The Hog Blog

So a couple years ago, I was on the fence about heading back to NC for the archery opener. My little brother tossed the last straw on the load with a game cam photo of a really nice buck.

Well, there are only about two weeks left in the season this year, and no way I’ll make it back… so when he sent me this pic from his food plot, I think he was just being mean. What do you think?

Well, I’m back.

It was an eventful couple of weeks at Coon Camp Springs… too eventful, in fact, for me to simply summarize the hunts in a single post. Instead, I’ve decided to write up each hunt separately (although there’s a great connection between the first two).

Click Here to view Part 1

Click Here to view Part 2

Here’s the final part, then… hope you enjoy it!

The waxing moon was the biggest concern for our next hunt.  David Brown would be arriving on November 1st, and the moon would be completely full on the 2nd.  Way up in that country, a full moon lights up the night like daytime, and the deer stay active all night long and then bed up during the day.  The only bright spot was my hope that the moon would also help kick off the rut.  Nolan’s buck had been chasing does three days earlier, and on the Saturday before David’s arrival I glassed up a really nice 4×4 leading a harem of does, so things were looking really positive on that front.  As long as the moon didn’t screw us up, I had hopes that we’d see a pretty good hunt.

I was in Reno when David arrived on Sunday, so Dave (Allen) would take him on the tour, and go over to the shooting bench to check out his rifle.  I thought they’d also go ahead and hit the field for a little while before I got back, but they decided just to relax in camp and wait for me.  The hunt would start Monday morning.

Over dinner, we talked about the last couple of hunts, and I told David about the big 4×4 I’d seen.   I described what I thought was the best strategy to get on him, just sitting on a glassing point and waiting as long as we could stand to sit there.  A lot of western hunters can’t sit still for hours, but with the deer moving consistently over the same area, the longer we could stay put, the better our odds of getting a shot on that buck.  David assured me he loved glassing and sitting, so the plan was made.  We had a great dinner of elk and pheasant, and headed off to bed with visions of big bucks dancing in our heads.

Monday morning’s hunt was a guide’s dream come true.   Read the rest of this entry »

Well, I’m back.

It was an eventful couple of weeks at Coon Camp Springs… too eventful, in fact, for me to simply summarize the hunts in a single post. Instead, I’ve decided to write up each hunt separately (although there’s a great connection between the first two).

Click Here to view Part 1

Here’s the second part, then… hope you enjoy it!

When Nolan left with his father on Tuesday night, his plan was to get home, visit with his family a little bit, and then come on back out to the ranch on Thursday afternoon.  Tom said he might come back as well.  Even though he already had his buck, he wanted to be there when Nolan tagged out.  In the wings of the plan was the possibility that Nolan may bring his six year-old son back up with him to enjoy the hunt and camp, and possibly to see his father take a buck, just as Nolan had been there 35 years earlier to see his own dad tag out. 

With these plans in our minds, Dave Allen (President of the Coon Camp Springs non-profit org), Kat (my girlfriend and camp cook for the week), and I decided to take our downtime on Wednesday to get out to town and pick up some supplies.  We did some work around camp and headed up the hill to the highway.  Just before we topped the last ridge, a black truck came up the road toward us.  Nolan just couldn’t stay away!  I bailed out and let Dave and Kat go on to town.  I’d spend the evening hunting with Nolan and his son, Tommy, and see what we could do to fill that tag. 

With a six year-old in tow, the cards were stacked against us on this one.  On this property, there are a couple of ways to hunt.  One is to sit tight on a high spot and glass, and then either shoot or stalk for the shot.  That requires quiet, patience, and sitting still… none of which are exactly common traits among the first grade set. 

The other method is to still hunt slowly through the juniper thickets.  This is slow, silent going, and is difficult enough for a solo hunter.  With a couple of experienced hunters, getting close to a buck is a real challenge.  With two hunters and a youngster, it’s almost a guarantee we wouldn’t see anything except tracks. 

There is a third method, of course… road hunting.  While I’m not against the practice, and will do it from time to time, it’s not really something we encourage at Coon Camp Springs.  The terrain is pretty friendly, and there’s almost no place the most out of shape hunter can’t go on foot.  Besides, riding around in the truck isn’t the kind of experience most mule deer hunters are paying for. 

I had some decisions to make, and none of them looked promising.  This was gonna be tough and no way around it.  Read the rest of this entry »

Well, I’m back.

It was an eventful couple of weeks at Coon Camp Springs… too eventful, in fact, for me to simply summarize the hunts in a single post.  Instead, I’ve decided to write up each hunt separately (although there’s a great connection between the first two).  Here’s the first part, then… hope you enjoy it!

