Finally - Some Antlers!

So there are a few updates since my last post. First of all, the shed that I found in my last post was in fact from the buck we call Whitey, but it turns out it's his left side from 2009. It looks identical. The beam was short and obviously it was faded, but I thought that since it was shed in December, it might have had a chance to bleach out. I'm hoping to confirm with a neighboring farmer that said he picked up an 8 point set. I'm guessing it's Whitey from 2010. So that's one update.
Secondly, I was out on Monday morning and decided to scout through John's piece by the creek. There was some sign, but not much. While I was trying to film a woodchuck, I glanced around a willow and there was the white backside of a small antler. No doubt at least one year old. The funny thing was that I walked right through here last spring. It's crazy how easily antlers can disappear.

Next, Mom went out on Wednesday afternoon without telling me. I text dad about going out on Thursday (the three of us) and he text me back "maybe". In a matter of a minute later he text me again with a picture text. A nice antler appeared on my screen and at first I thought it might be from Mr. 140. It had some chews on the tip of the G4 and the mainbeam. At this point I figured mom and dad were both out there and dad just text it to me. We were on our way in to the band concert and man was I jealous. I learned that it was mom and she was out there on her own.  After the band concert we stopped by their place and examined the antler. It measured 57" and was definitely at least one year old and was not from Mr. 140. Two theories arose from this shed. Mom found it not far from the gravel pit by the border. Either I made the mistake in 2008 in assuming the buck that crossed the shack field in December was the same buck I got in January at the Cedar Stump, or we had two different bucks. The shed mom found was definitely NOT from the buck at the Cedar Stump, but it looked an awful lot like the buck that crossed the shack field behind the decoy. Hard to say. Regardless, it is a great find and better for her to have it than those stupid squirrels.

Lastly, Yesterday, Thursday, Mom, Dad, and I parked on the crossing by Pete's and walked North. Our objective was to walk the south facing edges of the clearing they did last winter. It would certainly allow new sunlight in and new vegetation to browse on. I knew it would also be a very valuable lesson in where the deer spent the fall/winter of 2010-2011. It was very slow to begin with until we reached the spruce peninsula that extends south from the three corner SW of the bus. That point had several trails running out of it across to the next point. Since the contour of their clearing was quite irregular, it created pockets or horseshoe-type openings within the bigger opening. If you connected the points by straight lines, you typically found most of your sign in these pockets. Good to note for the end of October/early November 2011. As we approached the second point of tamaracks, the trails got a lot heavier. I came into the point from one of the horseshoes and decided to make my way to the outside of the point again. When I did, I got around a few trees and right there in front of me was laying the unmistakable 3 point side of Pencil 7. The shed still had beautiful color. I'm 99% sure that a neighboring hunter has the other side. He said he found it 'under a cedar tree'. Not to be specific. Haha. I snapped some photos and got a quick video (in which I say the wrong date) and picked it up. That finally got the excitement bubbling in mom and dad. That second point turned out to be just as good as the first, if not better.
Here's the story of Pencil 7 (formerly Pencil 8):
2008 (yearling) :

2009 (2.5 years) :

And in 2010 (3.5 years) :

We took a breather and decided to keep doing what we were doing, because it was working. We continued to skirt the edge and by the time I connected with Mom and Dad again, Dad was standing over another antler. It was an antler that looked familiar. It suddenly came to me that it was the left side of a buck we began to know well...WideWeb. This deer was and remains a mystery. We had just a few photos of him in 2008 (3.5 years):

And then in the spring of 2009 (4.5) :

After June 2009 he totally disappeared. There's thought that he may have reappeared two miles west in 2010. I'm not convinced, but with that much time in between, we will probably never know for sure. Good to find evidence of his existence anyhow. The shed dad picked up measured 49 3/8", which would have put him at about 117" gross in 2008.

