Hey Treefarmer, glad your hip replacement went well. I'm praying for a speedy full recovery.
I went up your way Dec 6-7th for the muzzle loader antlerless deer hunt in D-2. We only took home one doe. She was about average. That full moon did us no favors I think. They were hitting the corn hard but not when we could shoot them. The good thing is, my buddy Art, the crazy Russian bought a new Barnett crossbow so he could get an extra day in as we drove up on Thursday. He's the only one that got a deer and that was with his new bow. He was pretty happy.
A quick Christmas Eve food plot update:
We got 4.4 inches of rain since Sunday. Clouds and fairly warm weather does a food plot good. The rain appears to have caused the Rye to look mighty healthy, but today is the 1st time I've been in the woods since my hip replacement. The does are still coming, one of the yearlings has figured out where the corn comes from. Several pictures of it lickin' the spinner plate on the feeder. Doe days this coming Sat and Sun, I'll probably not be up to it yet.
Y'all have a great Christmas and somebody needs to kill a sure enough big boy!
Treefarmer
How it going up there? How the PT coming along?
Sam, the PT almost reminds me of PT at Parris Island 50 years ago! I guess "no pain-no gain" applies in most facets of life. The physical therapist doesn't spit, scream and jump up and down like a DI, but they still make you hurt. When it gets easy they simply crank it up a notch. Things are gettin' easier.
Sure miss bein' in the woods but I haven't missed anything according to my huntin' buddies around here. No decent antlers anywhere yet. From the looks of the deer pictures this week, the does are not really gettin' ready. One old doe has some darker tarsals but the others look like they are in the middle of summer.
To get to the woods, I have to back into the cart and kinda' ease back in the seat, but once I'm seated and start drivin', all I got to do is go real easy over the rough spots. Naturally I took my rifle this mornin' when I went to check the feeder and the camera. Miss Joy asked, "What you gonna' do if you kill one?" I told her I could find some help. The dog went nuts windin' when we got into the food plot, the pictures show the deer had been at the feeder about 30 minutes earlier. There was a different spike that would be legal for a youngster to shoot. He came in on Christmas night. The Rye looks good and the left over clover is jumpin' up between the dead dog fennels. The woods are a little wetter than they have been, looked about right this morning. We've had another couple of inches of rain and it makes things look great. Maybe things will get better once I'm able to climb the ladder again.
Here's a few pictures for this week.
Let me wish y'all a very Happy and Blessed New Year!
Treefarmer
Yeah Farmer, you've got a lot of therapy in front of you because there is a lot of steps leading up to that box blind stand. You'll have to look at it like this, you'll probally sped more time in the stand because you'll probally not want to climb down as soon after making it up there.
:saluting
