd that is growing in interest of archery as a sport and hunting activity.

If you’re a parent that didn’t know about these products, salvation at last! If you already knew, great, but don’t forget the rest!

The Rest:
It’s not just about the gun or the bow; it’s about paying attention to what your child needs. They need to be warm and comfortable too. A proper set of clothing for the season is a must. You may need to change your hunting tactics from tree stands to ground blinds for example. While we can tough it out in the cold, kids will think your nuts and next time… back to the computer instead. For just the shooting sports, maybe a marathon 4 hour practice should be changed to 30 minutes and snack time. Maybe you should make a game out of it with small rewards for goals met, realistic goals based on the ability and age of the child. Make it Fun; you have a lot to compete against. Back to hunting; if they’re getting cold in the blind don’t push it, there is always next time. Next time take a heater. Best idea is to leave your gun or bow at home. Concentrate on your child and what they need. Show them what it means to be out in the wild and to watch game and listen to the wind. A lot of things we take for granted, they will be enthralled with… watching squirrels packing in nuts or birds looking for seeds and bugs. How the animals around you interact with the woods and the fields or how the trees grow and what types there are. Treat this as an opportunity to expand their knowledge and show them all the neat things. Make a game out of it. NEVER be critical. Learn how to communicate and build on that communication. There is always time to change and ways to make that change. Children are by definition not a hunter that can sit still for long periods of time. Prepare yourself. You need to change your Attitude more than they do. Patience. You won’t succeed unless you can be more patient than the trees you’re surrounded by. Learn to give. You are giving your time for Them.

The rewards are boundless if you succeed. Pride, Love and a better Relationship.

Some day, you will think as you’re heading out to the hunt with your child…” I’d rather be….” Then you’ll really know you’ve succeeded. Congratulations, you’ve passed on a heritage that will always be yours and gained more than you’ll ever know.

And for you dads out there…. NEVER forget mom. Whether she hunts or not, she’s as much a part of this experience as anything.

Relaoding : Fun and Saves Money!

2009-08-11T09:58:00.000-07:00

Reloading:

Many years ago, I bought a handgun chambered in .454 Casull. After buying several boxes of ammunition and realizing how expensive this gun was going to be after the purchase, I decided to try reloading. As with anything else, there were several good choices I could make in reloading equipment. Being new, I looked at what was offered as a package that would cover almost all of my needs and with little extra to buy. I stayed with popular, established companies and finally decided to go with a Lee Anniversary Kit. The Lee kit contained everything I would need except for the dies themselves and the case prep equipment. I purchase the Lee 454 carbide dies including the separate crimp die (all the manuals I had been reading strongly suggested a “solid” crimp on the 454 loadings). I also purchased a case polishing kit for my used cases. A couple hundred cases from Starline, several boxes of 454 bullets from Hornady, a couple boxes of CCI Small Rifle primers (again as researched) and several pounds of Hodgdon H110 powder…I’m ready to go. Just to note, all my choices on brass, primers, bullets and powder were just that, my choices. There are many different combinations of all these ingredients available, I chose these based on my research for what I wanted to achieve from my reloads. As you can already tell, Research is the #1 step in deciding to reload. Included in my research was the information on what pressures were safe and allowable for my specific firearm, what type of velocities, trajectories and kinetic energy I wanted to achieve and what types and weights of projectiles I wanted for the type of use I would be putting my .454 through… Deer hunting.

Another bit of advice, and it’s the most important….buy a couple reloading manuals…

Even with all of my research, there were many stops and starts my first few times reloading. One advantage of using the Lee kit was that it was a single press/single stage kit. I had to change the dies out at each stage and could only work on one cartridge at a time. This is the best way for a new reloader to start. Jumping in right away with a multistage or turret press can lead to mistakes and this is one process you do not want to make mistakes in. I learned how to “feel” the status of the case as I maneuvered the press and to visually inspect each cartridge as it was “worked”. I also learned a very important rule, work in a quiet and uncluttered area and work on only one caliber at a time to prevent mixing up process and causing rounds to be built with the wrong components or volumes. Measure and re-measure often.

Current .454 prices range from $28 a box to over $80 a box… 20 rounds in a box. My reloading expense is down to about 11 cents a round or $2.20 for a box of 20. That’s a savings of at least $25 a box, which quickly paid for all the equipment.

It’s fun, it saves money and there is a satisfaction gained when you start shooting ammunition that you created.

Give it a try.

Alone in the Woods

2009-06-15T07:45:00.001-07:00

A number of years ago, I would have said that Hunting is My time. I never really thought that my children would become involved as much as they have. See, I have two beautiful daughters, I figured they’d never want to hunt with their dad. I figured I’d grow old hunting by myself, filling that “missing” spot with my hunting buddies and their boys on occasion. I’ve found over the years that I really don’t like hunting alone. I like having someone to share stories with and spend time enjoying the secrets of the outdoors with. When you’re sitting in blind or in a tree stand, when you’re stalking or walking a fence row, there’s all sorts of wonders going on around you. Things you’ll enjoy seeing or hearing but never dwelling on long yet become a part of who you are. Things you’d enjoy pointing out to your child or your hunting buddy. I have never been in the woods or fields were something did not catch my attention with wonder. I’ve felt that those wonders were lost in the thoughts of just one…what a blessing that I was wrong.

Now, don’t misunderstand me… I would never be disappointed if my girls just liked to shoot targets. I’d even understand if they didn’t want to shoot at all. I’d never force them to do something they really don’t have an interest in. Everyone "just knows" that boys will follow their dads into hunting, trying to be just like him… but girls? I’ll be honest, I’ve thought a few times of what it would be like to have a son… Then I think of how blessed I am to have the daughters I have. I wouldn’t trade them for the world and I don’t want them to be “boys”. They just need to be themselves.

My oldest seems to just like to target shoot and I respect her for that. I think she goes hunting with me just to spend time with her dad, and I love her for that. She’s in college now and our time together is very limited, I’m trying to make those times as cherished as possible. Soon, she’ll really be on her own and time with Dad may be a fleeting thing…never caught and rarely seen… I’ll cherish those times together even more.

My youngest shows a genuine interest in hunting. I’ve tried to make sure she understands what it means to harvest an animal. I’ve had her research how to clean and skin squirrels to see how she reacts and I’ve involved her with processing the animals I’ve taken so she can experience the “other” side of hunting. Most of all, I’ve tried to teach her about Respect. Respect for the outdoors and Respect for the animals we hunt. I’ve not been disappointed, she shows a genuine maturity many would be surprised to see and many others never achieve.

I’ve learned a few things too. Patience is one. Explaining about sitting quiet and moving slowly was a tough one. About, paying attention and using your senses. Patience has been a teacher to me. I struggled at first but have since graduated and now, Patience is another tool this ol’hunter uses like a well worn knife or a comfortable pair of boots. Pride is something I’ve learned more about. I used to think that pride in my children was for doing good in school or winning a competition. Now I know that Pride is watching my girls Respect the outdoors and the animals that live there. Pride is watching my girls enjoy, really enjoy the time spent exploring the wonders they see and hear. Pride is watching them grow and learn. Pride will stay in my breast pocket were it’s easy to get to, bring out and show. I’ve learned about communication. Communicating with a child needs to change and grow just like her. Understanding how that communication works lets you bond even closer. Communicating is more than just a 2-way road, it’s a stream, a river, an ocean. It’s everything that moves between us. It can move us further away or it can bring us closer. Having a child does not teach you about communication, your child teaches you. It’s a lesson you can not afford to miss for it’s the building blocks of everything else you learn. And the foundation for communication is Love. I love my girls and I know they love me back.

Now, even if it’s just My time, I’ll never be alone in the woods.

Way Behind!

2009-02-17T08:05:00.000-08:00

Sorry, I'm way behind in posting some blogs..... been swamped. I've got the youth bow review to write now that the season is done. We want all the readers to learn what we learned and the manufacturers to get some feedback too. I'll update you on how my deer hunting season went and what made it one of the best I've ever had. Lots of info coming soon....

Colorado Trip - The Last Part.

2008-10-24T07:06:00.001-07:00

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Well, it’s Sunday. We’ll be home tonight. The adventure has been the greatest but it’ll be nice to be home with family. Mike was really tired last night so I let him go back to sleep and I keep driving through the next tank of gas (about 8 hours). Once we’ve traded off again and I’ve had a quick nap we start talking about our trip. I spend a little time putting all the pictures I’ve taken together and use my laptop to burn them onto a DVD for Mike to take home (all 782 of them). He’ll do the same with the video he’s taken once he has some time to put them all together. After another round of switching drivers, Mike gets out his gear and we start taping a segment for his Podcast on the http://www.upnorthjournal.com/ It’s a lot to talk about, our whole trip and our experiences, so he has to change tapes half way through it. Unknown to us, the second tape is bad and we don’t have it later when he’s getting it ready for his show (episode #77). Even with all the pictures and video we have, one of the things we wished we done was take a lot more. As we’re discussing each day, we remember little things that we’ve forgotten and wished we’d taken a picture of some video of it. So just a note to anyone thinking of taking a trip like this, or just a trip with the family…take lots and lots of pictures and video. You’ll only get one chance.

