A Free Lunch

So I decided to buy a sack of corn this morning and set up my feeder even though I have a full month and a half until rifle season opens, but I figured I see if they will come this close to the house or if I need to move my feeder a little further down the line.  The corn cost 5 bucks for a fifty pound sack and this year I am going to try to keep track of what I spend on hunting season so I can see if it is cost effective.  Bow season opens in a couple weeks and I am tempted to pick up a bow on Craigslist and give it a shot, but so far I haven't been able to bring myself to spend the money.  A new bow goes for a minimum of two hundred fifty bucks  with the average around four hundred and the top end around a thousand bucks.  You gotta put up a lot of meat to make a thousand dollar bow pay for itself.

The feeder has a light sensor which will set it off about a hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset.  The little metal plate spins around allowing the corn to flow out and be scattered around the feeder.  The black box holds the light sensor, a six volt battery and a controller that allows you to test the motor as well as set the amount of time the feeder spins.  I have it set to the minimum so that I won't have to fill the five gallon bucket as much. I know the deer are out there so really I am just trying to lure them a little bit closer and hopefully at a convenient time.  Apparently they have never gotten the message that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
The main reason I put it out now was to see if it draws the hogs into the area.  On the the east side of the creek where Luci's cousin bow hunts all he seen are hogs, at her grandmothers place a little ways down the road they have trapped ten or twelve this year.  If the hogs come I will have to take the hunting more seriously.  You can't have them to close. They tear up gardens and can be dangerous.

This feeder has to wait a full twenty four hours to set its internal timer for sun-up and sun-down so it wont be until the morning after next that I will hear the clinking of the corn and I can start watching to see how long it takes for them to go for the snack.

Salty Dirt, YUMMM!!!!!

Nothing says snack time like salty dirt!!!!!!!  I went out to check my mineral spot this morning because it is supposed to rain off and on for the next couple of days.  Last time I went out they hadn't found the spot yet, but this time they have definitely  added it it their list of places to stop.  Some how when I reinserted the memory card in the camera it changed the settings so I didn't get any pictures, but the tracks are clear.  I sprinkled a little bit of corn that had laying around from last season and that may have brought them in, but they are definitely digging through the dirt for the minerals.  Last year they never dug up any of my corn sites.

The tracks are doe tracks, but since I am not really concerned with getting a big set antlers or a head to mount on the wall then a doe will do just fine.  It will be just as tasty.  Of course the website for Deer Cane says that bucks will want the minerals for "overall health and rack development".  Somewhere out here is a big ol buck with  good sized rack.  Last year we spotted his tracks and this year Luci caught a glimpse of him on the edge of the road.  Of course they have this rule about if you take a buck the antlers must have a width of at least thirteen inches which is pretty hard to determine.  The best advice on determining width I have found is from Wild Ed's Texas Outdoor Blog.  I will probably just stick to taking a doe for meat if I can get one.  Last year I never could get even a look at the buck while I had a gun in my hand let alone a good shot.

Wish it was Bigfoot

The deer is hard to see behind the weeds, so a little mowing on the shooting lane is in order.  I know these guys will be out during the day time at least until hunting season starts and the bullets start flying.  Everyone tells me I gotta be ready when the season starts because the twenty or so guys that hunt the deer lease next to us will be shooting on opening day and whatever they don't kill will definitely have the Spidey sense kicked into over drive.

Love at first sight

Last night we had a massive thunder storm with severe thunder storm warnings and tornado warning all night. One daughter and my wife had been up since three am and me and the other kid got up at five, but it was still raining so I couldn't go out hunting as I had planned. As the clouds broke and the rain stopped my wife went to take a nap. I was about to go out hunting when she went to lay down so I stayed in with the kids.

I kept thinking that the deer might be out for a wander as the sun came out, but since I don't know what I am doing I didn't think much of it. After about a half hour I cracked the front door open and and standing next to a small pile of corn right in the center of the road is a deer. When I open the door her little ears pop up and she looks straight at me, but doesn't bolt. I slightly shut the door and grab the rifle out of the gun case. I tell both kids to hush since they are sitting on the couch about twelve feet from the door. When I open the door her head whips back around and looks straight at me, but she doesn't bolt.

