It's Hunting season

**0rion** · 11-13-2017, 06:11 AM

Congrats on your first deer Scott. Taking Zach out for youth gun this weekend. Trying to make it 3 years in a row for him. His start to hunting sucked so maybe he's going to be on a run for awhile. He hunted 3-4 years before he even saw one and those were some nasty years. We sat in rain, snow, and single digit temps those years.
I have to count my old tags but this one was either number 31 or 32 for me.

***SMWS6TA*** · 11-13-2017, 07:44 AM

Originally Posted by 0rion

Typed out the whole weeks story and lost it. Not retyping all that. We did well this year. All 3 we're killed in a 26 hour window. Mine is the smaller one on the left....7 point.

Damn I miss hunting deer up north. I've seen bigger dogs then most deer here.

My son wanted to go this year however the lease opening came up too late for him to schedule off or be able to pay for TX Non-Resident license ($300+). My VA rating dropped my license to $0. So that was a nice bonus otherwise it would have been the $300+ too.

So between now and next year it will give him time to save up for a rifle, the lease fee and license.

I'm planing on maybe going in Feb or spring to go hog hunting. I can't make it back to finish Deer season.

***SMWS6TA*** · 11-13-2017, 07:52 AM

Here's my Button Buck

My Dad got another Doe on Friday, plus 7 pigs on Saturday and now he got this 8 point Buck this morning. Now he's showing off.....

Stormy sure does love her Deer bone....

**hardtrailz** · 11-13-2017, 08:44 AM

I am blessed to have access to 255 acres of prime hunting ground in SE IN via my parents owning it. We have a couple old barns and a half redone old cabin to use as base camp for weekends during season. Our firearm season starts Sat and I got the last blind setup this weekend. I allow about 5 others to hunt it as well. Last year IN started to allow rifles, so i began using my Ruger American 308 with Bushnell Elite 4x16 scope. Harvested a few good eaters. We do all our own processing and take the deer from feild to freezer ourselves. Much nicer to know exactly what I feed my kids. After firearm I typically bust out the muzzleloader if the freezer is not full. I got myself a nice lil CVA w Konus scope last year for black friday and it does the job.

Few pics cause that makes everything better

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**hardtrailz** · 11-13-2017, 08:46 AM

Few more pics

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**Zinergy** · 11-13-2017, 08:47 AM

I shot a 7 pointer(8 with one broke off) Sunday morning. Wasn't one of the big guys I was looking for but I figured since it was my last hunt before gun deer I would shoot him. Friday was 7 degrees with the wind in the morning but my heart rate kept me warm with all the bucks running around me. I called in 2 little bucks and a third came in while I was rattling. Then another tall fork at about 8:30. I didn't shoot them since I knew I had all weekend to hunt. Only saw 1 on Saturday. Then Sunday morning, got to the stand at 5:40 waiting for some light. At 6:35 I grunted a few times and not 5 minutes later the 7 pointer came jogging across a recently cut bean field straight at me. Circled around to the left(downwind even though the wind was 1mph maybe) where I had my sight waiting and when he walked into my sight I shot. He made it about 15 yards... not even to the edge of the field.

Congrats Tim on your 30thsomething deer lol. This one would be my 10th.

***SMWS6TA*** · 11-13-2017, 08:56 AM

Speaking of temps. My hunt started in the upper 80's for 3 days and the last 2 days was in the mid 60's. I'm amazed I saw anything besides squirrels (they are some noisy bastards).

**hardtrailz** · 11-13-2017, 09:18 AM

We had been real warm until this past week or so and now its 30ish at night and 40-5os in day so it should be good temps. I hope for a little colder overall for letting the deer hang in barn, but can always pck with ice if needed.

**0rion** · 11-13-2017, 09:38 AM

Part of that long story I had typed was a deer that came by last Saturday. I was doing all day sits last week and about 1:30 a monster came by. I'm not great at guessing scores but this one was easy 180+. Tons of mass and just a ton of bone on his head. Broadside at about 35 yards I let an arrow fly. Right before impact it made a hard right turn and hit him in the rear quarter. I clipped a little twig. I gave him a few hours and then started looking at the trail. I knew immediately I was in deep shit. Found the arrow and it had only penetrated about 4" which I'm assuming is how deep the femur was. The end of the shwacker was bent which I wasn't impressed with. I trailed him for about a mile getting a few little drops here and there. He then turned up the face of this really steep ridge and went to the top. Another sign of being in deep shit. At the top of that ridge I was getting blood about every 40 yards and it would be 1 or 2 drops. I eventually lost the trail completely. I guess the good news is he most likely survived the shot. He wasn't going to water and he was heading uphill which are both signs of a deer that's not fatally wounded. Maybe he'll make it through the rest of the season and winter and I'll meet up with him again next season.