We get to the Michigan border around 2 pm. It’s like crossing a magical line into your home country… This is our home turf and familiar things are recognized as we get closer to home. We first drive to my nephew’s to drop of his quad with my many thanks… Paul, without your quad my hunt would have been a nightmare at times and much, much more difficult. Huge Thanks. We then head up to Mikes house to unload and get my stuff loaded into my Bronco for my final leg of the trip. At Mike’s house the unpacking and re-packing goes fairly quickly. For a couple of guys, we were pretty organized in loading our stuff. Mike’s wife and kids drive up as we’re unpacking and you can see the excitement in everyone that he’s home. I’m looking forward to the same when I get home.

One thing I’m really excited about (and Mike was too) is that while we were in Colorado our new bows showed up. They were both shipped to Mike’s house because we were hoping that we’d have them in time for the trip. Unfortunately, they showed up Monday after we left. While my Hoyt Trykon did its job and did it well, I was really hoping that I could have had my new Bowtech Guardian to use in Colorado or at least set it up and “play” with it during the day. Bowtech has been a huge contributor to our youth bow review and when Mike and I joined the Mossy Oak Pro Staff they stepped up and helped get us into the Guardians. (Both of our Hoyt’s are in the Real Tree pattern and not offered in Mossy Oak…so…). I guess we’ll just have to plan another big hunt so we can do a story with the Bowtech Guardians (in Mossy Oak Obsession pattern). You know, just to make sure they’re good for say….maybe Alaskan big game…maybe even a trip back to Colorado to make sure they’re good for Elk even… hmmmm… yup, I think that’s gonna be a requirement for testing them out. I’ll write a post later on how the Guardian shoots; let’s just say for now that… I Like IT!
Anyways, it’s one more farewell to my “brother” Mike (although my spouse calls him my second “wife” cause we talk so much) and I’m on the road. We made good time so I’m about an hour ahead of schedule and I’m looking forward to surprising the “girls” when I get home. I pull in the drive and before I can get to the door, TJ is running towards me… (TJ is my 2 year old Australian Cattle Dog)… Geezzzz, let me get in the house you crazy thing! Then it’s hugs and kisses from my girls (Mindy, who just turned 12 (happy Bday!) and (Ka)Trina my “first” wife). Unfortunately, Megan (my oldest daughter) is at college so I’ll have to call her later. Trina has made my favorite roast and potatoes…yum! After all the greetings and hugs and kisses and hugs…and diner, I call my mom to come over and give me a hand finishing up processing my venison (Trina does NOT process venison…Mindy helped though). Since my vacuum sealer was broken, Trina bought a new one…which only worked for the first couple of packages before it quit working… so it was back to freezer bags. Steaks, roasts and the rest are now in the freezer (thanks Mom), a sure sign of a successful hunt!

Back to work on Monday.

Writing this blog has let me remember and re-live a lot of our trip and experiences. From the long drives to the license fiasco and seeing the beauty of the Colorado Rockies. Meeting new people, hunting in a new and exciting environment and learning about different ways of doing things outdoors. Getting to finally hunt in Colorado, which is something that I had been wanting to do for as long as I can remember, and getting to experience the hunt with my best friend and “brother” Mike. It’s been great. Thanks to Aneal from Bowcast for meeting with us. A special thanks to Bill (Insane Willy) for providing the hunt! WOW! Big Thanks to Mike for asking me to go! A very dear thanks to my wife Katrina, for supporting me in going. I also want to thank my Dad. Without his help this last minute trip would not have been possible. Thanks Dad!

And thank you, for sharing my hunt all over again with me.

October 1st is Deer Archery opener in Michigan…oh boy!

Colorado Trip - Part 8

2008-10-23T09:14:00.000-07:00

Saturday, September 20, 2008

Saturday morning, Mike’s in a funk but we’ve got work to do. First, we need to get my deer quartered up and in the coolers. We get the camera out first because it was dark last night when we finally had a chance to look her over. Unfortunately, with the cold last night, she has stiffened up in such a way as that it was very difficult to take a decent picture.

Now, it’s been 20 years since I cut up my own deer. With my hectic schedule I usually just take my deer into the butchers and pick it up when it’s done. Mike is the teacher here. We get the doe hanging in the barn and Mike helps me get her skinned. Once skinned out, Mike points out the different muscle groups that will provide the “guides” for cutting out the various different sections of meat. Cutting out the back straps we observe that this doe was in perfect health, the meat looks clean and we see no indications of disease. I had brought a vacuum sealer to process any meat we harvested but unfortunately it was damaged on the “Insane Willy” drive. We decided to cut out the back straps and loins and then quarter out the shoulders and hind quarters. We wrapped them all up in plastic bags and got them in the cooler with ice. After we clean up we jump on the quads for the last time and head down to see if we can pick up the trail of Mikes doe. We locate the last spot were we found an indication of blood and canvas the area. No luck. This doe is long gone and running around some place. We spend about an hour looking and then head back to the camp. It’s time to load up.

We get my quad loaded into the back of Mike’s truck and then hook the trailer up and start loading all our gear. After we’re done we grab quick showers and clean up the cabin. One long last look around, our thoughts quietly reminiscing about what we’ve experienced here and then we get in the truck and reluctantly pull away from an Adventure we’ll never forget.

We’ve got a long drive in front of us but we’ve got a plan. We’re going to head north to Wyoming and then across to Nebraska, stop at Cabelas in Sydney to return some of the items we purchased for elk hunting that we didn’t need and then it’s homeward bound.

We get into Wyoming and get on highway 70. We stop in Encampment, a little sneeze of a town, population 100. A couple restaurants, a gas station and a party store. In the party store we pickup some snacks for the road… Imagine the late 60’s early 70’s, the owner is a weathered, long hair in a pony tail, beret and denim vest wearing fellow whom we’d guess grew his own medicinals…polite and easy mannered. After a short conversation about local hunting and fishing we get on the road again. As we head towards the mountains we start seeing herds and herds of pronghorns. They are everywhere.

When we get to 130 we’ve got a choice of staying on 70/130 north until we get to interstate 80 or we can turn East on 130 and go through Medicine Bow National Park and get to I-80 at Laramie… I told Mike to flip a coin. Heads we turn and tails we continue north…Heads. I think that coin was exactly what Mike needed. We head into the National Park. We notice that it seems like every turn off has trucks and campers parked in them. It’s the start of Elk gun season on Monday and hunters are packing in to the park in droves.

We also note that we’re still in the free ranging cattle area…they are all over the place, including right next to the highway with no fences…careful driving is required since our cooler is full.

Our first stop in the National Park is at The Continental Divide. Another photo opportunity. Mike has to call his mom from the top of the Divide…she’s not home so he leaves a message. We’re standing on the top of the Divide, In the Rockies, what a view.

We continue driving through the beautiful and winding roads until Mike sees a park stopping area and decides to stop. It’s Lake St. Marie and if you ever get a chance to go through Medicine Bow National Park you need to stop and look around at Lake St. Marie…It’s inspirational and can provide a little peace for your soul.

We walk down to the lake and simply stare at the sight of the water and the immense mountain cliff on the other side. Snow can be seen on the peaks. The water is crystal clear and cold. Fish are surfacing all across the lake making ripples, moving the water. Unfortunately, it’s overcast. You can imagine what the view would be like if the sun was shining down on the lake and reflecting from the snow. Reluctantly, we climb back into the truck and continue on our journey.

After we stop for gas our next major stop is at the Sydney Nebraska Cabelas. We return some stuff and pick some goodies up for the kids. We gas up again and we’re on the road. Now if we didn’t mention it before, as we’re coming down in elevation from over 10,000 feet in Medicine Bow National Park to 4000 feet in Eastern Nebraska…it’s nothing but corn fields and corn fields and corn… and corn. We run into rain again but it’s short lived and the sun puts in an entrance for the rest of the afternoon.

It’s been a busy, stressful, aggravating, exciting, emotional and wonderful trip. The drive home is a long one but helps us put into perspective our thoughts and feelings we’re experiencing. Tomorrow, we’ll try and put together a podcast for the UpNorthJournal. Tonight we’ll take turns driving and putting our thoughts together on what this trip has meant to each of us and what we’re taking home from it.