Now the deer has turned side ways and I aim the rifle out the door and have a nice clean shot, but I know if I try to go outside through this door the deer's gone. I should have took my shot standing in the entry way, but I thought the kids would freak. I didn't know if would effect their hearing and since my oldest already wears hearing aids I didn't want to risk even a tiny bit of hearing loss for them. So I drop the rifle down and gently shut the front door. Looking out the window I can still see it so I try to go around back.

When I pull open the back door it lets out a big ol' SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAK. Crap salad, now I know it's gone and when I get to edge of the car port the deer has bolted. I don't know how to guess how much they weigh or how old they, but this one looked Delicious.

Next time, I would make the kids go in the back bathroom and shut both doors. I would also listen to my father who said we needed to WD-40 the hinges on the door, just the day before.
I must admit I was excited. I have been hoping to get a shot since I started putting out corn, but this was the first time I even got a look. I never thought I would see the point of hunting, but now I get it.

Waiting with a deadly weapon

This morning I got dressed and tried to quietly go out into the dark and wait at the edge of the front porch with the rifle. I have a clear view of the place I have been putting out my corn. I know that the deer have found it because it is being eaten and there are clear fresh tracks right around the pile every day. Right now the thing I don't know is when they are coming to get it. Although, two days ago it was still on the ground when my wife left for work and gone when I left to take the girls to school.


I watched the stars slowly fade and the light come up while I listened to the owls. I did not realise how cold it would be before sunrise by the time I came in my finger tips were aching and I didn't see anything. I did learn a couple things while I was waiting out in the darkness.

1) I gotta find some gloves I can wear that will be easy to shoot with.
2) I need to bring out some kind of towel or cloth because the lens of the scope gets fogged up in the cold.
3) I need to clear, clear, and clear more brush to open up my Field of view.
4) I have a hard time waiting and hour or two without coughing, sneezing, fidgeting, etc.
5) This hunting thing could take a while.

The deadliest weapon known to deer: CORN

Ah the sweet taste of corn. Today I bought my first two bags of deer corn, extra clean, as it says on the bag although they eat it off the dirt so I don't know why that matters. I feel committed now like there is no backing out once the corn touches the soil. Even if I don't manage to shoot anything I feel like I will have to at least get up before daybreak with the rifle and pocket full of shells to see if anything is wandering about. I don't have any camo yet and since I am hunting on our property I don't need the neon orange vest that you are required to wear when hunting on public lands. I am also just old enough that in order to get a hunting liscense I did not have to take a hunter's education class. I was a if I was born in September in stead of July I would be required by the state to take the class.
The two spots I have picked to put out corn on are only about thirty yards from the house. Basicly I will just have to get up and go sit in my front yard or on my back porch. Walking my shooting lane I see fresh tracks all the time and I don't think I would need to put corn out down there. I can use that spot on the weekends and use the ones near the yard during the week while Luci is getting ready for work and the kids are sleeping. Not quite sure how the kids will react to waking up to the sound of gunfire.

A view from the sky

Last night I went on the Remington website to look for 3 inch 20 gauge buck shot shells, which they don't have, but I did find there custom map service. You can get either color Ariel photos, black & white photo's, topo maps, or a topo-photo mix which is pretty nice because you can see the roads and streams through the trees and brush, but having the photo image makes it easier to figure out what your looking at.

The ones for our place must have been taken around 2006 after it was logged, because has grown up quite a bit since this was taken. So far I few different sources for ariel photos the Microsoft TerraServer, Google Earth, and the Remington custom map feature. I am still on the fence about order a map or some photos. I could see how is you bought a really big piece of acreage that you didn't know much about you could you the photo's to locate things that my now be so overgrown you wouldn't know it was there.

The blue x is where Luci's cousin is bow hunting. His spot is right across from the small branch next the property line. I don't know if he has taken anything this season yet, but last time we talked he said he was having a problem with the pigs eating all of his corn so he put out a timed feeder. He has a couple of game camera's set up so he can see what is coming to feed. I can't imagine it will be long before the tech will be cheap enough that remote web cams will be put out and hunter's will be able to get a look at there blinds in real time. If it wasn't for security concerns I would think you would be able to do the same with satelite imagery to locate game for hunting. The technology already exsists, but the only thing hunted with it are people.

