How Many Points!?!?!

If you remember back a couple weeks ago when I posted a TCT that lead with a picture of a non-typical buck taken on a property next to Foggy Mountain, you're in for a treat. If not then you can look to the right a see the same picture that lead that post. Now you many be sitting there wondering why you are in for a treat.. It's not because it's almost rifle season in WV. It is not because The Will to Hunt finally posted on how I can save money on outdoor gear, however,  this will allow me to keep breathing once Cassie sees my next purchase, haha. Is it because we finally have a better idea of many points the buck (pictured right) has, were getting warmer. Is it because we finally have some quality pictures of it, you're starting to burn up. Who know this would turn into a game of Hotter/Colder? Not I... (Side note, Cassie says I am a dork.)

 Any ways on to the point of this, this buck that we have been chasing has 15 score-able points, or should I said had. That's right, he was harvested this past weekend. Yet again I didn't have any part in the harvesting of a buck on Foggy Mountain, but James (the one who originally had the Trail Cam pictures) took him on this past Saturday evening. Sorry for the quality of the first picture, it was taken with a cell phone, but the second pictures makes up for it and gives a better prospective of a head on shot. I think this just proves, even though WV is only known for having average deer hunting, we can still a few quality bucks hidden up our sleeves.

Look at the mass!!!

Talk about a freak!!!

Random Ramblings: Halloween Edition

It's been a long while since I've done a Random Ramblings. What better time to start doing one again that Halloween! Like I said in the Bear of an Adventure post, I have been slacking but I am going to try get start getting back into the swing of posting more regularly. I'm going to lay out a few things in this following post for everyone to looks forward to or not. This will be our own little form of Trick-or-Treat, if there is something that you see that you want to see sooner, let me know and you just might get your treat posted first, or I might have to trick you into holding out to the last one. That is the beauty of this day...

• Gear Reviews: I have a bunch of them still in the works. If you have been following along you know I have the been testing Seemz Scent Elimination System products and a Moultrie M-80 trail camera. The Seemz product testing is still going on, but the Moultrie M-80 is finally coming to an end so look forward to that in the near future! Not only that but I also have the Leatherman Kick finished review coming up soon also. A few other goodies I've collected along the way also, but for those you'll have to wait and find out.

• Recipes: A long, long time ago I promised my recipe for Black Berry jam, I haven't forgotten. I also have a quick 60 Second Venison Marinade that is always good to add a kick to your deer steaks or any steaks for that matter. 

•  Don't forget we still have a contest going on! You can still enter to win a Boone & Crockett Club Membership until Nov. 6, 2011 at 11:59 PM.

• A big thank you needs to go out to Paul, The Healthy Outdoorsman, for including me in his Top 11 Outdoor Blogs. 

• This is a little bit of old news, but I'll share it anyways. A week ago, the day after we went on a Bear of an Adventure, one of the guys who went with us, James, shot this great looking 8-point on the property next to Foggy Mountain. 

• Good luck and be safe out there hunting while the rut is getting ready to kick into high gear!

A Bear of an Adventure

Between hunting, school and projects I've neglected my blog, but I'm going to get everyone caught back up here on last weekend on Foggy Mountain. As I had mention in this week's TCT post, if you follow me on Twitter you have an idea how I spent last weekend. After a slow start to the day Jay and I decided to do an evening hunt in the same location. Everything was going good, a crisp cool evening and I could hear the deer moving all around me, but as the evening was drawing to an end I figured it would be another uneventful evening. As always I had my cell phone on silent, but for some reason I took it out to see that Jay was calling me as the last little bit of the sun was slipping behind the mountain. I answered it, his first words were a very shaky, drawn out "I shot," then he repeated with more vigor in his voice "I just shot a bear." Here's what transpired.

As you can see the shot looked a little low, after we watched it back a the vehicles we decided to leave it over night and pick up the trail and track it the next day. This was a long night for Jay, at least from what he said.


The next morning a small group of us (Jay, Skippie, James, and myself) assembled to try and find the bear. It started out promising. We found the blood trail immediately and within 50 to 60 yards we found Jay's broken arrow (see right) with a lot of blood and some meat still sticking to it.


