danb
dont be a dumbass
Fantastic idea! Wish I'd thought of it. I am thinking some camping stakes ought to do as well. Tie some rope to the stakes, put the stakes in the ground to hold the legs open.
Beginner’s luck so far, but now next steps
- Thread starter aray
- Start date
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Fantastic idea! Wish I'd thought of it. I am thinking some camping stakes ought to do as well. Tie some rope to the stakes, put the stakes in the ground to hold the legs open.
I appreciate all of the tips and suggestions & am still learning a lot. Thanks to all.
FYI my beginner's luck ran out Saturday as I sat in a tree stand for 4.5 hours in the cold and rain and never even saw a deer. But that's life; it was fun going on my first deer hunt anyway. I'm optimistic that by the end of the season I should bag a bambi. In fact I'll be back in the field on Thursday on another lottery hunt.
FYI my beginner's luck ran out Saturday as I sat in a tree stand for 4.5 hours in the cold and rain and never even saw a deer. But that's life; it was fun going on my first deer hunt anyway. I'm optimistic that by the end of the season I should bag a bambi. In fact I'll be back in the field on Thursday on another lottery hunt.
MikeTF
Ultimate Member
I did that last week, and I'll be doing it again tomorrow. I remind myself often that 'fishing' and 'hunting' are not called 'catching' and 'killing' for a reason.
wilcam47
Ultimate Member
...
MikeTF
Ultimate Member
Today, I didn't shoot anything, but it was an amazing day. I was set up in a tree stand with a muzzle loader and a doe ran along the path I positioned myself to take advantage of. She was moving quickly and I had her in my cross hairs, but I didn't feel that I would have made the shot on a running doe. I passed.
Later, a buck with an indescribable rack ran down another path, then stopped and started walking. I was doing a wildlife management hunt and the rule was: shoot a doe, then you can shoot a buck. I could have easily dropped this buck, but obeyed the rules and passed on several solid shots.
All in all, a very successful and satisfying day!
Later, a buck with an indescribable rack ran down another path, then stopped and started walking. I was doing a wildlife management hunt and the rule was: shoot a doe, then you can shoot a buck. I could have easily dropped this buck, but obeyed the rules and passed on several solid shots.
All in all, a very successful and satisfying day!
wilcam47
Ultimate Member
I had a similar experience this year...
MikeTF
Ultimate Member
I will always wonder how many points this buck was. It was a huge deer.
I found out I need a gutting kit. Just the stuff you'd need to do it in a separate pouch. Along with ziplocs for heart and tarsal glands. And more nitril gloves to put over the full arm gutting gloves.
engineerbrian
JMB fan club
I can't embed the video right now, but check the link in my sig line. We have a you tube video for basic hunting gear for the new hunter
madmantrapper
Ultimate Member
Ray did not let that one hang very long.
Good video. I liked and subbed.
engineerbrian
JMB fan club
Thanks!
MikeTF
Ultimate Member
This video nails it! Nice job! I really like the little hints you causally throw in 'orange is good because you can see it when it's on the ground'. I was going to tease you about redundancy: two butt out tools, which I only carry one of, but then I thought about my own 'kit' and I carry multiple sets of gloves (like you), 3 light sources, double sets of batteries even though the batteries can be used in lights or the gps and other devices. Safety belt, I have the exact same one, and use it for dragging deer. I think you have a future in out of doors videos or any 'instructional video'. You present it well and could host your own show. I'm looking forward to when you get 'discovered'.
engineerbrian
JMB fan club
Success!
Well I got my first deer yesterday. Some things went well while for others there is a lot of room for improvement. Here’s the story:
My day started at 0330. Ugg. I’m not a morning person and if I see 0330 it’s usually coming in from the other side… Anyway I stumbled into the shower, being as quiet as possible so as not to wake up my family, then opened the front door to load my car. Mistake. I set off the burglar alarm that was on Instant, waking up my wife and daughter. Getting up that early in the morning does not lead to coherent thinking. Sigh.
Despite the day starting off on the wrong foot, I arrived at the WSSC Brighton Dam on the Triadelphia Reservoir for the rules & safety briefing, then off to my assigned area. I think there were about a half-dozen or so other hunters in Big Branch Areas 3-6 that showed up, and I was the last one to leave my car with my gear and head off into the woods. Being a newbie, it took me longer to get ready than most.