After we made it all the way down the edge of the scrubby cedars to the road, we took another breather and headed back attempting to parallel our first expedition to the north. That was harder than it seemed, especially with no snow. After we got out of the cedars and back into the willows, I walked right into another nice antler. It was a 4 point that I didn't recognize. I was stumped for a good minute. I got some photos and while I was taking a video, I realized which buck it was. We don't have a name for him yet as there are really no unique characteristics yet. I found his shed in 2010 from his 2009 rack. He was a two year old then and this would be his 3 year old right side. In the video, I guessed him two be four because of his mass, but after I picked it up I realized he was just a 3 year old 8 point.

It's so neat to find the same bucks antlers in consecutive years. Hopefully I can get a shot at either of these bucks this coming year. They both should be around Pope & Young. The heavier 4 point I found measured 48 3/8". That would put him grossing about 115" as a 3 year old. My hopes were high. The three sheds we found were actually fairly close together.

That was a good area to go back to and spend more time. Since we were still so far from the vehicle we kinda wanted to get out of there. It was a long walk that was not very easy walking, but it was so worth it. If I can, I'm going to get back out there before the weekend is over.

Whitey's Left and Mom's Dinosaur

Steph had a track meet on Friday, so after I got some things checked off the list, I headed up to the hill. I called a friend to see if he was busy and if he wanted to go with. I picked him up at his house and was able to take a peek at the mount he did of Inside CrabClaw. It looked pretty nice considering it was a September hide. We took off about two o'clock and started lookin' about 2:30pm. We decided to comb the state-side of the swamp next to a standing bean field that had several young bucks going to it in december and january. This area probably has the most deer per capita around The Hill, but as we ventured into the swamp, we realized it just became a maze of trails - very difficult to navigate. Anyway, while we were nearing the heaviest trail where I had a camera in December/January, I was following a trail that was running north and south right in the brushline. It started out really nasty and then opened up enough so there could be decent deer traffic in there. I looked up ahead and just like magic, there was the unmistakable sight of an antler. At first I thought it was a year old because of how pushed down into the ground it was and how white it was. Then I recognized what buck it was from. I knew that this buck, "Whitey" as we called him, was by far the first buck on camera to have shed both sides. I yelled, "found one!" to my friend. "Nice one?" he asked. "Not really." I said as I pulled out the camera. I took a few pictures of it as it laid while my friend was trying to cross this ditch between us within the brushline. "Just pick it up", he said as he gave up on the idea of crossing. I through it over to him and told him a bit about the story.

Whitey's left side was laying less than 50 yards from where the pictures of him were taken. I'd be willing to be that had I known he had shed when I was out there to swap cards, I could've found it nice 'n' brown. I walked that little trail he dropped on afterwards and I'm sure I walked right over or on top of it. Oh well. I still found it. It measured 42 5/8. Which would only put him a hair over 103 inches with an 18 inch spread. Sad.

After that, we kept going north until we were almost even with a house to the west. We turned around and came south again until we started crossing the heaviest trails. We headed east-southeast into the swamp and found where there had been plenty of deer traffic. Plenty of rubs confirmed the deers' use of those beans throughout the fall and into winter. This was the primo spot. I need to make a mental note that depending on what gets seeded in that same pasture, a person might need to hunt it accordingly. After a three hour walk I dropped my friend off and returned to The Hill. I met mom and dad on their way up to the cabin to do some more looking. I drove to the landing and went southwest and west cutting parallel to the trail on the edge of the cedars towards the bus. Once I got near the bus, I followed the traffic south to the stand I put Zach Johnson up in during rifle season. There was a decent amount of sign in there, but not enough droppings to comb the area. I walked straight east until I hit the strip south of the landing and walked back up it to my truck. I met mom and dad at the cabin and mom said, "Do you want to see what I found?" "Yes." I said. Dad said that it was big, and that it was a set. I didn't believe him. I walked to dad's endgate and sure enough, they pulled out a big set. Too bad it was about 10 years old. Mom found it laying in a pile of tailings from when they cleared the woods after the '97 tornado. It's amazing how much that area has grown up. The antlers were definitely nice - especially for Minnesota Hill. They would've been either an 8 or 9 point set that would've went in the 140s gross. Good mass, nice brows and beams. The tines would have leaned in quite a bit at the top. Too bad it took somebody that many years to find it. All in all it was a great day. Too bad we only have about two weeks max until the green grass will bury everything. Endeavor To Persevere.

