Thursday, October 6, 2011

Daily Deercam

Two coons crunching corn.

One little nubbin buck early this morning. I poured out some Acorn Rage at this cam, so we will see some Whitetail temper tantrums.

It feels ritualistic- the annual buying of the hunting license. I don't fish or shoot birds so it's the basic Whitetail tags for me. Twenty five bucks. No little plastic covers for the second year. They want to IMPRESS upon us how broke they are at the state, I guess. There are more deer than ever in Texas right now. They could easily be relisted as non-game animals. Never happen of course. Too many state ricebowls would be threatened. The biologist at Clarksville is insistent that we reduce the herd as quick as possible because of the drought. I think the state boys have heard the long-term forcast.

So I'm down the trial with some Walmart deercorn, (The cheapest. Gotta shop for price because of the ethanol corn spike.) Some screw in climbing rungs and a coffee cup full of Acorn Rage. Acorn Rage is supposed to make the big bucks rage. At acorns, I guess. I think it IS ground up acorns and sugar.

Two armadillos on the trail, one missing about 1/3 of his tail. Hungry Coyote. I actually spooked a coyote who loped off with his ears turned backwards to listen for pursuit. He didn't think I saw him, but I did.

One little scrape starting under a now-dead branch over in the edge of a pasture. It's going to take a rain and a cold front to get them going in the rut. Usually the rain resets all the tracks every couple of weeks but when you go months between storms you just get trails full of powder and dust. No sign to be read. This is a very serious drought. They say Friday, maybe. Friday would be nice. Or anytime.

Nailed up a board and cut another in an obscure oak. A childhood education of tree fort building isn't going to waste. If we had these screw-in rungs no treetop would have been safe.

Corn still under one feeder. Very strange. One little nubbin buck on cam. Corn gone the other two cameraless camera positions. I was going to buy a Moultrie at Walmart but they didn't have the model I like. Several friends are bow hunting but it's still too warm and dry and the rut is a week off.

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