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Booshway |
Went to a place I have to hunt to put up a ladder stand in a different location for November...(one just like Daniel used)...got it up OK...but for some reason it seemed easier a few years ago...LOL Anyhow, on the edge of an Oak flat and I bet I didn't see 100 acorns. Flintlock Rifles & Smoothbores Hunt Like The Settlers | ||
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Booshway |
I haven't seen a lot of acorns over here on the Tenasi side of the mountains, either. I also think the hillsides are getting steeper, and what was once an easy walk now sometimes seems to be a major expedition. Big game is widely scattered here throughout the Cherokee National Forest and it can be quite a chore to find it. But, I chose to leave the snowwhite north where I think the hunting was much better, and came here because the milder winters are easier on my old bones. Late last year I found a gap in a ridge that has a well used game trail passing through it, and there were numerous buck rubs in the area. The problem for me is getting to it. Going in the easy way, it is about a 3 mile hike up an old logging road. The short way is still about 1 mile, but it is without a trail, through thick brush, and up the steep mountainside. Of course, if I get something back in there, I'll have the problem of getting it out. Deer and hogs I can cut in half or quarters, and pack out piece by piece, but TN requires that I bring in a bear to the inspection station with the reproductive organs still in place. There is no way that I can get a whole bear or even half a bear out of there by myself. (I hunt alone because my old partners have either died off, now live far away, or have given up hunting.) The first segment of the TN bear season opens this Saturday. The first segment of the TN firearms deer season (muzzleloader) opens on the 28th. I plan to be up in that gap, or in the area around it. Know what you believe in. Fight for your beliefs. Never compromise away your rights. | |||
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Pilgrim |
Less acorns might not be a bad thing, maybe the deer will have to move more to find enough to eat. But then again I ain't exactly got my own hunting show. So what do I know. One thing I do know is these dang ridges do get steeper ever year. There's one place me and my father used to hunt, we spent a lot of hours there and took several deer. I still go back when I can if nothing else just for the memories. | |||
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Booshway |
The ground is covered with acorns I have several white oaks that are raining acorns so much food on the ground I have no idea where to set up. As for stands I need to get a helper when placing them I have been using ground blinds more lately. The best thing about owning a dog is that someone is happy when you get home. | |||
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Booshway |
Acorn crops seem to vary year to year...last year ours was a "bumper crop"...ground was carpeted with them...this is an off year where I hunt. When I hit 60, I stopped using those little Loc-Ons I used to use for bow hunting and switched to natural ground blinds to minimize chances for accidents...and found I was much warmer, and far more comfortable. This one ladder stand is in a place where I learned that the wind is so fickle hour by hour that a ground blind there didn't work well all the time, so I got this one ladder stand...yes, it's some work to put it up but its roomy, solid, safe, and also pretty comfortable...but I can see the day coming in another year or so where I may not want to go through all this and just take my chances with a ground blind there. I'm experimenting with an 'Ameristep Doghouse' pop-up blind in one place this fall...they may be the next step in getting out of the trees all together...with the added benefit of being able to hunt some days where I'd otherwise be rained out. Heck...might even switch to squirrel hunting by then anyway...October / November is a great time in the fall woods to squirrel hunt but I don't because I don't want to start tromping around the very same woods I want to deer hunt in November. Flintlock Rifles & Smoothbores Hunt Like The Settlers | |||
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Free Trapper |
Acorns are moderate this year, but the shagbarks have a bumper crop. Apples and choke cherries abound. I am of the opinion that if God had intended me to hunt from trees, he would have made me a squirrel. Never hunted from a stand always having been a tracker, and find now at 62, I'm slowing down and seeing more that I missed in the past. This method has been good to me, and the North Country, with it's large tracts of wild bush lends itself to this method. Gary " You do with your scalp as you wish and don't be telling us what to with ours." | |||
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Booshway |
'Tracking' in northern states when there's snow on the ground is child's play...come try your hand at that in southern states through the leaves of autumn, LOL. And even if you're able to do that, but only have a 5 acre woodlot surrounded by other people's posted property, you won't track but a few hundred yards then have to stop. Different conditions around the country dictate different styles of hunting...god and squirrels have nothing to do with it. Flintlock Rifles & Smoothbores Hunt Like The Settlers | |||
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Booshway |
That's true. | |||
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Booshway |