Next – Sunday, Home and Final Thoughts.

BTW : HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIKE... you caught up to me again!

Colorado Trip - Part 7

2008-10-22T09:21:00.000-07:00

Friday, September 19, 2008

The last day of our hunt.

Mike and I wake up this morning with the understanding that this is it. It’s the last day of hunting. Tomorrow morning we’re going to have to load up and start our 25+ hour drive home and work starts on Monday.

This morning Mike and I decide that since I’ve not been seeing any deer I’ll follow Mike in and head to the other side of the valley. Mike’s at least been seeing deer. So, we load up and head down towards his water crossing. The only difference with Mike’s water crossing is that we have to do this one on foot. The quads get parked on the trail and we hike down to the water. We’re hoping that our boots are tall enough that the water won’t be soaking our feet… We made it across, in the dark and stayed dry. I walk with Mike to his stand and then continue on until I get to the edge of the valley and the mountain. I follow the valley line until I come across a stand of old pines that are on the slope but spaced about 4 feet apart in a circle. It’s perfect. The ground is bare and I can lean up against one tree with two trees in front that are slightly apart. The side trees provide cover to keep me concealed. After getting all arranged and my gear set out within easy reach it’s time to sit quiet… within a few minutes I can hear some scratching sounds… I watch a large field mouse to my left. He’s come out of his hole and is thinking about heading my way… Every time he starts towards me (he’s only about 2 feet away) I move my hand a little and he dashes back to his hole. We keep this up for quite awhile. He’s getting bolder and bolder each time. Eventually, he dodges around my hand and behind my back. Guess I didn’t see his other hole in the tree I’m leaning against. Now I can hear him running around just behind the bark. Getting ready for winter I guess. Well, it was a perfect hunting morning, cold after last nights rain but clear with almost no wind. Unfortunately, 10 am rolled around and no deer. I packed up and slowly made my way to Mikes stand. He didn’t see anything either. He only heard the coyotes calling but they’ve been calling almost every day and in several packs too. We didn’t see any though except for that one I missed on Monday night. Back to camp we go.

Since this is the last day I want Mike to see the view from the High blind. So we pack up (never know if you might get a chance at a shot) and get the quads heading towards the peak.

We make sure we’ve got plenty of pictures of crossing the river and Mike films me crossing and vise versa (even though each time I go across I hope I don’t get stuck or stall out!).

We park about 100 yards from the high blind. Mike spotted a doe between us and the blind when we had to stop and cross under a fence line just before we parked. She watched us pull up so there is no chance of a stalk and shot on this one. Once at the blind Mike can now understand what I was talking about when I discussed the difficulty of using the blind as an archery blind and what a nice snack shelf it makes for the bears… Some video and a few pictures later we’re standing there wondering how we can ever leave, it’s incredible up here!

Being from Michigan, we’re pretty much flat landers and we rarely get to experience this type of beauty. Eventually, we head back down and get the quads moving.

Since this is the last day, Mike and I need to get some fishing in. So after lunch we load up some fishing gear and drive down to the creek, past where I hunted my first night. The river is running cold and high, the weather is perfect with only a few storm clouds off in the distance and the sun high and warm. We can see the fish along the banks…and they’re huge! Now comes the interesting part…

Mike has a fly rod, which he’s never fly fished before and I have an ultra light spinning rod… spinning rods are just not made for using flies! I have to wade into the water and let my bail stay open until the fly is down river among the fish and then play it across the top. After doing this for almost an hour I hook one! Hot Diggity Dog! I finally get the monster towards shore and we realize that we don’t have a net! I let him back out to tire him out some more and that was a mistake… within a few minutes he’d had enough and busted the line…spiderwire 8lb test! Dog gone it! …Mike still hasn’t hooked up yet. They’re just teasing us under the surface. Even the eagle that flew by seemed to be laughing at us. Finally, we load back up and head back to the trout pond by the cabin. Surely we can hook up with some nice rainbows from the trout pond… right. After a few minutes at the trout pond, I hook a monster again! Again Snap! What do we need, steel leaders!?! Mike finally hooks up with a beauty after another hour of fishing and just drags it up the muddy banks.

Good thing there was all those rocks in the way when he washed it off…it sure was a lively bugger.

Mike graciously loans me his fly rod (which I’ve never used either) and before long I’ve hooked another rainbow.

This time, I follow Mikes lead and drag the silly thing through the mud instead of letting him break the line. If nothing else, we’ve got something on this trip… a couple large rainbows (and they were only about middle size from what we could see in the water!). We clean them and ice them up back at the cabin.

It’s time. The last Hunt. Mike and I load up our packs and with a few final words we head the quads down towards the water. Crossing on foot sure is easier when the sun is up. I wait while Mike gets up into his stand, wish him good luck and head for the final time out to my hidden tree ground blind. No mice tonight. I make sure my gear is set and my camera is ready just in case. Around 5:30 I hear Mike shoot and I hear the arrow impact! I never would have thought that you could hear a bow from over 200 yards away! I watch in his direction and quickly see a nice doe moving briskly but confidently towards the mountain. My guess is that Mike got a shot at his little buck again and that was the doe that he was following around. Since we forgot to bring out the radios (they’re at the cabin) I know that Mike will sit still until my hunt is done. Boy, am I excited for him. At least one of us will be taking home a deer. I think about how loud his bow was and how easily I heard not only the bow but also the impact with the deer’s body. I range find his group of trees and it’s easily 225 yards + away. While I’m thinking about that I glass the valley in front of me and to the sides. While I’m glassing to my right, through the trees, I see a shape that doesn’t look quite right. Sure enough, it’s a deer body (can’t see the head), browsing on the bank of the river about 150 yards away. I watch “her” browse and head down out of sight. I’ve seen another deer!!

Shortly after, I’m glassing straight in front of me and see a doe and young one following the edge of the river away from Mike’s location. I get to watch mom and young one browsing for almost an hour. As they’re making their way towards where I saw the other deer heading towards the water, I glass through the trees to my right and immediately spot a deer 40 yards away right at the edge of the field and the mountain! It looks like the same deer that I earlier saw disappear towards the river. She, I can see her head now, must have came back up and was following the edge of the valley right towards me. I shift my position and get my bow ready, turn on the risercam and wait. I think she heard me move because she suddenly moved away from the tree line and back out into the field strait away from me. While she’s spooked from some noise, she can’t see me and soon calms down again. However, instead of walking 5 yards in front of me she is now almost 40 yards out.

She starts walking from my right towards my left, strait away. I range her at 36.5 yards and get ready. She stops, looking towards me (still can’t see me) in a perfect broad side position. I calmly (I don’t know how I was…) draw back and anchor. I pick my pin and a spot over her heart… exhale… WHAM! The release lets go and the arrow is away… THWACK! Solid hit! She squats, kicks and bounces off… She’s not bouncing all out (Mule deer seem to bounce more than run) and starts to walk soon… At about 100 yards I watch her just fold up and collapse!

I have just got my very first Mule Deer! Not only that, but this is my very first Archery Harvest ever! Ever! WOW!!! Talk about excited! I know Mike has shot a deer and now this! Ok, no twigs on its head but I’m cool with that. Sure, it would have been nice to score on a buck but that’s not why I hunt. I m grateful for being able to harvest venison and I have no problems harvesting a doe when it’s available. And this is my FIRST ever with a bow! I know to let her lie for awhile just in case I didn’t make as good a shot as I think I made but I just can’t sit still. I get up and slowly walk out of my hide to see if I can spot her were she fell. I look around and see the other doe (with the little one) watching me… So I freeze. I stand still for almost 10 minutes hoping that the doe will stop staring… and staring… and staring… nope. I decide to slowly walk backwards back into my hide. When I get back the doe is still staring at me (or more likely where I disappeared). After what seems like hours, she starts walking towards me! What a silly deer! She ends up following the same path that I shot the doe on right in front of me. If I had 2 tags and she didn’t have a little one with her, she would have added to the cooler. I took some pictures and finally stood up.

She bounced off directly towards the other doe. I walked out and she bounced up the ridge. That took about 30 minutes. Time enough and it the other doe was not down for the count I think she would have been back up and gone with all the action. I walk out to where the doe stood when I shot and very easily find my arrow a few yards past that point… completely coated in red! I decide to play it safe and start following the blood trail instead of just walking to where I saw her go down… A blind man could have followed that blood trail. Sure enough, when I got to her she had bled out from a perfect pass through heart shot! It’s about dusk time so I drop my pack and start walking towards Mike’s stand. I get to Mike only to find out that yup, he shot, looked like a complete pass through but there is only a little spec of blood on the arrow. I tell him that I’ve got a doe down half way between us and that I heard his shot. He heard mine too and was fairly sure that I’d gotten something because he could hear the impact sound as well. We decide to not try and track his doe yet, let her lie down and relax. We’ll go back and grab my gear and head back to the cabin to unload stuff. Then we’ll come back with the quads and load up my deer and start looking for his.