I knew which tree I wanted from a previous scouting trip and had marked it on my GPS unit, but on the way in I felt really bad, clanking along with my climber past other more experienced hunters already on their way up their respective trees. I felt just as I did a couple of hours earlier when I woke up my family. I hoped I wasn’t spooking the deer for them but my loaner (steel) climber is just noisy (and heavy). Worse, it being still dark, I was using one of those headlamp lights to see my way. I was amazed that some of the other hunters were already on their way up their trees completely in the dark. I don’t know how they did it, I couldn’t see a thing without my light, and I could only hope that I could get away deeper into the woods quickly without disturbing any deer in their closer areas.
Finally I got to the tree previously picked out while scouting, only to discover that it was a bit too wide for my climber. So I had to scramble to find a smaller tree in the general area, and hope it was alive and healthy – something hard to do in the dark.
It was breaking dawn as I got to my final height. Then I discovered my next problem – I was facing the reservoir and could only see about 50 yards ahead of me before a steep incline dropped off sharply to the water. Behind me – 150 yards of prime shooting area in all directions. Great, now what do I do? If I stay put I’ll certainly be facing the wrong way from most of the real estate, but if I spin the climber around I’ll make more noise, and cause more ruckus, all during dawn deer rush hour. Plus now I have my backpack and my gun up high with me in the stand, making the transition a bit more difficult and slower. Not being sure of the right course of action, I sat and pondered it for a while … thus sorta forcing the decision on me. I waited about an hour, maybe missed some deer behind me (who knows?), then when the sun was higher on the horizon I rotated the climber 180 degrees.
About 30 minutes later I heard two shots at a distance off to my left. Five minutes after that I saw two does running left to right. (Do deer “gallop”? Whatever the right word is they were running full speed.) As they passed in front of me I thought about taking a shot. At their closest approach they were no more than 50 yards out (as measured later by my GPS unit). However I’ve read about people rushing an unwise shot just to bag a deer and I didn’t want to do that so I let them pass. I watched my first ever chance to get a deer go running past me and away into deeper woods.
Still unsure if I made the right choice I settled back down to wait for a better chance. Then the rain came, it got colder, and I was wondering if I’d ever see another deer. My first time out (this was my second trip) I never saw even one deer all day, and suffered in the cold and rain that day as well. Having nothing better to do I got out my new deer caller and every 15 minutes or so let out a doe call or buck grunt.
About 45 minutes later, and about 30 seconds after my last call, I heard some movement off to the left. I was wearing one of the Howard Leight amplified earmuffs so I could actually hear better than if I had on no hearing protectors at all. Sure enough, a deer came (walking this time) along the exact same path as the previous pair. I waited until the deer was behind a tree to stow my caller, then slowly lowered my shotgun and clicked off the safety.
I was going to wait until the deer reached the point of closest proximity, but then the deer suddenly reversed path. Its nose was to the ground and it returned to the tree that I had used to block my movements. Again it reversed its path and continued back to the original course, only to turn around yet once more and return to that same tree. I had no idea why it was backtracking over the same territory now four times, but I decided while it was paused beside the tree that I couldn’t let this opportunity pass by.
Front sight focus, respiratory pause, squeeze the trigger – the shotgun roared to life for the first time outside of a range.
Did I hit the deer? I was trying to call the shot but I guess the blast from the shell and the recoil initially obscured my sight. The deer jumped straight up, pivoted 180 degrees, then bolted off to my right and away. I could hear him running through the woods and into deeper thickets where I lost sight of him. However about 3-5 seconds after my shot I heard a loud crash and the sound stopped. He had run 40 yards, lost consciousness, and fell over.
But at that point I still wasn’t completely sure I had hit him, since I couldn’t see where he fell, although I was pretty confident from my sight picture and from his subsequent behavior that my shot had found its mark. About three hours later when the hunt was over and I climbed down from my stand, we field dressed him and I saw my shot had gone straight through his heart – using open iron sights at 50 yards. Thanks Appleseed, for turning me into a Rifleman, and to the unbelievable volunteers who freely give up so many their weekends to pass along the lessons of freedom, liberty, and marksmanship that founded this great nation.
I did see one more deer that day. About two hours after I had first fired, a huge doe came running out of the thickets straight towards my tree. She was in a full run and was closing the distance quickly. I rapidly swung my barrel down but as I did so, it snagged the tree umbrella that I had set up over my head to help keep the rain off. I had not secured it to the tree with a strap, and it began to pivot down in front of me. It was like a train wreck that you know is going to happen but you’re powerless to stop. The deer saw the movement, we made eye contact, and she changed path off to my right. As I was trying to gain a sight picture (she was less than 20 yards away at this point and closing) the umbrella fell over me like a guillotine, and I could see no more. I had to laugh at my stupidity, even while I was disappointed I wasn’t able to harvest the biggest deer of the day.