Zinergy.....we talked last year a lot about broadheads. I was high on the shwackers until this deer. I know a leg shot sucks but I didn't like what that bone did to the long shaft on that shwacker. That evening when I got back to camp I put muzzy's back on and sighted the bow back in. I'm just going to stick with muzzy. I know that's old school stubborn way of thinking but I have a ton of deer I've shot with those and seen how they do with bone. No way that muzzy shaft would've bent like that. It would have either broke that bone or slid off the side of it and kept going. I shot a deer directly through the spine a few years ago with one. The deer rolled over and bent the insert but had it of not done that I'm pretty sure I could've changed blades and reused that broadhead not to mention it penetrated all the way through the vertebrae and the blades didn't even break....they twisted as they went through. I just have a ton of faith in them and no reason to change. Shouldn't have done it this year but those expandables do fly a ton better out of the bow and that's what mainly had me wanting to switch.

**Zinergy** · 11-13-2017, 10:43 AM

Sorry to hear about the swhackers. I did see one bent but it doesn't count as my buddy shot over a deer's back and hit a metal walled building. It didn't penetrate the steel building to the side blades. So about an inch and a half. The 7 pointer I shot yesterday was shot with rage hypodermics. I hit some bone as well as it didn't go through and the side blades broke off but the tip was still intact. I'll try to post up some pics, what do you guys use now that photobucket is gone?

**0rion** · 11-13-2017, 07:56 PM

Imgur is what I currently use.

Years ago when I first started hunting I used satellite broadheads. I killed several deer with those....lost a few too but to be fair I was shooting a bow that *maybe* broke 180 fps. Those satellite blades would always break and it annoyed the hell out of me. Nothing like butchering a deer constantly on the lookout for a couple razor blades in the meat. My buddy shot muzzy and would show up with deer that had holes through both shoulders and broadheads that looked like you could use again. I also did a small stint with nuge 2 blade broadheads which I actually wanted to kill a deer with but never did. Magnus made those and they looked cool but I had several of them cross thread and ruin some inserts so I abandoned them. I worked on my bows tune tonight for a bit. I think I can get these muzzy to fly pretty decent but the tune will have to be top notch
My centershot was out a bit so I tweaked that. Still have a couple big issues to fix....the biggest being my inner fletching being dangerously close to the cable. Seems that's a common bowtech issue. I'm going this week to find different cable slides to try and pull that cable in a tad. I can twist the knock and just barely get it to clear but then my cock fletching is really close to the rest
Last ditch option is to put a drop away and run my cock fletching pointing out.

**0rion** · 11-13-2017, 08:03 PM

Got this one last weekend in the back yard. Going to do some yard hunting soon haha. If I can get him on the corn pile regularly after rut I'll let Zach stick an arrow in him.

**0rion** · 11-13-2017, 08:14 PM

I will add this too. My daughter is 11 and not ready to hunt yet....she says the gun is too loud but she's a deer butchering machine. She helps me on all of them and she cuts my time in half. We can knock one out in 2 hours start to finish and cleaned up. I work the knife and she does the grinding, vacuum sealing, and labeling. I usually finish cutting before she's done so I'll help on her end when I'm done. We have a whole system. I wanted her to at least sit with me this year but she has indoor soccer on the weekends and I already have Zach with me on opening day. I'm gonna figure out a way to get her out with me at some point though.

**pajeff02** · 11-14-2017, 02:55 AM

Look like some nice deer. BTW, did you hijack your kids' swing set for hunting season?

**hardtrailz** · 11-14-2017, 04:14 AM

I took my 4 yr old boy out to setup the "tent" aka blind and he is saying he will be quiet and sit with me if I let him wear his muffs. Should be a good experience for both of us.

**0rion** · 11-14-2017, 07:40 AM

Originally Posted by pajeff02

Look like some nice deer. BTW, did you hijack your kids' swing set for hunting season?

you talking about that hanger? I built that piece of shit. No way I'd let my kids swing on it.

My carpentry skills suck. I gotta get someone that knows what they're doing to fix that thing. It held 3 deer so it did it's job but there's more wrong with it than right. I'm just not good at that stuff.

***SMWS6TA*** · 11-14-2017, 08:23 AM

Have Jon design you one...lol. it looks alright in the pic. Hell holding 3 deer is quite a bit of weight.

You should see what my Dad made for their station. He re-purpose/recycled a 14ft trampoline that I was getting rid of. Made a new hog trap and a Quonset Hut style with 2 1000lb chain hoists. Comes in handy when you have a few hogs or a couple of deer to clean at the same time.

***SMWS6TA*** · 11-14-2017, 09:38 AM

Here's what he's made.

Here's one from the front but not the final product.
There are 3 refrigerators placed on their backs to hold corn and other items, there's a hard plastic tile in the center for easy clean up and not standing in blood and mud, and we closed in the front side across the top to help keep rain out.

**0rion** · 11-14-2017, 02:28 PM

That's pretty cool

**pajeff02** · 11-14-2017, 04:51 PM

Stepson plowed a buck tonight with his new Ram 3500. Folded the lower portion of the front bumper under the truck and took out the radiator. That is one cheap ass bumper. I towed him to our house with the Suburban and they'll come get it tomorrow with a rollback for a ride to the body shop.