No Dice... For Me

Well, Monday morning I was able to get out and finally spend some time out in the woods. I started the day off kinda crappy though. I was going to film myself broadcasting clover into a newly logged clearing for Midwest Whitetail, but when I got the camera on the tripod and turned it on I learned that there was no battery in it. IDIOT! Instead of waiting until I could film myself, I just opted to seed it anyway. So I got 10 lbs of Frigid Forage clover mix down into about a 1/2 acre strip. We'll see what comes of that. After that adventure, I walked over to the cedar stump to see what had been using it so far. I kicked up a lone big deer not far from the stump, so my hopes are high. The only camera I had out was going to produce for me early on. Not so. Zero images. Batteries died immediately after I left it. I guess that's what you get for using last year's used batteries. Trying to save money. After that, I drove down to the bus and took out the plastic sled I brought and through a 50 lb sack of trace mineral salt and a small brick of Deer CoCaine onto it and drug it the 1/2 mile over water and trees. I got the stump all salted up for this year and I gotta be honest, my hopes are high for these spots.

After my morning chores, I was able to take a hike in the swamp near the beans that were left standing this last fall. I looked in a few spots that I had imagined finding antlers on several occasions to no avail. I found one old yearling buck skull and one winter kill doe. Either someone had been through there or I'm really losing my touch as to where these antlers should be... probably both. I had to get back to town to work at Cenex so I left the woods about noon. Mom and Dad came up after I went home and asked where they should go that was dry. By the time I got back to them they were already walking around by the pits. I got a picture text from dad and I thought he might have found one and sure enough, he found a nice 57" 4 point shed. This has to be the darkest shed we've ever found/seen from around the hill. He found it points down right on a trail.After a few texts back and forth, mom text me with a picture. She found herself a cool little three point from the road. Good eyes.

At least this brings some hope to the spots I've been using salt. I hope to see more evidence of Dad's buck. It had a 21" main beam. I'm guessing him @ 5 1/2, going be 6 years old in a month.

It'll be interesting to see what turns up before green up.

Snow's Finally Gone

Mom and I went out for a bit in the morning on Saturday the 9th. At that point, there was still quite a bit of snow throughout the cedars. Today, there's probably none. We parked north of the landing and walked to the stump and set up a camera and some salt. We walked west through the cedars toward where dad picked up Scabby 10's 4point side from last year. We were getting close to that area when we came to a forked trail. I sent mom ahead on the heavier branch of it and about 50 ft later she said, "I found one!". I made my way over to her and told her to leave it lay until we got some pictures of it. At first glance, I thought it was a side from Whitey, but I soon realized it was much smaller than that. This was definitely off a 2 year old buck. Nothing super special about it other than it had no brow tine. The odd part of it all was that I could not place this buck, proving that there still are deer that do not show up on camera.

Anyway. I'm glad mom was able to find something. We've been so busy with photography lately, I don't know when the next time I could go out would even be. I chose to stay home and sleep in with Steph this morning, but it's stays fairly busy from here through the next couple weeks. We'll see. There's several bucks whose antlers are just waiting to be found. Somewhere deep within the swamp. The season isn't over yet.