I never saw another deer. The WSSC sent through drivers, and I’m sure it helped other hunters, but no more came past me.
When the hunt was over at 1100 I climbed down from the tree, grabbed my shotgun and backpack, left the climber, and went to the place where he had been standing when I fired my shot. Blood! I wasn’t sure any would be there since it had rained for hours, and of course I still wasn’t 100% sure he had even been hit at all. I never did see any blood trail beyond where he had been shot, but I knew the direction he had run and so walked over to where I thought he had fallen. By that time my friend and mentor (Joern) had joined me and I quickly saw the back of the deer lying on the ground right where I had heard the crash.
I was prepared to start field dressing him having nothing more to go on than YouTube videos however Joern grabbed my knife and started cutting into the deer. He was kind enough to do it all the first time and let me just watch and assist when he needed a third hand. I knew it would be messy, but it wasn’t quite as gross as I thought it might be. Actually the smell was worse than anything else. Joern even dragged the deer out of the thickets and up to the road, where the WSSC employees were collecting deer and transporting them back to the parking area for us. Since he had two deer in a processing facility he needed to pick up, I just went with him where I dropped off my deer and he picked up his ready-to-go frozen meat. I cut off the antlers to save (such as they were – it was a young buck) and I headed back home to clean up.
It was fun. Besides my sincere thanks and appreciation first and foremost to Joern for showing me the ropes, and my gratitude to the Appleseed program and volunteers, I’d also like to thank the MDS family for all of your kind tips and suggestions. I’ve learned a lot from this thread and forum, and it made the hunt successful and enjoyable. I know this posting is a bit long, but I wanted to take the time to write it all down because in many ways many of you contributed to my success as well. Thanks again!
Well I got my first deer yesterday. Some things went well while for others there is a lot of room for improvement. Here’s the story:
My day started at 0330. Ugg. I’m not a morning person and if I see 0330 it’s usually coming in from the other side… Anyway I stumbled into the shower, being as quiet as possible so as not to wake up my family, then opened the front door to load my car. Mistake. I set off the burglar alarm that was on Instant, waking up my wife and daughter. Getting up that early in the morning does not lead to coherent thinking. Sigh.
Despite the day starting off on the wrong foot, I arrived at the WSSC Brighton Dam on the Triadelphia Reservoir for the rules & safety briefing, then off to my assigned area. I think there were about a half-dozen or so other hunters in Big Branch Areas 3-6 that showed up, and I was the last one to leave my car with my gear and head off into the woods. Being a newbie, it took me longer to get ready than most.
I knew which tree I wanted from a previous scouting trip and had marked it on my GPS unit, but on the way in I felt really bad, clanking along with my climber past other more experienced hunters already on their way up their respective trees. I felt just as I did a couple of hours earlier when I woke up my family. I hoped I wasn’t spooking the deer for them but my loaner (steel) climber is just noisy (and heavy). Worse, it being still dark, I was using one of those headlamp lights to see my way. I was amazed that some of the other hunters were already on their way up their trees completely in the dark. I don’t know how they did it, I couldn’t see a thing without my light, and I could only hope that I could get away deeper into the woods quickly without disturbing any deer in their closer areas.
Finally I got to the tree previously picked out while scouting, only to discover that it was a bit too wide for my climber. So I had to scramble to find a smaller tree in the general area, and hope it was alive and healthy – something hard to do in the dark.
It was breaking dawn as I got to my final height. Then I discovered my next problem – I was facing the reservoir and could only see about 50 yards ahead of me before a steep incline dropped off sharply to the water. Behind me – 150 yards of prime shooting area in all directions. Great, now what do I do? If I stay put I’ll certainly be facing the wrong way from most of the real estate, but if I spin the climber around I’ll make more noise, and cause more ruckus, all during dawn deer rush hour. Plus now I have my backpack and my gun up high with me in the stand, making the transition a bit more difficult and slower. Not being sure of the right course of action, I sat and pondered it for a while … thus sorta forcing the decision on me. I waited about an hour, maybe missed some deer behind me (who knows?), then when the sun was higher on the horizon I rotated the climber 180 degrees.
About 30 minutes later I heard two shots at a distance off to my left. Five minutes after that I saw two does running left to right. (Do deer “gallop”? Whatever the right word is they were running full speed.) As they passed in front of me I thought about taking a shot. At their closest approach they were no more than 50 yards out (as measured later by my GPS unit). However I’ve read about people rushing an unwise shot just to bag a deer and I didn’t want to do that so I let them pass. I watched my first ever chance to get a deer go running past me and away into deeper woods.