It’s dark now, so we pack up what we’ll need to get my deer loaded and track Mikes. We have bottle of Bluestar (http://www.bluestar-hunting.com/) which is a blood revealing agent for tracking. Looks like a great chance to see if it really works. We also have some samples from illumitacks from elusive wildlife (http://www.elusivewildlife.com/) that we can try out for marking our trails. In addition to those, we’ve got our GPS units and our sidearms, just in case. Now, getting the quads over is a chore in itself. Earlier in the week we had to do some repairs to Mikes stand and to get the tools over we had to cross the creek up stream on a barely visible trail (had to turn around a couple times trying to find it). This crossing is even tougher on my 2 wheel drive quad than were I was normally crossing, talk about crossing my fingers! Now, we had to cross in the dark and find the trail!

We got across and found our way through the slashings to the valley. Mike stopped to tack the first illumitack to the tree by the trail (very smart move) before we continued on to my doe. We parked the quads around my doe to help discourage coyotes and such while we tracked his doe. Mike placed the next illumitack on the grip of his quad (another smart move). We mixed up the bottle of bluestar and sprayed it on the tall grass around my doe to test it…. You have to use this stuff in the dark so we turned our lights off and WOW! It looked like I’d shot an alien! Glowing all over the place! I think you could read by all the light. Ok, we’ve verified the stuff works so we walk over to where Mike shot his doe and turn off our lights… Mike sprays a little in the air and within seconds there are glowing spots on the ground and leaves. It’s obvious that it’s a pass through, the glow is from both sides of the trail she took out. We start following the glowing spots… to the edge of the valley were I saw her… up the mountain… across the mountain… down the mountain (only a 150 yards from were she went up)… through the thickest bunch of slashings you could find… found were she bedded down… to the river. Now, up until this point we’ve been finding blood with the Bluestar spray fairly easily. It’s not been much but it’s allowed us to track her…to the river. Mike crosses first, then I cross (I don’t have my rubber boots on this time…) only getting mildly wet. Within a couple of minutes, Mike has found blood with the spray, on the rocks coming out of the water. We spray the trails heading into the slashings but can’t find any more blood. The spray runs out. I look at the GPS and we realize that we’ve gone in almost a complete circle from when Mike took the shot. We decide to call it a night on tracking and try to find the trail tomorrow if she’s gone down. Personally, I think the amount of blood we’ve been following is the same as if you’ve cut your finger. Sure, the arrow did a pass through but it went over the lungs and didn’t hit anything but skin. A little blood, a scar and she’ll be back next year.
After crossing the river again, we head back to my doe. She was easy to find with the illumitack blinking like mad. We load her up on Mike’s quad and strap her down. We can see the first tack Mike placed which worked out well since we wouldn’t have been able to find the trail back to the water in the dark. Back across the water we drive and head back to camp. I dress her out on the back of the quad and then we put her in the back of Mike’s truck for the night. It’s in the 30’s so its cold enough and we don’t want the coyotes getting to her.

Back in the cabin, Mike is certainly depressed. I can understand how he feels, it’s a hunter’s worst fear that he’ll wound game and not be able to recover it. We talk about the shot and the amount of blood. How it was probably just over the lungs and really didn’t do any damage. She’ll scar and be fine. We’ll go out again in the morning to look on this side of the river just to make sure, it’s the ethical thing to do, but I’m sure she’s running around someplace eating and looking for a place to sleep. Deer are tough critters.

I could almost forget that I took my very first archery deer. Mike is worrying about his shot and I’m worrying about Mike (in 25 years I can count on one hand the times I’ve seen him this depressed). There’s not much I can do but be there. I call him a few nasty names, because that’s what friends are for.

It’s a long and restless night for both of us.

Next – Saturday, We Look, We Load, We Leave and New Discoveries

Colorado Trip - Part 6

2008-10-21T10:18:00.000-07:00

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Well, hopefully, this morning’s hunt will be exciting, but not like last nights…

I’m back in the ridge blind this morning. Things are looking a little overcast, clouds in the sky so no full moon lighting up the hills. It’s quiet and cold. One thing we haven’t talked about is the weather changes here. At night the temperatures are in the 30’s and very low 40’s but during the day the temps have been in the 80’s! Talk about a temperature swing! It’s all about layering your hunting cloths so you’re not too hot or too cold. Anyways, it’s below 40 degrees out but the sun is coming up on an overcast day. It’s one of those mornings that you just feel like everything is going to connect for a perfect hunt… Guess my feelings got hurt. Nothing. No deer, just one small Rabbit.

(You'll have to look hard to find the little guy).

Even overcast it’s a wonderful place to be in the morning…no cars, no desk, and no phone (in the stand). Oh well, I pack up and head down the mountain. On the way I decide to do stalk on this side of the creek, we kicked up a deer on the “Bill” tour and there are lots of deer sign. I slow walk the ridge edge of the open field (by where I parked the quad) and head down the 2 track that leads to the high blind.

Where it cuts up the ridge I turn towards the water and move slowly out… Nothing.

I do have a nice size Hawk circling overhead letting me know he sees me. I head back along the water, walking quietly and looking for movement…Nothing. Seems like today is going to be the “Nothing” day. I’m almost back to the quad when I realize that the broadhead is missing from my arrow! It was on tight when I was sitting in the blind… I took the picture with my bow just before I started my last stalk heading towards the quad. I did have to push through some fairly heavy slashings on the way to the quad while I was stalking. I held my bow behind me to keep it from being caught.

I guess that the broadhead must have run up against a couple of limbs and spun off. I tried to find it but talk about a needle in a hay stack! I’m more upset about leaving a sharp broadhead on the ground or stuck in a limb than I am about losing it. Not looking to be a good day so far… On the quad, over the river (through it), through the woods and back to “grandma’s” house we go…

After meeting up with Mike, who didn’t see anything either, we decided that we’d take a drive down the road the other way on the quads. While we were driving, we watched a storm coming across the mountains. After a couple miles and seeing lightning, we decided it would be smart to turn around and head back (we don’t always do the smart thing…).

We got back to camp and within a couple minutes it began to pour…hail! It started dumping marble sized hail! …and I had left my gear on the back of the truck… After running out and being pelted to no end I realized I left the keys (with the remote for the truck) on the quad…here we go again… ouch. I should have worn a helmet. Mike and I watched it hail for a good 30 minutes then it turned into straight rain for another 2 hours. Thunder! You have got to experience thunder in the Rockies!

(The sunny spot on the mountain is about were my blind is... now to get to it...)

Talk about sticking your head in a cannon barrel! Now, we figured that we could still have an opportunity to hunt. A couple of the blinds even have roofs over them. Our biggest concern was for the level of the water in the river… We picked out 3 rocks we could see from the cabin window and as they quickly disappeared under water we realized that crossing was going to be out of the question. Lunch was Venison hamburgers, might as well sit and enjoy the weather… The rain stopped around 3 o’clock so I convinced Mike that we should take the quads down to the crossing I have to use to see how bad it was. A bit of information… Quads are a requirement (or at least a life saver) in this type of hunting. The right kind of quad makes a difference… Mike’s work horse style quad works great, especially in the mud and getting through the river… My nephew’s racer style quad is a different story… It’s a 2 wheel drive manual transmit ion, high sprung suspension speed machine, great for the sand dunes and Michigan’s trails. When we picked it up it was completely coated in mud. I should have used that as a clue. I don’t have mud flaps. That’s what the body on top is for…to stop the flying mud… get the clue now… yup. It was an interesting drive down to the water. A mile of mud. Flying mud. Good thing we were just checking and I didn’t have all my gear on! Did you know that small tires with neat little “H” symbols are excellent for throwing mud up over 8 feet in the air? .. me neither. How about that mud from the rear tires can fly forward over the back of the quad and hit you in the face? … me neither. At least I had my Gortex coat on and could just turn the hose on that to clean it. My hat was another story. Ok. We’ll be taking a break tonight. Time to catch up on some writing and looking at the pictures I’ve taken so far. (I spent an hour with the water hose getting all the mud off my quad and I was nice and rinsed off Mikes too)

Next – Friday, the last hunt.