March Muley Madness

A 5 year story finally comes to a close. While attending college, I picked up a large mule deer rack and I have been wondering how great it would look like mounted ever since. Since then, I've periodically been checking ebay for a cape and most of the good ones sell for between 150 and 250. I finally saw a nice one that looked like it was going to sell fairly low. So I got permission from my wife to bid on it. She was so kind to say yes and I actually won. I got it for 91 dollars plus 35 for shipping. I called Bruce Sandahl in Lancaster to see if he would be willing to do a mule deer mount for me. At first he said that he'd rather not, but that if I couldn't find anybody else, to give him a call back. I called a couple other places - Lake of the Woods taxidermy quoted me $550 to do a muley - and eventually called Bruce back. I said I had the cape coming the next day and he said, "well can you bring it over tomorrow afternoon?" So that's just what I did. The cape shipped from Texas and it made it up here just fine. Good thing it was still pretty cold up here then. Dad and I drove over there and walked into his museum of a garage and into his first garage(these were both additions over the years due to his taxidermy). We had some good conversation and exchanged information and he said it would be about a month. I told him I was in no hurry. The rediculous part is that in 16 days, he called me to say that it was finished. That was Sunday morning the 20th. I told him I couldn't make it that day but that I'd head over Monday morning. Dad came with again and as soon as we entered the same garage, I said, "and there it is" it was tipped on its back with its nose in the air and the width was something to behold. It was jaw dropping from even a poor angle. Bruce came into the room a couple minutes later and he started talking about the score of the thing. I think it blew him away. He said he came up with over 200" gross typical. Dad and I were gawking at the unbelievable job he did on the mount. He charged $4oo plus tax - so $427.50. I gave him a tip because of how fast he got it done. It looks astounding. Dad was so fired up. It was exciting to have him help hang it up at our place.It truly is a jaw dropping, possibly once in a lifetime typical mule deer. There's something about putting it back on a head that just makes a person stare. One unfortunate thing is that it makes my mid-140" gross and 120" gross whitetails look puny. Was it worth the five year wait and $575? No doubt.

I'll post a few more close ups of the great job Bruce did with the taxidermy.

The February Lull

I don't know of a February that I haven't looked for sheds for a very long time. This year we got plenty of snow and it's made looking around here fairly futile. The only problem with waiting is that from the time deer are actually shedding antlers to the time you can get out there, their patterns can and most likely have changed rather drastically. It will be essential to figure out where the deer were from Christmas to the end of January. That is where your odds are best. Notice I didn't say that's where you'll find your sheds. Buck behavior overlaps the general herd's behavior at this time of year, but it's not nearly as consistent or as confined as the does and fawns area of bedding. Bucks may travel through and past the 'bedding areas'. They may even bed with the does, but if you take into account the times of trail camera sitings, the bucks are coming in a good two hours or more after the does are. This leads you to one of three conclusions. Either the bucks simply are not on their feet as early, they are spending a lot more time browsing in the woods before they cross the road, or they are coming from a much further distance. My thought is something between the last two possibilities. I believe that when heading back to bed, bucks take the same trails as does and fawns. Somewhere along the way, possibly based on wind direction etc, these bucks veer off the trail and bed down by themselves. Sure a buck can drop his antlers right on a heavy trail, but if you calculate time spent feeding and time spent bedding, the time they are in transition is puny in comparison to the previous two. Deer cannot afford to burn calories needlessly.

Yesterday I was thinking about the shed hunting in an unknown environment, say down in Whitewater. I don't know what those deer do during the wintertime. I can only imagine that if they leave the corn standing, that the deer would be drawn in to it like a magnet. Here's where it gets tricky. Whitewater State Park also enjoys plenty of other hunters and I would guess appropriately - many shed hunters. I suspect that the majority of these shed hunters hit the food sources because they're easier to access. This is what got me thinking. A deer's travel and bedding is in relationship to food this time of year. Food is number one. Safety is number two. Rest (conserving energy) is number three. In percentages, it may look something different. Although deer do spend a great amount of time feeding in the winter, they spend more time bedding. If a person was to base their odds of finding sheds on location, they would need to base their decision on where the deer are spending the most hours per day. Deer spend from 12-18 hours a day in and around a bedding area. They spend roughly 4-6 hours feeding per day. that leaves a span of less than 8 hours in transition per day. All this is to say that when I cross boot tracks in a food source, I'm not going to let that bum me out. I know that I need to find the heaviest travel in and out of the food source in an attempt to find the bedding areas.