Still unsure if I made the right choice I settled back down to wait for a better chance. Then the rain came, it got colder, and I was wondering if I’d ever see another deer. My first time out (this was my second trip) I never saw even one deer all day, and suffered in the cold and rain that day as well. Having nothing better to do I got out my new deer caller and every 15 minutes or so let out a doe call or buck grunt.
About 45 minutes later, and about 30 seconds after my last call, I heard some movement off to the left. I was wearing one of the Howard Leight amplified earmuffs so I could actually hear better than if I had on no hearing protectors at all. Sure enough, a deer came (walking this time) along the exact same path as the previous pair. I waited until the deer was behind a tree to stow my caller, then slowly lowered my shotgun and clicked off the safety.
I was going to wait until the deer reached the point of closest proximity, but then the deer suddenly reversed path. Its nose was to the ground and it returned to the tree that I had used to block my movements. Again it reversed its path and continued back to the original course, only to turn around yet once more and return to that same tree. I had no idea why it was backtracking over the same territory now four times, but I decided while it was paused beside the tree that I couldn’t let this opportunity pass by.
Front sight focus, respiratory pause, squeeze the trigger – the shotgun roared to life for the first time outside of a range.
Did I hit the deer? I was trying to call the shot but I guess the blast from the shell and the recoil initially obscured my sight. The deer jumped straight up, pivoted 180 degrees, then bolted off to my right and away. I could hear him running through the woods and into deeper thickets where I lost sight of him. However about 3-5 seconds after my shot I heard a loud crash and the sound stopped. He had run 40 yards, lost consciousness, and fell over.
But at that point I still wasn’t completely sure I had hit him, since I couldn’t see where he fell, although I was pretty confident from my sight picture and from his subsequent behavior that my shot had found its mark. About three hours later when the hunt was over and I climbed down from my stand, we field dressed him and I saw my shot had gone straight through his heart – using open iron sights at 50 yards. Thanks Appleseed, for turning me into a Rifleman, and to the unbelievable volunteers who freely give up so many their weekends to pass along the lessons of freedom, liberty, and marksmanship that founded this great nation.
I did see one more deer that day. About two hours after I had first fired, a huge doe came running out of the thickets straight towards my tree. She was in a full run and was closing the distance quickly. I rapidly swung my barrel down but as I did so, it snagged the tree umbrella that I had set up over my head to help keep the rain off. I had not secured it to the tree with a strap, and it began to pivot down in front of me. It was like a train wreck that you know is going to happen but you’re powerless to stop. The deer saw the movement, we made eye contact, and she changed path off to my right. As I was trying to gain a sight picture (she was less than 20 yards away at this point and closing) the umbrella fell over me like a guillotine, and I could see no more. I had to laugh at my stupidity, even while I was disappointed I wasn’t able to harvest the biggest deer of the day.
I never saw another deer. The WSSC sent through drivers, and I’m sure it helped other hunters, but no more came past me.
When the hunt was over at 1100 I climbed down from the tree, grabbed my shotgun and backpack, left the climber, and went to the place where he had been standing when I fired my shot. Blood! I wasn’t sure any would be there since it had rained for hours, and of course I still wasn’t 100% sure he had even been hit at all. I never did see any blood trail beyond where he had been shot, but I knew the direction he had run and so walked over to where I thought he had fallen. By that time my friend and mentor (Joern) had joined me and I quickly saw the back of the deer lying on the ground right where I had heard the crash.
I was prepared to start field dressing him having nothing more to go on than YouTube videos however Joern grabbed my knife and started cutting into the deer. He was kind enough to do it all the first time and let me just watch and assist when he needed a third hand. I knew it would be messy, but it wasn’t quite as gross as I thought it might be. Actually the smell was worse than anything else. Joern even dragged the deer out of the thickets and up to the road, where the WSSC employees were collecting deer and transporting them back to the parking area for us. Since he had two deer in a processing facility he needed to pick up, I just went with him where I dropped off my deer and he picked up his ready-to-go frozen meat. I cut off the antlers to save (such as they were – it was a young buck) and I headed back home to clean up.
It was fun. Besides my sincere thanks and appreciation first and foremost to Joern for showing me the ropes, and my gratitude to the Appleseed program and volunteers, I’d also like to thank the MDS family for all of your kind tips and suggestions. I’ve learned a lot from this thread and forum, and it made the hunt successful and enjoyable. I know this posting is a bit long, but I wanted to take the time to write it all down because in many ways many of you contributed to my success as well. Thanks again!
Last edited:
MikeTF
Ultimate Member
You took a bite out of the raw heart meat ... right? It is a tradition on your first kill to do that!
