Another deer season is over...

Well, 2009 is over and along with ended the archery deer season for us. I was skunked again. It was looking like such a good year - we had less people tearing around through the woods, we put up treestands which let us see further and get our scent off the ground. But, the deer just weren't there.

I've heard from others that saw less deer this year. We've had several longer, snowier winters in a row which means higher mortality rates, especially for fawns. Corn crops were up late as well so deer could live in the crops and never be seen.

We're not without venison in the freezer though... A couple of friends who had success earlier in the season dropped off some meat and sausages. Then in November, Tim went up to Huntsville with a few friends for a the last weekend of rifle hunting and came home with a BIG buck.

The guys didn't have a single doe tag for the area up in Huntsville (you have to apply for them by lottery), and they saw plenty of does. Tim shot the only buck he saw... and it just might be the buck of a lifetime. 11 point rack (the 12th point didn't quite come to 1" so it doesn't officially count), HUGE browtines, and that grizzled roman nose of an old buck.

I know it might seem a bit morbid for some of you, but this is one of my favorite photos of the buck - taken where it fell. I love the way it is surrounded but it's woods, and leaves, and sky....


One of Tim's friends had an ATV along, but it got bogged down in the mud hauling this big boy out, so our new neighbour came to the rescue with his bulldozer!


A photo of Tim and his buck once he got it home:


With it being an old buck we decided to make a pile of sausage - our first attempt at homemade. We had a friend (Kevin) help out and guide us through the first batch. Here is Kevin working the sausage press - filling the casings:

Here is another friend Mary-Lou who also helped with the butchering and sausage making. That huge bowl in the foreground has 17 packages of sausage in it - about 1/3 of all the sausage we made that night.

We couldn't afford to get a full mount done of this gorgeous deer, but Tim picked a really nice kit to mount the rack with. Here is the finished work:





Tim placed it in near his chair in the living room, right over his reading lamp... we were surprised by the cool effects of the shadows cast on the wall and ceiling!


So, we celebrate the circle of life. It's an honour to be able to bring home good, clean, organic, free-range meat. It doesn't get any healthier than that! It's also an honour to be able to take the meat from the woods, through each necessary step, and to the table. It sure beats paying someone to present hormone-injected, colour-treated meat on a styrofoam tray wrapped in cellophane.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Edible, adj.: Good to eat, and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pig, a pig to a man, and a man to a worm.

~Ambrose Bierce

Getting high....

Those of you who know me, know that as I've gotten older I've become less comfortable with heights. This year we decided to put up a couple of 15' high ladder stands on the one farm. The first time I tried to climb up one I got 1/2 way up and came back down. The second time I tried I got all the way up, but was pretty tense about it. My hands were sweating and I couldn't let of of the little bit of metal at the seat. I have to add that we bought the cheapest, smallest stands they have - just a little seat and a small place for your feet. Not much to them. When you're up there you can't really see the ladder below and it's a pretty freaky feeling... well, for me anyways. In fact, my hands are all sweaty just typing about it. lol

The 3 of us have had the nasty bug that's been going around and it cut into our hunting season. So far neither Tim nor I have been able to go out. Yesterday was our first day in the woods - Tim was out in the morning.

In the afternoon I climbed up into one of the stands and tried to make peace with my fear of heights. At first I was awful. Being attached to the tree by the safety harness helped though. After a while I found it easier to look down and not have to fight the feelings of queasiness and vertigo. Eventually I could look over at the other tree trunks moving in the wind and not feel that extra surge of fear when my tree moved. By the time I climbed down I was feeling much better than when I first climbed up. There is hope.

Here's the view Tim had when he was out hunting yesterday morning from the stand at the other end of the woods:

Here I am in the other stand once I got my heart rate down and felt comfortable enough to take some pictures....



In my face net:

My Excalibur Vixen xbow is ready for action:


This is the view through the scope. It's only 2.4 x magnification but it has calibration for various yardages which makes for more accurate shot placement. It's a little tough to hold the bow level and position the camera for a picture at the same time so yeah, the bow & the crosshairs are canted.I'm sure you'll notice the absence of deer pictures... that would be because I didn't see any. I did see 3 noisy riders on horseback coming through the woods which I'm sure didn't help the deer situation any. I pulled up stakes and headed home before dark yesterday because my brother flew in from out west and we were to meet him at my Mom's in the evening. I didn't mind leaving early as it was getting plenty chilly up in the tree and I'd started shivering pretty hard. Still, it was absolutely wonderful to be out in the woods again. Even just walking to the stand wearing my camo and carrying my bow felt so very right. The few short hours in the woods left me feeling like a totally new person. Therapy of the best kind! I'm ready to climb back up for another hunt again and tackle that fear monster.

Hopefully those deer photos will be coming soon. :)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Fear is the father of courage and the mother of safety.

~Henry H. Tweedy

WOW weekend

A couple of weeks ago my friend Mary-Lou and I attended the WOW weekend put on by OFAH (Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters) just for women. Check out the website:
http://www.ofah.org/wow/index.cfm


Was a beautiful weekend at the camp up near Minden:


We were divided into smaller groups to rotate through a variety of activites, including shotgun & rifle shooting, bass fishing, canoeing, archery, survival skills, high ropes and the climbing wall, carving, among others.

Our group the range preparing to shoot shotguns:


The archery range:The canoes at the lakeside:

Practicing bundling a hypothermia victim for transport:

Fire starting - this one was using steel wool and a battery:


Wonderful pork roast on Saturday night:


Had fun carving a whistle Sunday morning:

It's neat to go to these all-women events and realize that there are more women that enjoy some of the things I enjoy! Makes me feel a little less like a square peg in a round hole.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels.

~Faith Whittlesey