Tagged Out In Ohio

  We landed a lease in Ohio this year at the end of October, last minute like usual. We were searching all summer for a lease near Pro Staffers Mitch and Curt Coleman. I had looked on Base Camp Leasing's website several times and found a lot of good looking leases, but couldn't get everyone on board quick enough before someone else had snatched them up. Well one popped up just before the season and it looked perfect. It was within 10 miles of Curt and Mitch. They knew the area was good and told us to get it. We contacted Base Camp and landed the lease the next week. The following week Tommy and I went to check it out, hang some sets and put a few Moultrie trail cameras out. We planned on hunting a little while we were there, but it pretty much rained on us the whole time, so we just hung back and glassed a couple of days, we did get to hunt one day. 
  We left on Monday, but before we pulled out we hung one more set and pulled cards. The first pull we had a couple of decent bucks, but they didn't appear to be shooters, they looked young. I had already scheduled the next week off from work so I was looking foward to spending that time in Ohio hunting and filming the Colemans. Who wouldn't want to spend the November 3rd through November 11th in some great bigbuck territory? Figuring I was going to be back in Ohio at the right time I was probablly a little to pumped up.
   I was a little deflated down when I got back and was in stand. It was SLOW and after last years SLOW rut I was worried it was never going to kick off. We hunted for 5 days and never saw a decent buck, we hardly saw any rut activity. We had a couple good bucks on our Moultries, but we weren't seeing them on stand. That changed on day 6 for me. Curt and Mitch decided to hook up and hunt thier farm so I was off to our lease to do some self filming. I hate self filming, but I figured that the set I was going to I should be able to handle it.

  Right after first light I saw what appeared to be a decent buck cruising, but I never did get a good look at him. I did an opening interview a few minutes after that brief encounter and not a few minutes after that I saw a fawn bust over the hill followed by the best buck we had on trail camera. After what seemed like forever (actually a little over 30 minutes) he followed a doe down the hill and right into my lap. The buck turned broadside and was walking along the hill perfectly 30 yards away. When I drew my bow the doe not 20 yards away, busted me and threw me off. I missed my oppurtunity to stop the buck and he got in behind some limbs. After a 10 minute standoff he moved down the hill closer and started to walk off giving me a PERFECT slightly quartering away shot that I did not miss. He went 80 yards and piled up on camera. Man I like Ohizo!
 

Opening day of turkey season in maryland turned out good again for me this year. Tommy and I went up to our honey hole last Sunday to check things out. We were a little worried because the landowner had the property logged last fall/winter. Our favorite spot had a bunch of sign and a new logging road cut down a ridge leading straight to where we usually set up. We heard a few birds gobbling on the roost and 2 of the toms headed straight to the bottom (honeyhole). We drove back down to the bottom to glass to see if we could spot the birds and ended up seeing three toms down there. Once they moved off we went in to look at wherewe would set up on Wednesday. On the way in we bumped another tom. We decided on setting up at the base of the ridge with the new logging road because there was a lot of scratchings and sign at a Y in the logging road. Wednesday morning came and it was raining so we grabbed the blind and headed for the Y in the logging road. The first bird in was the ole bearded hen we have been seeing for the last 4 years. We saw a few more hens and then a jake. The jake walks off up the logging road and runs into a longbeard on his way down the road to the bottom. The longbeard ran the jake off up the ridge and eventually comes back down the ridge. He messed around forever just out of range and a little shy of our full strut decoy. He eventually works he way back up the logging road so I started to call a little aggressively at him with one of my Coleman Game Calls mouth calls and that's all it took. The scouting and calls were all on point but my shooting was not. First shot was a little low and pounded him in the chest. The next two I have no idea where they hit. To say I was a little upset that i didn't drop him would be an understatement. Tommy looked at the video and noticed that the bird folded up after flying off. We went down to where we last had video of him and there he was. We did have to finish him off, like I said on the video, it wasn't pretty but there's a bird going home with me again this years opening day.

Check out Mitch and Curts contest they have going on on Colemans Game Calls facebook page. Name thier new call and they will send you one. They field tested it last year and there is video to prove it works and work great. Go to Colemans Game Calls facebook page, give them a like and post your suggestion on a name for it and we will pick the one we like the best and the call is yours!

Back in the office

Now that all the shows are done we are headed back to the AO cave to get back on editing. Gonna be a rough one for a bit. We have a lot of footage to go through and the PC is starting to act up. We are in the process of getting a MAC so hopefully that comes through and makes life a LOT easier. We are considering doing the sportsmen show in Boonsboro this year so check back in later on to see if we are going up there. We had a blast at the NRA show in Frederick so I dont know why we wouldn't do the Boonsboro show. Also keep an eye on the blog as we are in the planning stages of doing a web show. Details on that a little later on.