Colorado Trip - Part 5

2008-10-15T06:25:00.000-07:00

Day 5 – Wednesday September 17, 2008

Wednesday starts out with me heading to another location. Since I’ve not been seeing any deer from the valley I decide to head to the first blind that Bill showed us, halfway up the mountain. The cabin is at about 6300 feet and this blind sits at around 7100 feet. I had my GPS on when Bill gave his tour so I feel confident that I can find where I need to go…. I hope. I jump on the quad and drive until I get to the water (about a mile). I didn’t think about what crossing the water in the dark on the quad would be like… I remember big rocks and this quad is only 2 wheel drive. I cross my fingers, try to spot the best path to cross at and give it some gas… made it (not without some moments of, shall we say, renewed energy levels). I park the quad down a trail by the water and start hiking towards the stand on the ridge above me. Luckily, I’ve got a pretty good sense of direction and after a few minutes of huffing and puffing (I’m not used to the elevation yet either), I get to the blind. Just a note; this is were Bill was telling us not to worry about the bears, even though the blind is built in a stand of berry bushes, “it’s been a good year for them and they shouldn’t bother you, it was last year we had a problem”. Bill said that smoothly enough that you had to think about what he said or you just forgot that little bit of information. It’s a good blind though so I’m not worried. Besides, another item that Bill suggested we carry with us was our handguns. Just in case. Anyways, I settle in and watch the sun come up for another beautiful memory. Just about 7:30 while I was glassing the ridge in front of me, I spot a little bit of white that looks out of place. I steady the binocs and watch as a nice muley doe is nibbling on some leaves. I watch her for about 30 minutes as she wanders back and forth while heading towards me. That is until she disappears in the thicket and never comes out. At least I’ve seen another deer. As the morning hunt comes to a close I look around and think about how fortunate I am to be able to experience this tranquility in the outdoors. It’s quiet; there are no cars, no planes or trains and no voices. Just the sounds of nature, the birds, the wind and the sound of the water in the creek below me…

I should have brought lunch with me and a sleeping bag. Oh well, I pack up and head back to the quad for another adventure in river crossing.

Back at camp I meet up with Mike and we talk about the morning hunt. He’s seen so more deer but nothing shootable. Once again he is out like a light taking a nap… seems to be a trend here… Lunch today is venison spaghetti.

We’re now rested and fed…hmmmm, what to do? Mike wants to jump on the quads and take a ride before we have to go out for the afternoon hunt. We head up the road past Bills house looking at the mountains and following the river. We stop several times to remove the rattles from rattlers that didn’t quite make it across the road in the last hour. We watch one truck go by with a really nice elk in the back, looked to be at least a 6 x 6. I spot a mule deer down in a draw by the river and we stop to take some pictures. While we taking pictures my wife calls to see what’s going on. We’re chatting away when Mike say’s he sees what looks like sheep crossing the road down in the valley… He gets his video camera out to use the zoom and says they look like mule deer. From what I can see the color is wrong but close to what elk cows would look like… I say bye to the wife quickly and we get the quads moving quickly towards were we can see the “critters”. We arrive at were we saw them cross the road and don’t see anything until we look past the large stack of winter hay and see….

Prong Horns! A whole herd of prong horns crossed the road. Mike jumps off his quad (leaves it in the middle of the road) and tries to sneak up on them to get a better shot with his camera. Oops, big ranch rig coming so we need to move out of the way (it turned before it got near us…) so we drive past the hay and see the goats running up the hill. And then we see him… If you’ve ever been in Cabelas and seen the prong horn mounts they have…they’re not even close to the size of this monster.

Not only is he well over 15” but his horns are spread way past his ears. What a beautiful sight. We watch him move his harem over the hill so we drive around to the other side and watch him move them towards the public open lands. We haven’t even had our evening hunt and it’s already a day to remember.

Speaking of which, it’s time to head back and get ready to hunt! On the way back we stop at a couple of spots to take pictures. The views are incredible and every time we turn around we see something else that just makes you stop and stare. After a couple more stops and a little fun on the quads we get back to camp.

Tonight I’ve decided that I’ll head up to the high blind, it sits at about 7400 feet and is the highest hunting spot on Bills property. A new adventure (and boy was I gonna eat them words!), off again to cross the water. It’s about 2 miles to get to this blind, even though it is only a couple hundred yards up the mountain from the blind I was in that morning. After I park the quad about 200 yards away from the blind, I climb and get to the summit…I keep saying “what a view”...but, what a view!

Now, the blind is a bit different from the others. It’s only about 5 feet off the ground and has a low (about 2’) wall running around 3 sides. No top cover, but a large half circle of wood on the long wall to hide the silhouette of the hunter while he’s sitting. It’s sitting on a ridge that looks down a cleared path about 35 yards on one side and a short cleared path on the opposite side (short walled sides).

The front is blocked by large bushes and the back has the large half circle. Unfortunately, I realize that this is really a gun only style blind. The short walls are about 8 feet apart so you can’t get a good down shot with the bow and still cover the other clearing. There is a chair so I position it right in the middle. This allows me to see down the dropped path and also see the short clearing. I’ll just have to move to make a shot down either one. I’ve been sitting for about 20 minutes when I hear the sound of trees snapping and branches violently breaking from the upper ridge about 250 yards away. It’s either a bear or a bull elk thrashing some trees. This goes on for awhile and I can follow “it’s” progress as it moves about 150 yards parallel on the ridge. Shortly after it quiets down I hear several cow elk calling down from were I parked the quad! Shortly after that I hear bears fighting close to the cow elk… By this time I’m intensely scanning the ridge line and straining my ears to hear movement…. Any time I’m just positive that something is going to come into view… BAM! The bush 10 feet in front of me explodes! A red tailed hawk had decided that something in the bush needed eating… and hit that poor thing in full stoop at what seemed like 200 miles an hour! Talk about making a person jump! I couldn’t swallow my heart… I first had to pick it up and put it back in my mouth then swallow….whew! After it settles down for awhile and it’s getting close to perfect dusk… I’m quietly listening… SNORT! STOMP STOMP! SNORT! STOMP STOMP! Hol%* Cra*$! A bull elk! He’s gotta be 30 yards next to me just on the other side of a huge bush! …I’m busted! …..or am I? He’s carrying on like a freight train, stomping and snorting… he’s moved back a few yards but doesn’t seem to be running off. It’s more like he’s startled and pissed… yikes. But as my pulse starts to level out I realize that it’s not at me he’s making all this noise at. The wind is strong in my face so he couldn’t smell me and the bush is too thick for him to see me…hmmmm… then I hear what’s in the bush…. Did I mention bears fighting earlier…and did I mention that the bushes are berry bushes…. Did I mention that the blind is only 5 feet off the ground and open on one side…? Kinda like the food shelves at a grocery store….YIKES! I decided to become the perfect example of a statue and didn’t move! After awhile the elk has moved off, snorting all the way and the bush is calm and quiet… (maybe he walked under the blind….) and it’s now dark… I quietly get my carbon suit off and into my backpack (I always pack it in to keep odors off it). I get my arrow put in the quiver and my bow strapped to my pack. My surefire flashlight is ready and my gun strap is unsnapped…. Now to get out of the blind… it’s only 5 feet of ladder, thankfully, because halfway down it decides to tip over and dumps me on the ground…oh perfect I bet I sound just like a dinner bell... After a gold medal quality gymnastic move to get back up, I put my pack on and start carefully heading towards where I parked the quad… (it’s hard to hear anything with my pulse beating so load in my ears…). I make it to the quad and jump on, get it going and turned around… to realize that in the dark the trail is almost non existent and the grass is higher than the head light! And the moon is behind storm clouds that moved in… Yikes! All kidding aside, I don’t think I’ve ever been the type to panic, so I think about how I drove up and start looking for the little signs of passage. A bent over area of grass here and there and I finally make it back to the more worn trails heading towards the water. I can see how someone that is prone to panicking could end up heading in the wrong direction and get lost or worse yet, drive over a ravine or cliff. Always stay calm and think about what you need to do. At least now crossing the water doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.

Tomorrow, I’ll be back in the lower ridge blind.

Colorado Trip - Part 4

2008-10-14T06:08:00.000-07:00

Day 4 – Tuesday September 16, 2008

Morning comes early in the Rockies… But the Michigan Hunters are up and ready to GO! (Ok, 5am in Colorado is 7am in Michigan…means I got to sleep in). We loaded up our packs, hopped on the quads and headed out. After I parked my quad and hiked over to my tree it was wait and watch…and watch…and watch…and watch…I watched a beautiful morning in the Rockies with the sun coming up and the temperature rising. I saw some birds. Birds, but not much else. It’s really hard to complain about not seeing anything (it’s only my first full day) when I’m not in the office, I’m in the Rockies hunting and the weather is perfect… there’s still time to see deer. Before I head into camp, I head over to the river and walk its edge looking for tracks and crossings.

