Bringing the Big Guy home.

 2008, 2000, 1999. 

  I've had my this year's deer up at the studio since his skull and horns came out of the pot.  Nice deer.  Brought him home to hand next to some of the others at the house.  He's one of the bigger ones.  The two oldest bucks measure a solid 11 inches from the base of their skull to the tip of the upper lip.  Their skulls look more solid and developed.  This years is 17 1/4 inside spread.  The previous big, a 1999 138 1/4 deer is 15 inches.

  Fortunate to get him, but there were three other bigger bucks on cam out there.

  No more 2 1/2 year old bucks like the 1999 deer.

Buck skinning video up at Youtube.

  Just put the video up.  Starts with buck down in the field and goes through skinning.  Skull boiling process coming up.

Update:  Skull boiling up.  Learn to boil your own skull for a nice museum quality wall mount.  Cheap.

  I know it's kind of graphic but just be thankful I'm not making sex instruction videos.

Daily Deercam

  Nothing left but a mass of acorns and mast.  Not a drop of blood or a twist of flesh.  A black vulture was overhead as I dragged him out and the rain erased the rest.  I took an acorn as a token.  Scrapes hadn't been worked but had fresh footprints in them.

  When a big deer, especially a large buck with a territory he is defining and defending, disappears then the whole herd has to adjust.  The little bucks will still slink around nervously, the does watch the four corners of the compass and his rivals will wonder where he is.  Things will shift and some other buck will pick up any slack.  I imagine most of the area does are bred by now.  He wasn't the only big buck in the area but he had to be reckoned with.  Big 10 and the buck I was hunting are here somewhere close.

  He was on cam.  24 files running up to 8:52am.  I shot him a minute or two before nine.  I'm not quite ready to hang up my aplenflage and go play vintage rifle with Alan's does in Clarksville but the buck hunting is over.

  Typical human psyche:  Hunt 'em.  Kill 'em.  Then mourn them.

  Across the creek: a coyote, the bent-horn buck, (who will be better next year) and a 1 1/2 year old three-pointer.  Rolled up my camo and went across barefoot to keep from having wet feet.  Barefoot boy with cheek of tan.  November in Texas.  Gorgeous woods.  Carried the AR in case I chanced across a coyote.  The rushing creek was saying something but I couldn't quite make out the words.

Celebrate your Garand!

  Maybe it just needs more grease.

While on the subject of Whitetail deer...

  I used the Rachel Lucas » Demotivators button to get myself addicted making these posters.  I think I may need an intervention before I quit.

  This is one of Alan's does from up in Red River County.  I got bored shooting them with my scoped Ruger #1 and started working my way through all the old military rifles I had bought over the years.  Every time I added a mil-surp rifle my excuse would be: One of these days I'll use it to shoot a doe tag.  

  Surprisingly, I did!

  Rifles used:

M1 Garand.

M1 Standard Products .30 cal. Carbine.

1909 Argentine Carbine in 7.65.

1891 Argentine Cavalry Carbine.

1891 Argentine Engineers Carbine.

K98 Mauser.

Swiss K31.

Japanese T44 Carbine in 6.5X50.

1917 Eddystone 30-06.

Springfield 1903A3.

Swedish M38 in 6.5X55.

1898 Krag 30-40.

  Zeroing, carrying and hunting with every one of these rifles was a delight.  It seemed to take several hunts to get a doe down, so I got to spend a little time with the gun.  I appreciated them more and more as I carried them.  (The K98 and Krag, for instance, are very sexy rifles to carry in the field.)  I shot deer offhand and from stands.  Some have a peep and post, some old pyramid triangle sights, some ladder sights.  When I took a guest or a kid they were always fascinated to see me carrying a vintage rifle with original strap and military ammo.  The M1 Carbine, Garand, 1903A3 and K31 had been shot in competition.  (full bragging disclosure:  I'm the current Texas Garand and repeat Vintage Rifle Champion)  

  On deck for this deer season: SKS and AR15.

Two fawns and a doe on the main cam.

  I hunt at the lake sparingly.  125 miles north at a friends Red River County farm we shoot doe tags as permitted by the State Biologists to balance the sex ratio of does to bucks.  My friend up there usually has 30 doe and 10 buck tags for his 120 acres.  We never shoot them all or even get close no matter how many guests and kids we take along.  Part of the permit process is data gathering on the age of the does.  We are shooting the largest does out of any group and they average 2 1/2 years old when we take them.  At the lakehouse here, the does are never hunted.  There aren't any doe tags in Smith County.  The does I regularly see on cam are long faced, long bodied does with deep chests and developed hindquarters.  They must be the maximum age for wild whitetail does in the state.  Range conditions are optimal and there isn't any hunting pressure.  Usually they have twins.

  When I was a kid, we didn't HAVE deer in Smith County.  The first time we found a hoofprint in the mud at the lake spillway it was like finding Bigfoot.  We raced back to the lakehouse and announced it and even the adults come down to look. 

  Now there are so many deer that they are being killed on the highway and seen in town.  Nice to have them back.