After only finding a third of the arrow and the great coloration in the blood we thought the would be an easy tracking job. Well we were right about the track job. It was easy for a while, the Rage 2-Blade that Jay uses sure gave use a nice, red trail to walk stumble down a hillside for the first 500 yards. The next 300 yards were a little more difficult, we started having to actually look but still wasn't to hard. After that it wasn't the best, more of a guess and check for blood for the next 200 yards or so and after that we didn't get to see much of anything. Everyone hates to wound an animal and Jay was no different, but after looking for 3+ hours and completely losing the blood trail in a thicket there wasn't much more we could do.

L to R: Jay, Skippie, and James heading down the hillside looking for the bear. 

My First Bow Kill: Filling the Freezer

If you follow along with this blog, you know I love to bow hunt. This has been a newly formed passion. I use the term "newly" loosely because this is my third season of bow hunting. Three long years, in reality this is just a short time period, but this past Saturday was a first for me. It was this first time I was able to harvest a deer with my bow! I was close to taking one my first year, I had a 6-point at 26 yards but buck fever got the best of me. I nicked the deer and tracked it for roughly a mile but never found it. I found out that later that it was a non-mortal injury as this buck was shot on another property later that month. As you can imagine with those thoughts racing through my head as I released this arrow, it was  a BIG relief to see this deer drop in sight.

This past Saturday started the same as opening morning, minus the fisher. The night sky was clear as could be but soon there after sunrise the fog started the settle in. The first movement I heard was around 7:00 AM, it wasn't much to get concerned with considering it was just a few squirrels. It wasn't much longer though until I heard something walking up the hillside behind me. This deer walked in the same exact path as the doe and fawn did the previous weekend. This time it was a lone doe, which meant fair game. As many have talked about before, I see anything I take with my bow as a trophy. Not to mention any chance I get to fill the freezer back up this early I am going to take it. 

The lone doe skirted around my stand, which would lead her to enter directly on my right hand side. As soon as I saw this I grabbed my bow and connected my release. Momentarily before she entered my food plot I drew back, but  she made a detour behind a tree. As she stood there for a few moments I let my draw down, this was the worst thing I could have done. Not because it spooked her but because this allowed me to start thinking. Luckily, this didn't matter before I could let anything throw me off too much she stepped out for a perfect quartering away shot and within seconds I had my pin on her and let the arrow fly. It looked like a good shot, she did the mule kick and then had her head to the ground as she tried to run off. That was a great feeling, but I still wasn't sure for a moment. It didn't take long to know that it was not going to be a long tracking job. She  started thrashing around and then went into a death roll within 15 to 20 yards from where she was shot. Before I could even think or have any real emotion, I heard my phone vibrating with a congratulatory text from Jay. It wasn't  hard to take this one, but all I could think of  is that I had my first deer with a bow and the freezer was back on its way to being full again. 

Below is picture of the tree by which I found my arrow (from a pass through shot) and the next one is the tree in the foreground with the deer in the background.

And now for the hero shot.. 

The before and after..

Trail Cam Tuesday - October 11, 2011

I bet everyone thought I forgot this week. I didn't forget, I've been swamped with midterms. Midterms started last Thursday and ended today. Between the excitement of this weekend, studying and misplacing the SD cards with my current pictures on it.. Instead I will give everyone a teaser of what post is coming tomorrow; you might have a clue if you follow me on Twitter.

First Buck of the 2011 Archery Season

As much as I'd love to be posting this about myself, I am not. Yesterday evening Jay hooked up with this great looking 8-point. If you remember I had a few different TCT posts from another location Jay hunts, that is where this buck was taken. Congratulations goes out to Jay on a great beginning to a long season!

Trail Cam Tuesday - October 4, 2011

This is going to be a non-traditional TCT. If you didn't read on Sunday, bow season has started here in WV and I spent the majority of Saturday in the woods. I do have a few good trail cam pictures to show you, but they'll have to wait, I tried my hand this weekend at videoing some of the deer that came in. I was planning on taking my Nikon D3100 with me not only because it takes great pictures, but because it shoots video in HD (1080). But as you read before it rained and rained and then rained some more, so I had to leave the DSLR at home and went with the old point and shoot. It's a good little camera itself but only shoots in SD so the video quality isn't the best, but I think it did good for my first try.

