August 11th, 2008
By Arthur

I was recently reading an article in my Quality Whitetails magazine about the newest rage for hunting mature whitetails….suburbia. The author talked about making sure you don’t overlook well populated areas near you that could be holding big bucks. He talks about how he loves to hunt whitetails in the suburbs, and well populated areas, that most hunters would not think to hunt.

I have seen this particular topic brought up in a few magazines in the last couple of months, and quite honestly it was a shock to me. I’m not trying to toot my own horn here, but Jeff and I have been doing this since we started hunting. Sure, we hunt out of the way places as well, but one of our best spots, when we were just starting out hunting, (and still hunt to this day) is a small tract of land that to look at you wouldn’t think held deer at all. When Jeff first set me up in it about 10 years ago I thought he was crazy-right up until the point where I shot an 8 point out of it. That is exactly why these areas are great places to hunt. There is no pressure in these particular locations, and that is exactly why the deer flock to them.

Another place we used to hunt was a piece of property that ran along a major highway, and also had a multi-million dollar corporation located right across the street. I could not believe the number of people who were so shocked that deer were in the area. We shot many a buck off this property, and people were always surprised that it held deer. We sure weren’t. We knew it held some nice deer and proved that every year.

I guess my main point is that, for us hunters, it is easy to overlook certain areas because of the location. The fact is, in today’s world, deer adapt so well to humans, that you can’t overlook these areas. There are plenty of places that hold great deer numbers, despite the close proximity to housing developments and such. A lot of these places are great opportunities for bow hunting especially, and are well worth the effort, even if the property owner takes her morning walk under your treestand every morning (I had that happen on one property quite often, and a few minutes after she would pass, the deer would appear).

While I do hunt a more secluded place at this point in time, I still recommend not overlooking those “suburbia” type locations. They can make for a great time, and even though you might encounter some lulls in the action, when the action finally does happen, it can create memories that will last a lifetime.

Popularity: 15% [?]

August 06th, 2008
By Arthur

After my post yesterday, and the lack of comments on the post, I thought my coverage of local events might be boring a few of you. In light of that I decided to go a little more light-hearted with today’s post, and I hope that generates comments and keeps a few of you from falling asleep.:)

I work in the technology field. Now, I don’t want to get into too much detail about what I do, or where I do it, but at least you have an idea of what my job function is. Of course working with computers and technology automatically puts you in a category. You all know what I’m talking about: The he’s-a-pocket-protector-wearing-geeksquad-computer-nerd category. I love being stereotyped though. It makes for great conversation.

I remember the first time I walked into a room to help a particular gentleman with his computer. He had animal mounts all over his “office”, and curiosity got the best of me, so I started asking questions. Where did you shoot the elk? Did you shoot and catch all of these mounts? Then I proceeded to tell him about the eight point I shot with my bow just a few years earlier. It didn’t take me long to realize that he thought I was from another planet. “Who are you again?” he asked. “I’m here to fix your computer.” I replied. You could tell the conversation was about to start. After explaining to him multiple times that I did in fact work in technology AND hunt, he finally started to believe me. It just took him some time to digest the fact that I could do both-work with computers/technology and hunt. See, I told you it makes for great conversation sometimes.

I used to be bothered by the stereotyping, but now I think it is great. It has allowed for many a conversation about hunting, fishing, and the outdoors with people who normally wouldn’t hear about these kinds of things. To be honest all of the conversations have been positives one’s as well. Even if the particular individual didn’t hunt, they were always open to listening about my passion. It allowed for the communication lines to open up, sometimes just because of the simple fact that they were so shocked, but I still took the opportunity in stride. Any opportunity that I get to promote my way of life, and explain it in a way other than what they normally would hear from the evening news and PETA, I think, is a good thing.

I do realize that I’m not the only one in my field who enjoys the outdoors. Plenty of other people at my work enjoy the outdoors as well. But the message I’m trying to convey is you never know, regardless of what kind of company you’re in, who is “open” to our way of life. Just as people shouldn’t stereotype me because of my job function, we, as hunters, fisherman, and outdoorsmen, shouldn’t stereotype others either. We should take their different lifestyle choices, be open to them, and take an opportunity to explain our lifestyle choice in the process.

You just never know who might be listening, and changing their opinion about the beer-gut-cigarette-smoking-drunkened-NASCAR-fan-hunter that everyone associates with hunting.

Popularity: 19% [?]

August 04th, 2008
By Arthur

So, if any of you out there doubt the impact that a food plot can have on your property, please continue to read.  I am in sure awe to be honest.