The huge mule deer stood broadside… not 40 yards from where I crouched with my hunters, glassing the thick brush.   “I can’t see his head,” said Tom Henry, the senior of the father-and-son team.  “Is it a buck?”

His son, Nolan, whispered back.  “It’s huge, that has to be a buck’s body.”

“Does anybody see horns,” I asked? 

It seemed like we were standing there for several minutes before I was able to spot antler tines protruding well above the juniper branches that obscured the deer’s head.  Once I saw that, I was able to piece together the rest of the rack and head.  I had been looking too low… this sucker was big!  It was definitely what we were looking for. 

“It’s a really good buck,” I hissed. “Kill it!”

“Did he say it was a buck,” queried Tom?

“It’s a buck,” answered his son.  “He said, ‘kill it.’” 

“What,” said Tom?

“SHOOT IT!”

At the crack of Tom’s .270, the buck hopped and kicked out his back feet, then tore out through the brush.  His right leg was flopping.  To all appearances, it looked like a textbook shoulder/heart shot.  I breathed a sigh of relief, and started out to follow what I expected would be a really short blood trail to a really dead deer. 

The last time the elder Henry killed a buck with his son was almost 35 years ago, when Nolan was a youngster of around six.  They’d hunted together since then, but it seemed that Tom was destined to go home empty-handed every time he joined Nolan in the field.  This year he’d bought two of our PLM tags at Coon Camp Springs as a birthday gift for his son, both as an opportunity to spend that time together, but also as a chance to break that long, unsuccessful streak. 

This was the first full day of hunting with these guys, after spending the previous evening checking the zero on their rifles, touring the property, and scaring the coyote population with a few long shots.  Since we had a little daylight left, we even sat and glassed for a while before heading back to camp for a big dinner of wild boar sausage with apples and wild rice. 

At first light, we were back on that rock. Shortly after we settled in, I spotted some does off in the distance.  They were way off the property, but we watched them as they slowly worked their way toward our fenceline.  There were about eight or nine deer in the field, but no bucks that we could see (they were over 1000 yards away).  Suddenly, Nolan hissed, “deer!”  Read the rest of this entry »

I haven’t done a lot of deer hunting this season.  For one reason or another, I just haven’t had a lot of opportunities to get out for our local blacktails.  But this weekend will change all that.  Holly will be joining Kat and myself up at the place I call “Kokopelli Valley” for a last hurrah, B-zone deer hunt! 

Typically, odds of success on public land are pretty danged low, and I really expected this trip to go the same way.  But over the last couple of days it’s pretty obvious that the rut is wide open around here right now, which translates into “all bets are off” on the deer up where we’ll be.  Lots of good signs going in, even if I haven’t hunted there in a couple of years.  The weather is right, with cold mornings and moderate days, and there’s a major weather system coming in early next week.  The deer should be moving, and if the road-warriors and idjits will give us half a chance, we’ll be in the deer in a big way! 

I’m just a little bit stoked!  Last time I went up to Kokopelli Valley feeling like this, here’s what happened:

If all goes well, at least one of us will have something like this to show for our efforts this weekend. 

And if not, well… it’s the hunt, not the kill that really matters.  We’ll have a good time in some beautiful country, and that is its own reward. 

See ya’ll on Monday!

So, the other day when he shipped the meat from my NC doe, my brother mentioned he was shipping me something else too.  He was kinda secretive about it, but I didn’t think too hard on it, figuring I must’ve left some of my gear behind.  He sent the second package by ground, because the overnight service we used for the meat was a little too pricey, so it took a couple of extra days for my package to arrive.  I’d almost forgotten about it. 

Today, I noticed a big ol’ box in the doorway with my name on the label.  “Hmm,” thinks I, “what the heck is this?”

I have a short memory sometimes, and the rest of the time I have no memory at all…

I sliced open the tape and started digging through the cellulose peanuts (no one uses styrofoam anymore).  I felt a board… and on lifting it from the packing I saw the coolest frickin’ thing I’ve seen in a long time!

So ya’ll may remember that I mentioned in the story from my NC hunt, that, when I was feeling pretty sure I’d lost another animal to the bow, I broke the offending arrow on the running board of my brother’s truck? 

In frustration, I took the unlucky arrow, laid it across the running board of Scott’s truck, then stomped it in half.

Well, when I broke it, I tossed it in the back floorboard of my brother’s truck (don’t litter, it’s rude).  Well, the sneaky, and thoughtful, little devil saved if for me and made me a gift I’ll treasure for a very long time…

It’s better than any set of horns or skin!  I don’t know if you can read it (click it to see a larger image), but it says the date, and “The Jinx is Broke!” 

That’s just downright cool. 