When you find beds, it is very helpful to stop and analyze the where and whys of the deer's preference. Is it open to sunlight? Is there browse nearby? How far am I from the hottest food source? How many deer does it look like are bedding in a 50 yard radius? Can I tell if they are buck beds? Are there tracks confirming that? As you start to notice trends in the deers preference of bedding areas, other areas might come to mind. As I mentioned Whitewater, it makes me think about the terrain differences. There will be steep hills, gradual ridges, and gorged out valleys. The south facing slopes will be the warmer ones and the ones that I believe deer will prefer. Not always, but most of the time. Finding benches and places of less stress also will pay off. Like I said, number two priority for deer is safety this time of year. Survival is always number one, but certain times of year survival means different things. Winter time brings about that switch. Food trumps safety. Anyway, safety includes thermals and wind currents. Deer will often times bed facing a direction they cannot smell. The will put the wind to their backs so they can smell what is behind them and see what they cannot smell. This could create many unique situations where the terrain has such exaggerated changes.

Hopefully when this snow melts down a bit, I can afford to spend some time in the woods. There are lots of antlers that I would love to find. Nobody has broken the 60" mark at Minnesota Hill. This could very well be the year. Stay tuned.

Fogged Over In Hibbing

So of all places I get to write this blog... I'm stuck in the Hibbing airport waiting for a taxi to come pick us up and DRIVE us to Thief River Falls. Oh yeah, it's 10 minutes past midnight right now. So let's do the math, the taxi should be here by 12:30am and we should arrive in TRF at about 4am. So far Delta hasn't been able to do anything for me. They think their taxi-ing me in the fog at 45 mph is complementary. Haha. Anyway, I might as well update this blog with the most recent happenings.

First of all, I took all my cameras down before I took off to Covenant Midwinter Conference in Chicago last friday. I got a few pictures the same bald bucks, a few new ones, but nothing that was too noteworthy. Just more wolves.

The best thing I get to write about is that after the Youth Workers Connection (Fri-Sun) I had to transfer from the Hyatt downtown out to the Hyatt O'hare, still in town, but by the river. Two years ago I took a walk one afternoon north of the hotel up the river bank. I went under a bridge and stumbled across about 8 deer including one decent shed buck. This got me fired up to find his antlers. I looked and looked, but there were also boot track in there. No antlers.

This year, I glanced at GoogleEarth before I transfered hotels and once I was checked in to the O'hare, I decided I should try to take a nap. I just about fell asleep, but I just couldn't. I don't know why. Anyway, I got up and decided I would take my walk then. I grabbed my hat and gloves and headed out of the east parking lot. The riverbank is probably about 100 yards wide at this point. As I went south, there were places where it pinched and there were some small drainages flowing from the streets into the river. Once I got past the biggest pinch (one that pushed me up on the street), it opened up to quite a stretch of woods. I dipped back into the woods and saw a few openings and sure enough there were beds and lots of fresh tracks. I circled around and followed the most tracks I could and the closer to these apartment buildings I got, the heavier the tracks got, it was weird. I angled back towards the main road running south and kept it to my right so I could comb the area on the way back. That's when I kicked up my first deer. It didn't seem too spooked, so I kind of followed where it was headed. I started to see more and more deer. Pretty soon I was in a little honey hole. Deer were jumping and walking everywhere. There must've been at least 20 deer in a 50 yard area. None were carrying that I could see. Soon enough I saw a shed buck and he was limping. His left front knee was broken and healed over. I slowed way down after I saw that buck. The tracks were thick. I scanned as best as I could and then after about five minutes I saw my first antler to my right - points down. Would've been not too hard to miss. So this corridor that I was walking through, was about 100 yards wide at the most between the road and a grassy opening. My goal was to walk close to the highway to make sure I didn't miss anything to my right. Sure enough that's where this antler was - about 50 ft from the sidewalk under some willows. The shed ended up scoring 63 5/8", which would've made him roughly gross 145". I'm pretty sure he was a four year old. There were a decent amount of people tracks on some of the walking trails, probably out walking their dogs. I put my money on that somebody else already found the other side.

We also got hit by a "record" snowstorm on Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday so that pretty much shut down looking any more. We received around 20" of snow and had 45 mph winds.