We had a GREAT time at the NRA's Great American Hunting and Outdoors Show here in Maryland this weekend. We had a blast meeting a bunch of new people and companys. While at the show we hooked up with the guys ( and Ladies ) of Wyld minerals. I saw them at the show last year and started following them. Over the summer I saw lots of positive reviews and lots of pics to prove their stuff works. We can't wait to get some sites of our own going here in a few months. We will have the Moultries monitoring the sites and we will have plenty of our own pics to prove Wyld minerals work.

Been doing some waterfowl hunting

I've been doing some goose and duck hunting lately and it's been hit or miss just like deer hunting has been this year. Been to the shore twice with John and we have only managed to knock down 2 birds while hunting together. John's been hitting the shore alot more and he's up to somewhere around 10. Hit the potomac river last Monday with Clayton and Tommy and it was dead. Saw a couple and 1 peeled off and gave the decoys a look but no shots. Going out with Clayton Saturday morning to hopefully get into some geese locally. Hopefully with the colder weather it has froze some of the water up north and some of the birds start coming down to pay us a visit. I noticed a lot of the ponds around here are starting to freeze but that's not going to last long.

Full Moon Luck

Last Saturday was the last day for the Maryland shotgun season. Justin and I had made plans the night before to flip flop hunting and filming. Justin was up to bat for the morning hunt. We was suppose to meet at 5:15 am but Justin was running a few min behind. Around 5:30 Justin was pulling in to pick me up and we were on our way to a honey hole he has. After almost hitting about 10 deer in our short 15 min drive, we arrived safely at our morning destination. This spot has an excellent pinch point so Justin was going to take his bow along with his muzzle loader. After getting his bow ready to go he pulls out his Thompson Center and starts to load it. He first dumps the three pellets down the barrel and then follows it up with the sabot. Then there was a load snap. Looking at each other we soon realized that he had just broke his ram rod after only getting the sabot half way down the barrel. Needless to say there goes the muzzle loader. He grabs his bow and we are off to our set about 300 yards away. With a full moon there was no need for a flash light. We get to the stand and got every thing set up and it wasn't long before the sun was coming up. Around 8 we looked at each other in disbelief. We hadn't seen a single deer yet, this was very unusual for this spot. Then out of the corner of my eye I caught movement of a good buck. Getting the camera on him and starting to film him Justin says "I don't have my grunt call". I reached down grabbed mine and hit it. The buck stops, turns and runs from about 100 yards to 60 yards then to 40 yards. He slowly walks into 30 yards still not offering a shot. He starts to make his way off when he seen some does moving down the hill below him. Hitting the grunt call one more time in desperation didn't work either. The buck turns and walks down to the the does. Not 15 min later, BOOM, in the same direction they had walked in. After not seeing any more deer we rolled out, got breakfast and came up with a game plan for the evening.

We had decided to meet around 1 pm knowing that we needed to get to one of my spots as early as we could. On the way in we seen some deer and turkey already in the field. We slowly made our way to the blind step by step. After reaching the blind and only bumping the turkeys off the field we set up the camera gear and was ready for the evening hunt to unfold. Around 2:30 pm I caught movement of a good buck on the neighboring property. He had came out and checked just about every doe in the field. As quick as he appeared he disappeared. Now there was about 5 or 6 deer on our side of the property line. After several cars stopping on the road to look at the deer and the neighbors dog barking the deer on the neighboring property had had enough and cleared the field leaving the 5 or 6 deer on our property. With all of the commotion the deer were very nervous and spooky. Not 45 min after the field had cleared deer started to make their way back onto the cut corn field. After glassing a bunch of deer I noticed a big body standing 50 yards off our property line. The deer then picks his head up and all I can see is what looks like a nice buck, but I couldn't tell much about him. Telling Justin there was a good buck coming he gets the camera ready. The buck slowly walks into the field to eat and check out the does. We confirmed that the buck was at least a 4 1/2 yr old buck and was indeed a shooter. I slowly get Dons Thompson Center ready and out the window. YES I said Dons Thompson Center, Its a long story. The buck slowly walks out of the corner and I settle the cross hairs behind the shoulder and squeeze the trigger. The big 9 pointer runs 75 yards and stands there. At first I thought I had missed but when he jumped the fence I noticed a dark red spot behind his shoulder. The buck takes a few more steps and falls over. Justin and I celebrate, make a few phone calls and then finally head down to him. When we get down to him I realize who he is, I have a bunch of Moultire trail camera pics of him. He is a good old buck and one that I am extremely happy with. I would like to thank Justin for being there to video everything and Don for letting me use his gun. All in all it was a good evening and the deer were moving good, even with a FULL MOON.