I hope to put a lot more animals behind this bow in my hunting career, but no trophy will ever be as important to me as this one right here.  Many, many thanks to my little brother, Scott!

On Saturday afternoon, after about three hours of sweating, crashing through the cat-claws and spider webs, and being eaten alive by chiggers and mosquitos, I had a really bad feeling.  As the blood trail seemed to evaporate into thin air and the ground was crisscrossed with fresh tracks and trails, it was looking like I’d be bringing home another sad tale of lost game.  We’d covered almost every nook and cranny on my brother’s little place, with no further sign of my deer.  The blood first looked like someone had turned on a spigot, then suddenly became a few scant drops about fifteen yards apart… and then… nothing.

So let’s back up.

Saturday was the opening day of the NC archery season, and as a birthday gift, my mom offered to fly me back home for the event.  I couldn’t turn that down, even if there were no hunt, since I haven’t seen the family in a while.  I booked the tickets, and on Friday morning I was on the ground and saying, “hello” to my old Carolina home.

My brother, Scott, had done plenty of pre-scouting, and had even hung a stand for me in the woods near mom’s place.  That would allow me to maximize the hunting-to-visiting ratio, since I could walk to the woods from the house.  Unfortunately, that property is being sold off and my brother lost his hunting rights.  We regrouped, and returned to his property down the road.  He’s got a ton of deer there, and since I’m meat hunting, I really didn’t need to find a monster (although he’s got a couple of real nice bucks there). 

Saturday morning at first light found me up the tree.  The stand is set on top of a dirt mound, which put me about 25 feet up from the ground.  It’s the same stand I was in last year when I had the sad tale of the lost buck that became bear food, but I didn’t let that bother me.  In fact, I decided to use the same arrow and broadhead I’d used then… sort of pushing back against luck. 

Before light, several deer had moved through the thicket behind me, but after that things were pretty quiet until around 0900.  I heard a deer blow a little ways up the trail.  I couldn’t tell what it was blowing at, and didn’t hear anything bolt through the woods, so I stood up and started looking around.  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught something through the brush directly behind me.  Sure enough, a big old doe was meandering along the trail. 

I eased around and lifted the Mathews off the hook, then turned ever-so-slowly back to face the deer.  She was oblivious, but moving painfully slowly.  Finally, she entered a clear spot.  When her head went behind a tree, I drew, and when the near leg moved forward, I let the arrow fly.

Now I haven’t shot a lot of arrows at a lot of animals, but most of those shots I have taken were errant.  The thing is, there’s always a moment after you release that I have to wonder if I just screwed up.  And usually, I did.  But this time there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that I was looking at a dead deer.  The chartreuse and white fletchings lasered right into the spot I’d aimed at, and angled through perfectly to stick in the ground on the other side.  It looked textbook from where I was standing, and in my mind a cheer went up… finally!

The doe hopped the creek, and I could see her for about fifty yards through the oaks and briars.  She disappeared, and then things went quiet.  I didn’t hear her crash, but I was certain she’d laid down and gone to sleep.  I glassed the arrow, and even from 17 yards away I could see it was well-covered in blood. 

I sat back down in the stand and played with the video camera for a few minutes… trying to be patient so as not to push too soon.  I may have lasted 20-30 minutes, which may not usually be enough time, but I was extremely confident in the shot.  I just knew the deer was laying there, already dead.  The day was warming up fast, and I was excited, so down the ladder I went.

The arrow looked and smelled perfect.  It was soaked in blood, and it smelled like a chest cavity (distinct smell if you’ve ever dressed a deer).  There was no blood at the spot, though, which was kind of odd.  I followed the tracks across the creek, and up on the bank I found my first drops.  It was scarce at first, then becoming a solid splash of red on the oak leaves and low branches.  I moved along in confidence as the trail avoided the thick stuff and stayed in the open path… a sure sign of a well-hit animal.  When the trail veered off into the thick stuff, that’s where I’d find her.

But suddenly the blood just seemed to stop.  She’d turned off the spigot!  I figured that she’d bled out and I’d find her under a bush or blowdown, but I didn’t.  WTF?  I kept backtracking to the last blood, then circling out on likely trails.  When that didn’t pan out, I circled out on unlikely trails too.  Still, nothing.  I went back to the last spot and stood there, scanning the ground and trying to think. 

Then there was a drop, barely visible on an overturned leaf.  I moved up and stood there scanning again.  About ten feet away I saw a glistening spot, and on investigation it was another drop of blood.  I found one more, and then was stumped. 