Lots of tracks in the slashings along the river. I even found an elk skeleton (minus the skull) along the banks. Hiking and scouting is as much part of hunting as it is getting in a stand and waiting. It certainly helped give me an idea of what was behind the row of Aspens the runs between me and the river. Anyways, I end up following the water to where I parked the quad, so I load up and drive back to camp.

Mike’s had a good morning; he’s seen a bunch of does and little ones. We set up the block for some target shooting because Roscoby Risercams has been generous and loaned both of us a cam to put on our bows to tryout. We replaced our stabilizers and turn the video on (after reading the instructions – surprise!). Re-tuning is important as the risercam is a little heavier than my stabilizer and longer. Our 20 yard shots are quickly adjusted and we move the block to 30 yards. Again, on target now without further adjustments. Since I missed the coyote at 40 yards because I wasn’t tuned yet for 40, I move the block out again and it only takes a couple shots to get it in the money. I look at Mike and decide that we need to take a few practice shots at 50 yards, so once again I move the target out. One note, we’re both using G5 Montec 100’s but I’m shooting the pre-season practice blades and Mike is shooting the actual live blades… and there is no difference! At 50 yards I take my first shot… down and left a couple inches, but that was me … next shot….dead and I mean dead center! I’m set. Mike starts out with his first shot being a couple inches off. His second shot….nothing. No target, no sound of hitting rocks…nothing…! We look and look and look and look… (don’t forget about the rattle snakes…) and look……nothing. So we decide to take a break. Mike is not feeling to well, he is still trying to get acclimated to the altitude. So he lays down and is asleep so fast it’s scary. While he’s sleeping, I continue to look for his arrow, without luck. However, my brain catches up with me and I remember that we’ve been using the risercams while we’ve been shooting… I load the video up and start looking at it frame by frame. You can see the arrow leaving the bow and another frame shows it halfway to the target. I mentally visualize the trajectory based on the frame shots and walk out to the block and find the focal point of my imaginary line…and walk up, look down and there it is, just lying in a bush. I turn around and realize that it is about 80 yards past the block and half way up the road! Between the CE Maxima arrow and the G5 Montec broadhead, there is about $23 I just found, loosing arrows is never cheap. I remember that we’ve got a rattler in the back of the truck. I was going to cook it up but forgot it was there from yesterday. So, I decide that I’ll just skin it out for Mikey (jr). since he couldn’t come with us this time. I get it skinned out and salted. It’s time to get moving so I wake Mike up to give him back his lost arrow and get some lunch… Lunch today is Venison steaks on the grill, rice and apples…yum (somehow I think I’ve ended up the chef this week). We’re now rested and fed so it’s time to hunt!

We’re feeling positive as we load up our gear and head to our stands. “Positive” slowly turns into a quiet afternoon in the stand watching the sun go down, the moon rise and the deer decided to stay home… I did see the bald eagles flying along the creek again, Cool! Just about the late prime time for hunting I watch Bill drive his truck down the middle of the field and stop in front of me….???!?? It turns out that Bill thought I would be in a different location and decided to drive the river and feed some fish…. Oh well. Let’s go back to camp and wait and see what Mike’s done. Mike shows up with a look of distain… Seems he had an opportunity at a nice little 3 pointer and it didn’t turn out the way he wanted… His first shot went just under its belly, behind its front leg. He got another chance and his 40 yard estimate turned into a deer standing at 52 yards. Darn, he’ll be back. (at least he’s seeing some deer and some action!) Well, Bill says good night and Mike and I grab some leftovers and relax for a little while. Mike had his video camera going as well as his Risercam so we review the footage. The video camera was at the wrong angle and the Risercam doesn’t show up as clearly as we’d hoped. It’s been another day of memories so we turn off the lights and head towards sleep thinking of what we’re going to see in the morning.

Next – hunting the side of the mountain.

Colorado Trip - Day 3, Continued

2008-10-09T11:39:00.000-07:00

Monday, September 15, 2008

(google seems to think I’m a spammer so you might not be seeing this blog as soon as I hoped…an actual person has to verify my account…)

Well, I’ve taken a mental break just in time for our story to continue with our driving break…we’ve arrived at camp! Bill tells us to get unloaded and ready to go in 30 minutes, he’ll be back to take us around the property and show us were we’ll be able to hunt. So, while Bill heads up to the house, Mike and I unload some of our gear, stretch and take a look around.

Bill’s hunters camp is a small (12 x 24) converted pole barn that now has a finished floor, a small kitchen, bathroom with a shower (very important), a small couch area and a separate bunk bed sleeping room. Very nice for roughing it… Ton’s of flies and Wasps inside though…good thing the fly swatter is handy. We unload most of the cooler into the refrigerator and get some of our hunting gear sorted out.

By the time we change into our hiking boots Bill is back and is ready to give us the “tour”. …Did I mention before that Bill is driving a rental truck… Bill starts out by driving us down a two track towards the southern mountain range on his property. We see some muley does in the brush and brambles on the way…good sign! Having already relayed Bills love of driving (like he stole it!), it comes as no surprise that he drives the same way no matter what the terrain… we soon come to the river, slowing only so that Bill can line it up in the right path to miss the boulders that are just too big…. Oops, silly me, he wasn’t aiming to miss any boulders, just checking out the views… Wham, bounce and slam …no problem, it’s a rental… We park just on the other side of the water and start hiking up the “hill” to the first higher elevation location. Did I mention that Bill may be old but he could kick our butts….guy’s hardly breathing and Mike and I sound like freight trains… It’s only a hundred yards up (up being the important word)…

What a view and we jump another Muley doe while we’re standing in the blind. Then it’s down the “hill” by another path and back to the truck… next stop, the highest elevation blind. Through the field by the river and onto another narrow two track, up… hey, a tree has fallen across the trail…no problem, we go around…the rental company must have some excellent insurance and really love this guy… About a mile (so it seems) of driving and we get within a couple hundred yards of the blind. We skip the actual walk to the blind at this time because we’re on a short time table to get everything checked out and into the hunt this afternoon… Back down the trail and we end up getting a little hung up on that tree we drove around before… just a few scratches (you can’t see in the mud later) and we’re back where we started from. Bill takes us over to the house to pick up some fish food for his stocked pond and then we’re off to check out the lower field tree stand and feed the fishes. We stop at the pond and Bill shows us how he wants his fish fed (it’s part of our agreement for staying the week – we feed the fish)… man are those Rainbow Trout huge! And they’re like piranhas with the fish food! He also feeds a section of the creek so we head that way which happens to pass right by the tree stand one of us will be using. We see another Muley doe standing directly under the blind as we drive by….excitement is starting to pump…. We stop at the creek to feed the fish and watch as two Bald Eagles fly down the creek! WOW! What a paradise to be enjoying!

Ok, we’ve seen and been instructed; now it’s time to get ready! Since I just got some new arrows and they’re heavier than my old ones, I need to re-tune my bow for them. Mike and I get our bows and set up the target 20 yards out. A few shots for Mike…right on target, he’s ready. I’ll be using the new Carbon Express Aramid KV’s with G5 Montec 100 grain heads. A few shots for me and some adjustments then a few more at 30 yards. I take a couple 40 yard shots but I’m not quite tuned in yet. I don’t have time to fine tune the 40 yard shots but since I’ll be starting out in the lower field tree stand I don’t think I’ll have anything farther away than 30 yards anyways. Mike is going to be using a tree stand that is just below the house that Bill said should be the best place to see deer. It’s Camo Time! We pack our backpacks with the necessities, get into our base camo (its 80 degrees out!) strap on our bows and hop on the quads. Mike and I look at each other and realize that our dream hunt is about to begin. I couldn’t even begin to describe the grins that spread across our faces and the excitement we both felt. With a quick “good luck buddy” we start our engines and drive in separate directions… it’s begun!

Both of our drives are fairly short but having the quads helps tremendously as we’re not yet acclimated to the altitude and it saves a hot sweaty hike. I parked my quad inside a small stand of trees (cut open specifically to hide a quad in) and start hiking towards my tree stand. Before I even get to my spot, I jump a nice doe. She stands broadside to me at about 30 yards but I decide to let her go. It’s the first hunt and I’d like a chance to take a nice buck if I can… I get into the tree stand and realize it’s more designed for gun hunters than bow hunters. It’s about 4’ x 8’ and you can’t move around because it squeaks a lot. I position myself so that I can get a shot either behind me or into the open field. There’s a metal chair but it’s a “metal” chair and not a quiet one either so I stand instead.

