Yesterday's Weapons Forums

Dog breath was all whining around about 6:30. When I'm home, I always go for an early hike, and the mutt enjoys it, too.

So we loaded up & off-a to the public hunting place where we hike. I knew centerfire deer season started yesterday, so I stopped at a trail bare of trees in all directions that we not be mistaken for deer. ( I get that a lot! ).

It leads to a small public shooting range that's little known. We messed around there for a bit & I scored a full box of new 7mm Mouser brass where someone had sighted in. Other than that it was mostly steel Wolf ammo cases. Out in the tall grass, I picked up a dozen or so intact clay pigeons for targets later.

We're beating it back to the truck & at least 6 pickups rolled by. This is not a large hunting area & I've never seen more than 3 deer in one place over the years.

Just for the fun of it, I drove clear to the end of the road ( about 3 miles) and all those hunters had ground assaulted the smallest portion of the public area. Saw one old-timer in a sturdy chair & it looked like a couple guys were going to try & drive some deer by him... if any were around.

Saw 4 more pickups on the way out. Most of these had staked out different hillsides hoping for deer to try & sneek by in the bottoms.

One mile after that... right in the middle of the road... were 2 nice does. I stopped & yelled at them & mutt lips was all whining around to get out & show them the short way through the buttes. Not to be. I don't let her chase deer anytime & not when they were having such a rotten day in any case. Either one would have been a good freezer stuffer.

I could have plugged one of them with a 357. Ah, but you only get shots like that when you don't have a license or shooter. I laughed!

Then! I hit the hiway & was heading for town when I saw a flurry of activity down a small creek. A bobcat must have jumped a gaggle of turks as several flew up into some huge cottonwoods. Got a brief glance of the cat. I was moving & so was the cat, so a glimpse was all I got. Couldn't tell if it got a lurkey.

It's been many years since I've had a centerfire deer license. It just gets too crazy - too many people for the limited places to hunt. My closest friend - now deceased - had a ranch where I hunted for several years, but it's pretty much public hunting now. I have some private property I could hunt, but folks heavily hunt the adjoining property & I'm leery of flying lead.

The best place would be the 6500 acre public hunting area, but you whack a deer in there, it's quite a hike back to the parking lot. So hardly anyone goes in there for deer.

There's another public hunting place where the Omaha & Denver hunters drive all the way out & saddle up their "ornamental horses" to try & find deer. I've never noticed a lot of kills for that bunch.

Came back to town & bought a Sunday paper @ the C-store. The mutt was all happy when we got home & I was feeling pretty good myself - it had been cheep entertainment! SW

I used to go to public hunting here in Ohio but when it gets daylight you look around and it looks like you are in the middle of a pumpkin patch. I now go out to my wife's cousin's farm, 80 acres and decent size for here. Bow season is in now and I saw 5 does and one small buck chasing one of the does this afternoon. One did finally get to about 50yds form me but didn't stand still long enough for me to get a shot at her.

Then again I also have 80 acres in the black hill of Wyoming and don't have much hunting going on around there. Out there I just sit and wait on them.

Rad

Cool.

Love to sit back and watch "The Game" as we call it, when others are hunting and your not.....