When I hunted in NC/VA/GA.I was always looking for snakes,chiggers,ticks and wading in the swamp mud in Ga kept me busy.Wild hogs were always fun to scare up,who was scared always left me wondering.The snow we get up here will limit your wandering,walking around on snowshoes in 3 feet of snow will wear you down, especially now that I have passed the 66 summers of my life. ha ha Hunting is good no matter how you do it,with dogs in the South or Still hunting or setting up and waiting, it's all good. We had a fair mast crop this year beech/acorns and lots of berries,apples.Forester told me acorns come good everyother year.Leaves are turning already and the temperature is dropping,smell it in the wind,Old Man Winter is coming to a town near you.Had my trail camera out for three weeks,,nothing,absolutely zero,three different locations.Moose on the front lawn, turkeys everywhere but no deer or Squirrels.Bird hunting is open but the Coyotes cleaned them out,them and a very wet spring/summer. Oh well ,Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass,but learning to dance in the rain.See you up the trail. PS: The first lier in deer camp never wins!!!!! ha ha ha | |||
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Booshway |
I tried hunting out of a ladder stand a few years. Seems like I saw more deer hunting on the ground. Didn't say I shot anymore ,just saw more.Been itching to take the hound to the woods but its stayed pretty warm and I don't want the dog getting snake bit. There are quite a few rattlers on the ridge. Squirrels come in here in about two weeks. Then trapping starts and that cuts down the time I have to hunt. Tye ridges are getting a little steeper.Mostly what I think about is if I get a deer way back here its a long way out. Didn't used to think about it much. Everyone enjoy the fall woods and be safe. I never have been much for drinking the kool-aid.It's not in my nature. | |||
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Booshway |
I thought that was just some weird geological thing in Idaho. | |||
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Factor |
Acorns aren't too thick here in Maryland, but the hickory nuts are a good crop this year, and more squirrels in the trees too. I haven't noticed that much of a terrain change, but my hunting trousers shrunk up in the closet during the summer. This is a regular problem for me, and I think that perhaps the cloth is being designed that way to make me purchase more clothing or fabric to fashion more clothing, each fall. LD It's not what you know, it's what you can prove | |||
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Factor |
This shrinkage of clothing in general is documented. I tested it by trying on a pair of dress pants, a pair of jeans and my camo hunting trousers (this was 3 years ago) and simply hung them up. I wore them at least once each year and the last year I could barely get them fastened! The mirror tells me my athletic physique hasn't changed and the scales only show an added 20 pounds of muscle mass. I just can't see how the waists can shrink that much by simply hanging in the closet! Wonder how many of us have noticed this bizarre occurrence. *Young guys should hang out with old guys; old guys know stuff.* | |||
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Booshway |
The shrinkage is a design feature, It's a well orchestrated plot by clothing manufacturers to sell more stuff. | |||
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Hivernant |
what do you think heaven will be like? tree stands should be easier to get up plenty of time for sleep in the grave | |||
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Booshway |
Scoundrel ya got me. Heaven I hope is sunny ridges with tall oaks and beech to sit under. Dark hollows with tall hemlocks and laurel and clear running streams. I never have been much for drinking the kool-aid.It's not in my nature. | |||
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Booshway |
That sounds just like East Tennessee. Know what you believe in. Fight for your beliefs. Never compromise away your rights. | |||
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Pilgrim |
Doesn't matter what the acorn mast is like. I gave up deer hunting, tree stands and being cold and wet for hunting spiders. I don't hit many but there are plenty to be hit at the chunk gun and table shoots that I go to now! | |||
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Booshway |
About 10 year ago I discovered that my hunting gear shrank to a considerable amount. I tried and tried to lose weight hoping I could get into the clothes but finally gave up and purchased larger gear. Then I donated all my small(old) hunting clothes too our gun club to raffle off. Two years ago, the doctor told me to lower my sugar intake. It wasn't real high, but we didn't want it to get higher. I stopped using sugar in the copious amounts of coffee I drink, plus eating less and working all night shifts. Before I knew it, I lost 15 lbs and now all my hunting gear hangs on me and I have to cinch up my belt extra tight to keep my pants on. Load fast and aim slow. | |||
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Booshway |
I do a little chunkgun shooting also, but I'm a hunter first, last, and always. Even though my eyesight is failing, my back aches, and I'm getting creaky in the knees; when I can no longer get out to hunt, that will be the day I die. Some days I don't feel like climbing over mountains, and so I just sit in the woods a few hundred yards from my home. I sit there listening to the drone of highway traffic and start feeling sorry for myself because I'm an old man reduced to sitting in a woodlot surrounded by "civilization". I hate that! I imagine that old Jim Bridger might have had similar thoughts when he was blind but he would sit all day in the woodlot behind his daughter's home until she would come and fetch him at the end of the day. That was all that he could do. So, I go back to crawling up the mountain sides again, away from the sights and sounds of other men. One of these days the exertion will probably kill me, but I can't think of a better way to go. Know what you believe in. Fight for your beliefs. Never compromise away your rights. | |||
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