My brother had come out of his stand, and I heard him out at the barn so I hollered for him to come over and give a hand.  But try as we might, we couldn’t find another single drop!  We crawled on hands and knees, pushed through brambles, and spread our search out until we’d eventually gridded the entire 20 acre woodlot.  He even brought in his dog, but she got hung up in the same place we did.

After about three hours, hot, scratched, bug-bitten, and hungry, we decided to back off and get some lunch.  Back at the truck, we talked about what happened.  We were both at a total loss.  We consider ourselves pretty fair trackers, and we’ve found some tough animals, but this one looked to have given us the slip.  Still, we kept thinking back to last year’s buck… it turned out to have been laying less than 50 yards from where my brother gave up the search.  And the year before, we kept almost giving up and then going back to look some more, until we found his doe.  Persistence pays in the tracking game… but this one had really maxed us out. 

In frustration, I took the unlucky arrow, laid it across the running board of Scott’s truck, then stomped it in half.  We loaded up and went back to mom’s place for sandwiches.  He was going to run home and shower and get a short nap, then we’d decide what to do about my deer.  The options seemed slim.  Either go back and look some more, or call it a loss.  Neither of us wanted to give up, but it didn’t look good.  He drove off, and I stretched out on the couch.

I was sleeping pretty hard when I heard Scott’s ringtone (an elk bugle) on my cell phone.  I rolled off the couch and answered.  “Is it time to go already?”

“Hey,” he said.  “Get over here to my barn and skin your damned deer!” 

On his way home, he’d thought about one trail we didn’t search.  (This is the benefit of having such an intimate knowledge of your property.)  He walked down that trail, and then started up a side trail on a whim.  A few yards in, he hit blood.  A couple hundred yards later, he found my doe.  The shot had been exactly where I’d described it, and he was purely amazed at how far she’d run. 

While waiting for me to arrive, he went ahead and gutted her to avoid spoilage.  In the process, he performed a little post-mortem.  Two things conspired to almost cost me my deer.  First, this doe had unusually tiny lungs.  My shot had been nearly textbook, but I only passed through one of her lungs. 

The second factor was probably the extreme angle.  I was 25′ up and 17 yards away.  The doe was stepping down the creek bank, and quartering slightly away.  My arrow went in about 2/3 up and about six inches behind the shoulder, and exited a few inches above and behind the off-side “armpit”.  It went just behind the heart, and completely severed the esophagus (yuck!).  How it missed the second lung is beyond me, but there ya go.  And even so, it’s amazing how she managed to go so far with the massive internal injuries! 

I can’t thank my little brother enough for his perseverance and patience, not to mention for all the effort he always takes to try to make sure I have a great hunt whenever I go back home.  By finding this deer, he really salvaged my confidence in archery tackle… and possibly my entire future as a bowhunter.  As much as I love everything that goes into archery hunting, I don’t take lost animals lightly, and this would have been my fourth (two hogs with the recurve, and the little buck from last year).  I was seriously contemplating surrendering the bow for good…

By the way, you’ll see the sign I’m holding in the picture.  Accent Outdoor Adventures is my brother, Scott’s new guide service.  He’s offering whitetail hunts in southeastern NC and in South Carolina as well.  He also guides waterfowl during the season along the Cape Fear River.  If you’re interested in a hunt, give him a call at 910-612-1620. 

Well, as I write this I’m sitting in the airport in Las Vegas, NV.  This is the first of two stops before I find myself back in Wilmington, NC… just in time for the archery deer season opener on Saturday morning! 

Last year’s hunt was exciting, but the bear got my deer before I did… and that just doesn’t seem fair.  So I’m heading back to try it again.

I’ll be on and off this computer thing while I’m out there, but unless something big comes along, I doubt there’ll be any updates until I get back to California. 

In the meantime, here’s hoping for a great big whitetail buck!  It’s time to end this archery jinx!

Looks like I found another free weekend, and I don’t plan to let it get away from me.  I’m heading back up to the Hedgepeth Ranch this weekend in hopes of hanging my deer tag on a nice blacktail buck.  This may be my last deer hunt in the A zone for the season, and I’m gonna try to make the best of it.

Stories, pictures, and maybe some video to come!

Now that Hank has told his side of the story, I can release my own without playing spoiler…  His is much better than I could ever tell it anyway, which is cool, because this hunt really was about Hank’s experience.  I was just there to help.

Besides, I’ve been trying to think of a re-telling of the tale I knew Hank would be writing without sounding like two sides of the same story.  So instead of rewriting the whole story, here’s a little video of the last few days, and with Hank telling us how it all went down.  Then I’ve got a few more things to throw in.

It was a rewarding hunt, but with some hard lessons mixed in.  Things didn’t go exactly as we’d like to see them, and we paid the price.  So did the deer. 

Read the rest of this entry »