My first bottle of BuckJam

Driving the girls to school this morning we saw deer crossing the road three times. I realized that it won't be long before rifle season starts so I need to get ready. After dropping the girls off at school I went to the store to stare at the wall of deer bait, I guess would be the term. Even after living here for a few years I never realized how much stuff they have to try to attract deer. Everything from the fifty pound bags of corn you see everywhere to freshly squeezed juice of some kind of gland from a doe, which actually warns not to put it on yourself or you will rudely assaulted by a randy buck.

I decided to start with a bottle containing a gallon or so of BuckJam, some kind of syrupy mix of sugar and salt. You clear a spot in the dirt and simply pour the thick goo on the ground. Apparently deer are not opposed to eating a salty dirt snack. Well see.

On my way back to house I stopped about half way down from the road to the house where the corner of a forty acre plot meets our a section of our place. The forty acres is land locked and has no access except through our place or one of our neighbors so it is on of the few that has not been logged. I think half the critters in twenty mile area are hiding out there. My wife's cousins is bow hunting alone one edge, the dillweeds who have a hunting camp down the road are hunting along the far edge and I am going to set up a shooting lane down another edge. I'm not really sure what a good range is for my 30-06, but I picked a spot about sixty yards from the corner figuring that I can move my blind a little bit either way. Raking off the leaves and sticks about six or seven feet from what I think is a path that the deer have been following through the brush I made I pour out my bottle of goo. Now have to wait and see I will go back in a day or two and look for tracks. Of course not being a good gnarly mountain man tracker I can't tell the difference between a hog track and a deer track, but I figure a track is track either way I will have something to shot at.

Hunting season comes to the the garden.

Lately, the signs that hunting season is right around the corner have been popping up all over the place.

We're seeing lots of deer on the roads and even a few in the yard--apparently, deer like their peaches and pears straight off the trees.

The neighbors who have a deer lease that borders our property have been out clearing brush and riding their four-wheelers. I had to ask them to move their stands because they had them right at the corners of the property line, about as close to our house as you could possibly get without actually being on our property. (They were very nice about and said they would move everything before the season opened and were clearing some new spots last time I talked to them.)

My wife's cousin called to ask if he could bow hunt out on our place down by the creek. We said of course, I may rifle hunt in the same spot when bow season is over. I think he has another place he goes for rifle season. This is the first year I will have been home during hunting season and I would like to get a deer or two so we could put up the meat. I don't have any interest in hunting for trophy antlers. I want trophy burgers.

Archery Season is from Sept. 27 through Oct. 31; General Season is Nov. 1 through Jan. 4.

So basically, unless I am gonna bow hunt (which I won't) I will have two months to get ready and could take up to four deer. That would be enough to keep us in meat for most of the year, but I will be lucky as a first-timer to get even one. I'm told that as of November 1, deer get pretty crafty.

I think most people don't learn how to hunt on their own. Usually, you learn from your dad or uncle...So I am on my own, as my dad lives in California and hasn't hunted since he was 11 and lived in Oklahoma.

Before we moved to the country, I had a very different image of hunting in general. I had an image of hunting from the movie The Deer Hunter with Robert Dinero, where you drive out into the woods and wander around trying to be sneaky and quiet until you see something to shoot at, or even possibly following the occasional track or two like Daniel Boone. This is not the case. No stealthy wandering here. Nossir. Apparently, folks around here are smarter than Robert Dinero.

Here are some basic steps for hunting in East Texas.

1) Buy a fifty pound bag of dry corn.
2) Pick a spot. Figure out where you think the deer are close by.
3) Pour out some corn so the deer can come get a snack on the spot you picked.
4) Set up somewhere to sit where you can see aformentioned spot. (Best if they can't see you.)
5) Get a weapon: Rifle, Bow or Musket, depending on the season. I also believe there should be a spear season.
6) Get a License. Very important.
7) Repeat steps 1 & 3 until the season begins.
8) Get up before dawn and wait in your seat.
9) When the deer, who are coming to get the snack you so kindly provided, come into view, take aim.
10) FIRE.

To make this experience even better, set up an automatically timed deer feeder that dumps out corn at a specific time. This is like sending out a deer invitation, telling when the party starts every day. You can even set up a night-vision motion-activated deer-cam, to see if deer are actually eating your corn and what time they show up. I'm not kidding. This is totally legal.

This is not the way I thought people went hunting. However, if you are trying to put up some meat to feed a family, this is more effective.