Good luck - less than ideal weather, but they should still be moving. Where you headed? And this may be one of the most important things to learn when hunting...stomach sagging and neck/face are the easiest ways to age a buck
My god daughter just took a pretty nice buck, but the rack looks a little weird to me. She's super proud, 8 points, but just looks off. Please opine.
For bucks yes You want to grow mature trophy bucks, they need to be at least 4.5 hrs old for that. Young bucks are easier to kill, if you shot every 2 yr old 6 pt it'd never grow to that trophy 10 point. If your first buck is a 3.5 yr old 8 pt then take it and be proud of it for sure but after that go for the older ones. I won't lie, I've shot a couple 3.5 yr old bucks that I really should have passed on. Does... some say shoot old nannies but to me it's not as important. I hardly ever shoot does so I let me friends shoot them and just tell them to shoot the biggest one out there.
Ive never seen anything like that. Might be worth looking into, could make for a good story. The spread is fantastic.
My guess is the 3.5 year old bucks you shot were probably 2.5 year old bucks. In good nutrition areas (anywhere with farmland) good 2.5 year old bucks are 100+ inches....which to most hunters is a trophy deer. That's also assuming good nutrition. I hunt 2 vastly different areas...farmland in pennsylvania and backwoods West Virginia. One has abundant farmland (and hunting pressure) and the other is the total opposite. Pennsylvania a good buck lives to 3.5 (pretty rare for where I'm at) and he's probably 140 inches or better. In WV that same buck 3.5 may only be 115 or 120. Just not enough nutrition down there for them to get big.
Gf gave me a savage axis 30-06 last night. Got it sighted in and shot it a decent amount both from a seated position resting it on something and standing up free firing it. Thing is loud as hell and has some kick to it but once you get used to it it isnt that bad.
RJF-GUMP not sure what your needs are but this is under 700. Refurb, but Leupold still guarantees it as long as you register it http://www.midwayusa.com/product/88...ocus-varmint-hunter-reticle-matte-refurbished
I stand by my statement. I had a vx3 on my rem 700 vtr before I lost it. I then put a vortex viper on my replacement gun. It is everyour bit of the scope the vx3 was.
Haven't had a chance to go back home and hunt in about 7 years, just spent the past 3 days hunting and managed to get 2 does and a small spike. Rut was starting to pick up pretty good, but didn't see any chasing yet. Back in NC where I only see about 10 deer a season... I did catch this guy on camera this season in NC, about 200m behind my house.
I just pulled the Tasco scope off of my childhood bb gun and mounted it on my deer rifle. are you telling me it is inadequate?
It's rough hunting, the tail end of my property is protected wetlands. The past 2 years, El Nino and Hurricane Matthew(?), really screwed deer movement up. I'm picking up a Kayak tonight and going to spend the last week moving up and down the property seeing if I can get lucky and catch this guy in the daytime. You can't walk 50m into it without needing hip waders which isn't the quietest way to go about it.
Long story short, let my brother borrow it to coyote hunt and he left it in our barn/hunting shack which then burned up in a fire that same weekend. Pretty shitry deal.
Last week, I tried canning a few honkers as an experiment. They turned out ok. They tasted similar to duck done in a crock pot. I still have a pile of honkers in the freezer, so next time I do that, I'm going to marinade them for a day in red wine, olive oil, and sea salt before I can them and it will turn out much better.
I happen to disagree to a point. First of all, if you're just looking to get into hunting, your first season shouldn't be spent worrying about whether a buck is mature enough to take or not. If you see a legal deer, take it. You need the experience. Secondly, I don't buy into all of the QDM propaganda. If you want to manage a herd on private property that way, that's your business, but don't impose bullshit regulations, like antler point restrictions, on public land. Public land and the animal resources that live on it belong to the people, not so some small special interest group. The health of a deer herd isn't measured by the number of monster bucks roaming the area, it's measured by a healthy, disease-free population with ample habitat and a good doe-to-buck ratio. Telling someone that they can't put meat in their freezer because it doesn't have an arbitrary number of points on a non-edible portion of its body is stupid. If you choose not to kill (or aren't legally allowed to kill) that 6 pointer in the name of QDM, something else probably will. Whether it gets hit by a car, chowed by coyotes, or succumbs to a harsh winter, it is probably going to die in the next few years anyway. Never pass on opening day, what you'd be happy with on the last day.
Sorry, I didn't quote that right. Duck is fine fine eating. Especially cooked in a dutch oven smothered in brown flour gravy...cest' bon
Teal are by far the best. Mergansers are by far the worst, or so I've been told. I'm not going to find out for myself.
Yes Sir it does, we don't limb rats by the droves here though like we did when we were kids. Not sure why...as we have the hardwoods to support them. Are they pretty plentiful where y'all are Sah ?