What a beautiful area. I stand there looking at the mountains and can hear the river. I watch the Bald Eagles flying down the middle of the field looking for dinner…just incredible. I got into the tree stand around 5:30, it’s been quiet and I’ve not seen anything at all except the Eagles. It’s now around 7:00 and dusk is starting to set in. I see movement across the field, directly in front of me… It’s a coyote! It’s a very large Coyote and its coloring is more towards a golden color as compared to the ones we see in Michigan. I watch him (or her) slowly make a bee line across in front of me. It looks like 40 yards is going to have to be the closest shot….and I’m not tuned in to 40 yards yet… I get set and adjust my aim to where I was hitting on the block, breath and release…. A hairs breathe in front of his chest! I little hop and he briskly jogs back the way he came and stops, turns and looks at me. I think the message was… this is my field, you missed and I’m now a ghost… good bye. Back into the tree line and he’s gone.

It’s time to head in. Back at camp, Mike lets me know that he’s seen 8 deer. Including a nice 3 point and a big buck that stayed too far out to count. He too let the does and the little one walk for opportunities down the line… We clean up and head to the house. Bill has steaks on the grill for us and we sit down to watch the Monday night football game, eat and chat about our first hunt. The moons well into the night sky when we make it back to the cabin and settle in for the night.

The first day’s hunt has come to the twilight of the crisp clean air in the Rockies. I’ve seen a deer, had an opportunity at a beautiful coyote, watch the Eagles soar and experienced a solitude that is hard to come by in Michigan.

Next - Day 4

Colorado Trip - Part 3

2008-10-03T11:10:00.000-07:00

Day Three - Monday September 15

Monday morning, the "real" start of our hunting trip. Time to get up and showered, make a final trip to the grocery store for supplies and then meet up with Bill Riley. It's a different world while you're on a trip. There is construction going in the lot next to our room but it realy doesn't bother us. It's like a background noise in our grand adventure. The sky is blue and the air clean (if a little thinner than we're used to) and the truck is re-packed and ready to go. After we grab our final supplies (food), we grab a bite to eat at the local Wendy's to await Bill. He shows up before we finish eating. He's not what I had invisioned for our elderly sponser of our great hunt.... He's gotta be close to 6'3", fairly trim and in shape with a head of white hair and an inability to either slow down or relaxe...I haven't decided which yet. We hop in the trucks and head to the Colorado DOW (Department of Wildlife) to get our licenses. Following Bill up the ramp to the building, we barely have time to look at each other in bewilderment as we almost have to run to keep up with Bill's walking... Now, the DOW has a few surprises for us as well... Bill provides the DOW with his landowner licenses to sign over to us and we supply the DOW officer with our drivers licenses and hunters safety certificates (another tidbit to make sure you don't forget!). The license system decides it doesn't want to find our information even though the DOW officer just entered it into the database....go figure... While we're waiting on the DOW system to burp up our stats, I ask the officer about the muzzleloader licenses and about the inability to purches them after the hunt starts. She looks at me and says "You can buy them, you just have to buy them from a DOW office only..." ......Mike and I look at each other...feeling distincly like the guy in the V8 comercials who gets wacked in the head... duh....WHAT? Gee, sure glad we didn't buy that muzzleloader at dealer cost to hunt Elk with..... hehehe...smack! Well, we finaly get our licenses after the system decides we realy do exist...(we heard them talking about how it issued 2007 licenses the other day....ouch) and pile back into the trucks to follow Bill to his place about an hour or so away..... and thus starts the begining of one of the most nerve racking drives of my life... It appears that Bills inability to walk slow is in no way hinderd by sitting inside of a Truck (a rental truck at that...which might have gave us a clue to what was ahead...). Nor do I think that Bill was under the impression that a truck towing a trailer should in anyway be any slower than his truck....wow, drivers ed in Colorado is just a bit different than Michigan...

We soon figured out that in Colorado, the driver must add a minimum of 20 mph to any speed limit sign, even if it's on curves... slow traffic ahead is only cause for exhuberant celebration by out of state hunters praising fate that provided such a short relief from "concentrated" driving... (it's a good thing it's Mikes truck and he's got such a ..... "sturdy" trailer....yikes)... Some place in Wild Bills (we started out calling him that...) thinking, paved roads are just too slow....and smooth... Hey Look! it's a 2 track with a gate and ...speed limit signs?...(add 20) ....oh yeah! It must be the physical properties of high elevation cause I didn't realize that driving 50 - 65 mph on a 2 track with a drop off cliffson one side and hair pin turns on the other side, would not cause our vehicle to simply fall off the face of the earth... oh, lucky us...

Since Insane Willy (as we're now calling him) has found such a nice drivable road, he realy decides to show us how good a driver he is at high speeds..... look, no brakes on the tight curves (in case we were looking for brake lights to warn us of dangerous curves....) ...see, I can get at least a mile in front of you and you can't catch me....hehehe.... I'd look at Mike to make conversation but doing so would require more than 1/10 of a secound's distraction from the road, something we deemed might be fatal...

Mike started off with his video camera in his hand, someplace soon it was returned to the seat because it interfered with Mikes ability to keep both hands locked on the dash at all times... Shortly after I mentioned..." hope we don't run into oncoming traffic around one of these blind curves"... that I realized I should have kept my mouth shut. It is interesting to note all the things that go through ones mind when you come around a hair pin turn, down hill, in sand, on a one lane road.... and run into a gravel train heading up the hill towards you. Yup, even though you could realy smell our brakes over heating for the last half hour, we were able to stop (after sliding in the sand almost to the big truck aiming at us...)

After the stare down (his looking preturbed and ours like we've seen our lives flash before us) he decided to back his rig up enough that we could drag the trailer around him.... and the next 4 rigs just like his...and the road grader.... and onto the huge pile of gravel they had just dropped in the middle of the road.... Did I mention that during this there was no sign of *^#%?! Bill (as we now started to call him). After dragging the trailer down the huge pile, litterly off it's wheels, we had to stop and dig the gravel out of the brake rotors before they melted the GRANITE chunks embedded there! We finish and guess what....that MAN shows up to see what's taking us so long...did he stop, nope, just saw us getting in the truck and turned around and started driving again (if you can call it that!). The drive does get easier, it's just turns and hills now, gee if we go 65 we might catch a glimps of the other truck....might... At least I can now take a look around, quickly!, and see the beautiful landscape....wow! BTW - I think I owe Mike a new steering wheel as his now seems to be deformed from my death grip on it...

Did I forget to mention the free range cows....

Oh look...there's.....Mr. Bill.....now... see that speck in the picture....?

At long last.....we're leveling out for landing.... hey look! it's a $1200 a day lodge/spa...in the middle of nowhere! ...

A real road: .... soon we're back on a paved road (at least for 1/2 a mile...). Mr. Bill lives off of County highway 1 .... we find out that County Highway 1 is a nice loose gravel dirt road....with Mile Markers! WOW.

...Hey!, Insane Willy has stopped...????

He ran over a snake....

Seems kinda angry....can we pet it? guess not.

Bill decides to "dispatch" it.

We keep it....lunch...later...

And at long last, the weary travelers, reached their destination......

The days not done, but reliving that drive has given me the shakes.... I'll continue on Monday's adventure... later....

Colorado Trip - Part 2

2008-10-02T11:10:00.000-07:00

Day 2 - Sunday September 14, 2008

As we continue our trip to Colorado, we're now in Nebraska. We decide to stop in Kearney to visit the #2 Cabela's store. It won't be open as it's about 6am Nebraska time, but we can at least say we stopped... Just before we get to the Kearney exit, we drive under the Great Platte River Road Archway Museum (http://www.archway.org/). The silly thing crosses highway 80 like a big covered walking bridge. Anyways, we pull off at the Kearney exit and start looking for the Cabelas...and looking....and looking.... after following the directions, seeing the telltale water tower but no giant building with Cabelas written across the front, we decide to turn around... and what do we see...Cabelas! Mike says "hey, there's a sign...it's realy tiny...hey! that little factory looking building has "Cabelas" on the front...that's it! it looks like a small single story, factory building. no big signs, or statues (a small one was out front that we could have put in the truck) . The parking lot is tiny...oh well....