Bow Season 2011: A Soggy Opening Day

For anyone that hunts, you know one of the most exciting days is opening morning. Yesterday morning started bow season here in West Virginia. All the excitement, anticipation, traditions, and hopes. The only part that we weren't looking forward to was the forecast, well only half of it. There was a cold front moving through that would be putting the lows into the upper 30s. With the cold front moved in some rain and possibility of snow was also in the forecast. I'd prefer snow, but it's so wet out now the snow won't matter much.

This past week was a blur with the anticipation of this weekend, many calls were placed between Jay and I making sure all our plans were set. Not to mention a few runs to the store to pick up those last minute items. After everything was double and triple checked, all we needed to do was sleep. The anticipation made it hard to sleep, we just wanted to sit in our tree stands.

Jay and I are always eager to get to our tree-stands, this year was no different. The only thing that was different this year was the fact that we decided to take the ATV instead of our usual vehicle. This didn't matter much in the morning as there wasn't much in the rain department, but it was a little chillier for sure. This gave us the chance to be a more quite getting into our stands, and boy was that a mistake.

 As we both turned down the trail that leads to my tree-stand, we noticed a few sets of eyes around and under my stand, normally this wouldn't have meant much, but one set of eyes didn't match. They had a greenish tint, a little lower to the ground, and the width/distance between the eyes were a lot larger than the rest. At this point we looked at each other and knew it wasn't a deer, but continued to slowly walk towards my tree-stand in the pitch dark at 5:45 AM. We made it to my stand and and continued to discuss what it was. As  it left it made a good bit of noise and took off in the opposite direction of the deer.

After a moment of discussion and deciding that Jay shouldn't walk the same way as the animal, what we would later agree on being a bear, we were trying to listen to see where it went to.
Now this is the interesting part, as everything started to calm down we heard it, we both looked at each other and headed for my tree-stand to try and see what made the noise. The noise, it was a horrific, blood curdling scream that sounded like a young child being beaten. Quickly running through my mind was what it could be, it wasn't a coyote, bear, bobcat or fox, at this point we were clueless as to what it was.  Now, we might have over reacted, but at the time we had no clue what to think or what it was. After whatever it was left, we decided to head back towards the ATV for a little while to let it leave the area, not to mention everything that ran off ran towards Jay's stand, so we decided to be cautious and give it a few.

We took a short break and decided to head back into our stands, this paid of immediately as I already had a deer at mine, and Jay had some come in shortly there after. The first deer I had come in was a small 5-point, but he'd wouldn't leave the thick cover. A little over an hour later, I had a doe and fawn come in, these two stayed there for what seems like forever, but even with a 11-yard broadside shot I couldn't bring myself to shot a doe at 8:30 AM opening morning. It slowed down greatly after that, I had a group of three does bed down roughly 150 yards away from in the some laurel and not until we started to walk out at noon did I see any more deer. It was a small, barely there 3-point and then a spike. By noon the rain had picked up to a heavy drizzle, Jay decided to head back to Bruceton to hunt the afternoon with his dad and it was time for a hot drink and some dry clothes.

The rain only continued once I got home and the temperature continue to drop. This was a hard decision to make, it was opening day but was terrible conditions to bow hunt in. At this point I knew what I needed to do, but decided to take to twitter for some opinions. After a short discussion with Tommy at Following Ghost and @firstlightgearI knew I was making the right choice and not going back out to hunt. Even after that I went against my better judgement and headed back out, although I did take my bow, my main weapon was going to be my camera, but I didn't even need that. Yet again the only two deer I saw that afternoon were on the way out, another set of bucks, but this time it was a 4-point and a spike. Despite it being soggy and not seeing a decent buck it was still a great day, I was able to sit in my tree-stand, what else could I ask for.

Oh and for that noise, after some research and asking a few more seasoned outdoors man than myself we came to the conclusion that this unholy noise was a Fisher. Yes, a fisher, I had no clue those little vicious animals could make such an awful noise. Now to leave you with a little view of what I spent most of my day looking at.

Panoramic view from my tree-stand. Click on picture to enlarge it.