I wrote this post last week about Jeff planting a new food plot in some leased land that he has.  Well it didn’t take long to see the impact that these little planting excursions can have on an area, as well as the type of deer that they will attract.  Jeff has already had multiple bucks on the trailcam overlooking the food plot.  He has also had plenty of does, turkey’s, raccoons, and a host of other critters enjoying the planted morsels.

The motherload didn’t come until Jeff went to check his trailcam on Friday morning.  The  picture you see to the left was picture 106 on his SD card, and I would have loved to see Jeff’s face when he came across it.  This buck actually came in with another buck that is a shooter in any of our books, but I don’t think anything prepared Jeff for this particular buck.  What a brute.

For this property to have such a turn around from when we hunted it a couple of years ago is amazing to me.  We did have plenty of deer on the property, but it seemed that they really trickled off towards the middle of the season, and I honestly had my doubts about how well their investment would pay off for them.  It seems planting the food plots helped immensely with that investment.

Of course the downside to this whole thing, is that I don’t have rights to hunt this property.  I opted to not pay for land to hunt this year when I could hunt a different set of acreage for free.  Hopefully though, one of them gets a chance to take this brute.  I’m rooting for the guys from South Carolina!

Popularity: 17% [?]

July 30th, 2008
By Arthur

I mentioned yesterday that we shot our pistols Sunday evening, and that we also shot other things as well. Well now I get to tell you what those other things were–our bows. The best part of the whole thing though, is that we not only shot our bows, we got to shoot them on our new and improved 3-D course. We have finally come full circle from one year ago and the aftermath of the tornado. (If you would like to see a refresher of what the course looked like after the storm click here.)

The course orginally was setup last year right around this time. SimplyOutdoors was just in its infancy, and things were going great. Then the tornado hit in August, and completely changed all that. All of our newly purchased targets were thrown through the country side (we never did find any part of them) and the 3-D course was history. Well, thanks to insurance, and a little patience, we finally got around to setting the 3-d course back up. Sweet!

The course is even better than least year, and the targets are amazing. They are the 3-D Mackenzie targets and they are outstanding. They should last us for many years to come, and provide for some great times I’m sure.

We have 5 targets total-four of them are deer and one is a boar. We stand in a stationary position and have to shoot at the different targets from various ranges. It is a complete blast and I’m happy to report that I WON EVERY ROUND TWO NIGHTS AGO. I won’t even mention that Jeff completely missed a target though–whoops, I guess I just did.

The night was great, and we all had a really good time shooting the course again. Jeff, Tyler, Ron, and I will be back out there again very soon I’m sure. It was awesome to finally have things completely back to the way they were before the tornado.

Grilling, food, guns, and bows. What more could you ask for in a single evening?

Popularity: 18% [?]

July 29th, 2008
By Arthur

I wrote a post awhile back about my struggles with Taurus, and the difficulty I was having getting my front sight replaced. I finally came in contact with a very nice lady in customer service at Taurus, and after explaining to her the things that I had went through, and the frustration that I was feeling, she was completely shocked. She couldn’t believe that I had went through that much work in order to get this site replaced, and I am happy to report that my front site arrived at the house on Saturday-a full 4 days ahead of schedule. I think the planets finally aligned.

After all the work that I had to go through in order to get this site, you can bet that I wasn’t wasting anytime in putting it on and trying it out. Sunday night we headed over to my cousins house and got the pistols out and plinked around for quite awhile. I was pretty happy with the results considering, and I hate to admit this, but I hadn’t shot the gun in almost a year. I will let the picture speak for itself, but I was pretty happy with the results (at 20yds).

My cousin got in on the act with his Springfield XD .40, and we also let my nephew get involved with his Ruger 10/22. It was a night of shooting all around and it was a complete blast. We shot other things too, but I will elaborate more on that in my post tomorrow. It was a great, great night.

The highlight of the night for me though, was my wife shooting the pistol. You don’t mess with a pregnant woman with a gun I tell ya. She shot pretty well, like she always does, but she didn’t shoot quite as much as the rest of us. That was fine by me. I really couldn’t help but wonder what little Abigail thought about what was going on. I’m sure it was something to the effect of “Man, my mom is cool”, or something like that.

It felt great to shoot the gun again, and all of us had a really good time, and just enjoyed the time spent together, and the time we got to spend outside. It is so relaxing for me when I get outside and shoot. I know that sounds funny, but it really is.

I can’t wait until the next time, and I’m glad my gun is back to %100.

Popularity: 17% [?]