After we grab some breakfast a little farther down the road, we continue on...enjoying the flat, the corn and the flat... not realizing that we are gradually rising from Michigans under 1000ft mark to almost 5000 feet above sea level. The day has turned into a perfect day. We decide to continue on 80 until we get to Sydny to hit the very first Cabelas (and pick up some more stuff!). This one is open (it's about 1:30 local time) and looks like Cabelas is supposed to look, impressive. (since it's the very first Cabelas, it's obvious that it's been redone to match the new stores. We pick up our final supplies ( a Hoochie mama elk call, a new flashlight for Mike and some apple blocks). Next stop - Denver! While we're driving towards Denver, Mike doesn't see any mountains...it's cloudy... Mike, those are the mountains in the clouds...you'll see when we get to Denver. They'll seem like they just appear all of a sudden. We're heading into Denver to meet up with Aneal Roney from http://www.bowcast.com/ to talk Muleys and Elk! Aneal has been gracious enough to invite us to meet at his home so he can give us the lowdown on what to expect and some pointers on how to hunt the Colorado natives (not the Broncos fans...the Elk and Deer). As we're driving into Denver we start noticing fields that look like someone has thrown dirt every few feet....? all over the place. Then we realize that it's prarie dogs! Talk about an infestation! Mike is practicaly going nuts for his 22 Hornet....doggies beware! 4 toll booths later, we follow the GPS to Aneals house. We're treated to a video of an incredible Muley hunt and Aneal spends an hour telling us what to expect when we get to our hunting spot. He's got some excellent advice and tidbits of information on Muleys and Elk that we just didn't know. Unfortunately, we can spend all afternoon chatting (even though we could), we've got to get on the road to head up to Steamboat Springs. Aneal tells us how to get to his local Sportsmans Warehouse (http://www.sportsmanswarehouse.com/) in Littleton (I think...) so we can pick up our Elk licenses. He told us it's a little more complicated for out-of-state licenses and they would be able to help us a lot better than the regular "box" stores could. Boy are we glad he sent us there!!!! .... We got the the store, Mike picked up some binostraps and we head for the license counter... It turns out that the licenses we've been looking at, the leftover archery elk for area 4 and 5, were actually for Muzzle loaders not archery! Once the code was explained (and it is not explained on the DOW sheet) it was obvious. If the number ends in "A" it's archery, "M" is for muzzleloader and "R" is for rifle...duh... but you wouldn't know just to look at the code number and we were told they were archery licenses before we left....CALL THE DOW BEFORE YOU PLAN YOUR TRIP!!! Now, we have a dilema... there are licenses left over for muzzle loaders but we didn't pack any... the guys(and Gals!) bent over backwards to help us out. The checked on what it would cost to ship at least one gun over night from several shippers....EXPENSIVE and then offered us a nice Traditions at cost just to help us out! We decided to buy the Traditions and supporting gear and once again headed towards the license/checkout counter (after almost 2 hours)....wait, we're not done yet..... At the counter, the young lady said to let her try and purchase a license first since some licenses you can't buy once the season starts....guess what....muzzleloader was one of those and the season started SATURDAY!!! Crap! Oh well. Yes, we were very disapointed but after thinking about it we knew we had Muley licenses and that it was possible that we would not be able to get Elk licenses...so we just saved over $1200...ok, we can live with that...Muleys watch out!

Finaly, we're on the road out of Denver towards Steamboat Springs...and run smack into a traffic jam. Well, at least we get to watch the sun go down over the mountains and watch the moon come out! After we get out of the traffic jam, we start climbing...and climbing...and climbing. I've got my GPS out and we're watching our elevation increase every minute...8000, 9000, 10,000 feet...and more. I think we peaked out at around 11,200 feet. Not being used to the eleveation we were feeling it. Our jaws were aching and our joints too. It felt like we were having problems with our sinuses and the thiner air was evident. Thank goodnes we'll be hunting at a lowly lever of around 7000 feet!... We went through some cool tunnels in the mountains too (it helped to distract from the discomfort). When we we're about an hour away from Steamboat Springs we ran into a detour, onto a side road, and boy do I mean side road! it almost doubled our last leg of the drive. Did I mention that there are lots of curves and drop offs in the mountains, next to the moutain roads, that we were on.....yikes! Lights in the distance!....it's Steamboat Springs! Believe it or not, we were staying at the Bunny Ears Motel. Not the Playboy Bunny Ears...just Bunny Ears...no relation at all (maybe in the winter during skiing season....we'll have to go back just to check.) Nice place, right on the river. It's now about 10:30 Steamboat Springs time....12:30 Michigan time and we're exhausted from driving what seems like forever! Mike gets on the computer to do his last blog and podcast before we're out of touch...and promply falls asleep with his fingers still on the keys. It's a priceless picture but he wakes up before I can find the camera... darn! We finish the Podcast and sign off for the night. At least we don't have to meet Bill until noon local time so we can sleep in and try to catch up a bit on our energy!

Next: the Wild Bill turns to Insane Willey ride!

Colorado Trip - Part 1

2008-10-01T07:32:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, I know you've been reading Mikes blog on our Colorado trip but I figured I better give you my side of the story too. (Just in case you think Mike is full of it...lol). Anyways, here it goes....

Day 1 - Saturday, September 13, 2008

After running around for a week trying to remember everything I/we would need for the trip and what I was forgetting.....it was time to leave. I had packed up my Bronco the night before with everything, and I mean everything, so I was ready to just start up and go. The girls made sure they got up at 5:30 to kiss daddy goodbye and the wife added her kisses too. 6:00 am and I'm on the road! "Anticipation", what a word undervalued to what I was feeling! Colorado, Muleys, Elk and my best buddy Mike...

It took me about 40 minutes to get up to Mikes house. I backed up the Bronco to his trailer and we started the process of loading up all our gear. You would have thought we were moving to Colorado to live by the look in the trailer. One note: we were hoping that our new Bowtech Guardians would arrive before we left so we could play with them during the week...unfortunately, while they were mailed on Monday they did not arrive in time... Ok, we're packed, Mike's kissed his wife and kids, we look at each other.....Lets GO!

It's about 7:40 and we start our trip with a drive to the gas station (first of MANY) and then a stop to pick up some items that need to be dropped off were we're picking up Mikes Quad...Curran...about 180 miles north. Did I mention it's raining...? We get up to Mike's hunting club to get his Quad at about 11:30 ...and what a good omen....deer, watching us drive in and back out again. It did stop raining just long enough for us to load Mikes Quad.

We head out and aim towards the West Branch area were we need to pick up the quad I'll be using thanks to my nephew Paul (Thanks Paul!). The only thing that has me a little concerned is that while Mikes quad is a nice 4x4 400cc work horse with nice tractor style tires, my nephews is a 400cc 2 wheel drive sport quad with small aggresive dirt/sand style tires...it don't go slow! We're not sure if we'll need them both but better safe than sorry...(what words of wisdom...!). On the way to Paul's cabin to pick up the quad, we passed an accident that looked like some guy lost control of his truck in the rain and rolled it....ouch! Funny thing, it stopped raining just long enough for us to load my quad into the back of Mikes truck, then it started again....hmmmm. Maybe it'll wash the mud off of it...since I'm fairly sure that it's white but you can't see any white through all the mud dried and "welded" to everything... I'm sure that's a story for another day if I know Paul (I've been on a couple outings with him...Quads, 4x4's, mud, sand and beer....yup, sounds right). Anyways, we've now got both quads, it's about 1 pm, we head accross the state and pickup 27 south. We need to stop at Jay's in Clare to pick up a couple of Elk decoys and get my new Carbon Express Aramid KV's cut down to size. While we're there, we bump into John Eberhard from Scent Lok and get a couple copies of his book, Precision Bowhunting, signed (thanks John! http://www.deer-john.net). Finally! it's about 2:30 pm, we've got our decoys, my arrows cut and some candy (what? it was right there by the register begging to be bought!). We grab some lunch and hit the road for (hopefully) the last leg of our trip out of Michigan. Did I mention that it's still raining?

By now I think I've asked Mike at least a dozen times if he wants me to take over driving for awhile...still no. Either he's having flashbacks to my driving during our college days or he's just to geeked up to let go of the wheel.... By the time we get near Holland he finaly relents and lets me start driving...just in time for the rain to start getting heavier... We hit the Michigan boarder around 6:30. It's like leaving the country (at least in our minds it was...). Just past Michigan City we have to detour off the highway because the highway has flooded from the storms! It sure is nice having the GPS on board. We finally make it to higway 80, the long stretch, 1000 miles of driving ahead and it's night time now. We've finally worked out the driving schedule too, every time we get gas, we switch. That's about every 220 miles or so. (I think Mike finaly trusts me driving. either that or he's not getting enough sleep). After about 12 hours, the rain finally stopped. I then got to deal with high winds for my 3 hours of driving...oh joy... gotta love Iowa and Nebraska. Lots of flat and Corn. BTW, we passed the Cabelas in Hammond Indiana...looked nice but we didn't stop...no stopping us now...it was tempting though... we know there is another one in Kerney Nebraska and Sydny Nebraska (#2 and #1 store) so we'll probably be stopping there to pick up another elk call.

NEXT: Day 2 (Sunday)