Trail Camera Pictures

Well, I haven't had much to post about, but I finally got my latest trail camera pictures uploaded so I figured I would share those.

My niece visited last weekend and we went pig hunting one evening but didn't see any pigs. I stayed an extra day but they stripped the cotton in the field next to my property and I only saw one pig about a 1/2 mile away and moving. It wasn't ever on my property that I could tell.

I got a decent picture of a bobcat during the daylight on one of my cameras. Not a perfect picture but the cat sure looks pretty with some great spots.

When it gets cold enough I'm going to try to set some traps out for it, but I'm not sure how successful I'll be since it usually takes several days for a bobcat to find a trap set and I usually only have time to leave one out for a night or two at the most.

I got another interesting critter on the trail camera. I guess porcipines like corn too!



It got me thinking of all the different animals that I've seen in person or gotten pictures of on the land since I've owned it less than two years. Of course I've seen plenty of deer and pigs, also plenty of raccoons! Some other critters I've seen or gotten pictures of include a javelina, coyotes, bobcats, porcipine, skunks, rabbits, armadillos, and a badger. I think that's it for animals. I've also seen Turkey, quail, dove, cardinals, blue jays, hawks, owls, buzzards, and a bunch of other birds. Rattlesnakes, bull snakes, turtles. I'm sure I'm leaving something out. It really is amazing the diversity of critters on one 160 acre piece of property.

I posted a bunch of other trail camera pictures if you are interested. They start on page 10 and go to page 11. There are several different bucks but nothing too exciting. Some pigs as well including a new batch of piglets.

Here's a link - http://padens.com/v-web/gallery/album04?page=10

Well, that's about it for now. Missed a few posts lately, things are getting busy at work and I'm sure I could come up with a few other good excuses!

Later. Nathan

Doublewide is Down!

Well, the buck that was #1 on my hit list for this year is down!

Not the biggest buck as far as antlers go, but he is for sure the oldest deer I've ever shot. The only problem was that it was too quick, I shot him on the evening of the 2nd day of rifle season. I passed on a really nice looking 2 1/2 year old the first evening and watched a couple spikes roaming all over the property and saw one forkhorn as well. I didn't see a doe the entire time.

About 30 minutes before sunset a spike crossed one of my fields and came through the creek bottom and then about 5 minutes later Doublewide followed him up out of the creek bottom. About 5 minutes later he was on the ground. Shot was at 125 yards and I actually hit him a little forward of where I was aiming and went through both shoulders and he dropped on the spot.

He is actually so old his antlers are regressing. He had a pretty nice rack last year and that's when he got the nickname of "Doublewide." This year he lost about 4" in spread and about 10" in tine length and some mass as well. He actually is fairly small bodied for a buck in my area, so it made his rack look a little bigger than it actually was also. He weighed 172lbs on the hoof.

He only scores 112 2/8 but he is still one of my all time trophies in my eyes. I'm working on bleaching his skull out and trying to decide how to mount it. I'm wanting to put his jawbones on there somehow, I think they are as much of a trophy as his antlers. Also thinking of putting some of last years trail camera pictures with it as well as some of the harvest pictures on a plaque or something. Oh well, now for the pictures.




Self portrait with a timed camera on the backpack:


Here are some trail camera pictures that show that his antlers actually were smaller this year than last year.

First a comparision of his spread. First picture is before he shed last year's antlers, second picture is when he was pretty much done growing this years antlers. I don't have any pictures of him after he shed the velvet off of this years antlers for a perfect comparison, but you can see that he is several inches narrower this year than last year.



Next is a comparision of his tine length. Again, the first picture is before he shed last year's antlers, second picture is when he was pretty much done growing this years antlers. His right side was particularly smaller this year than last year.



The only negative aspect of the whole thing is that the county that I hunt in is a 1 buck county, so it looks like that is the end of my deer hunting for this year.

Another interesting thing about this weekend was the number of predators that were out during the day. I saw 3 coyotes and a bobcat all during the day. I ended up shooting all 3 of the coyotes. 1 was at 256 yards, 1 was at 251 yards and 1 was at 125 yards. I was feeling pretty good about my shooting abilities after that and dropping Doublewide with one shot, but somehow I missed a pig that came into the feeder after dark the last evening!

Here are some pictures of a couple of the coyotes that I shot. I didn't include one because it ended up pretty messy. I was shooting 175 grain bullets out of my 7mm Reg Mag so it was a little overkill for coyotes.




Well, I might have exceeded the allowable post size with this one! I actually have some pretty good trail camera shots to post as well but I'll save that for later.

I guess that's it for now.

Nathan

Quail Hunting...

Well it was a BEAUTIFUL week weather wise. We had several awesome evenings with temperatures in the mid 60's, calm wind, and not a cloud in the sky.

Saw a very nice mature whitetail buck and doe one evening on the way home from work as I turned the corner on the way to the house so that was neat (they were on my property about 400 yards from the house with 2+ hours of daylight left - I think the rut must be starting).

I saw the first ever pheasant on my property, a huge rooster that flew into my CRP grass from my sorghum that I planted this spring.

However, I only saw 1 covey of about a dozen quail on the property around the house. I shot 2 of them and that will probably be the extent of my quail hunting around the house unless I see more quail than that. Late this summer I had 2 good coveys hanging out, but not sure where the other one went. The cotton fields haven't been stripped yet so they may be hanging out in them.

Dove season goes 1 more week but there aren't many dove hanging out around here right now. I think we need another hard cold front to bring the rest down but hunting season will be over by then. I may do a little quail hunting down on my Fisher county property, I have 3 or 4 good coveys down there, but I hate to quail hunt during deer season since I would rather shoot a nice deer than some quail. Maybe I'll get a big buck down early and be able to spend some time on quail.

Here's my results from Saturday's hunt. 2 Dove and 2 Quail.



I'm hoping to go down to our land in Fisher county this weekend for opening weekend of deer season. Not sure if that will happen or not though.

I did get my chainsaw out and cut up some smaller dead trees around the house and got some firewood ready. It started right up and worked great.

Not a lot else happening here.

Dove hunting

Well, I got to go out dove hunting this evening and got my limit (15) right as the sun went down. Our dog Baby helps me find them after I pull the trigger.



Not a whole lot else to talk about. Things at work have a little lull before they are going to start picking up again for real in a few more weeks. Cathy went to Weatherford to visit her parents so I'm on my own this week. I should be able to go out dove hunting a few more times this week after work but the season is over this weekend, but that means quail season starts this weekend too!

That's about it for now.

Nathan

New trail camera - Videos!

Well, I got a new trail camera and put it out a month ago and was pretty happy with the results this weekend when I went to check on it. It is a tiny camera compared to my others (it is smaller than a coke can) and it seems to work very well also. It cost about the same as the last one but seems to work much better. Hopefully it will last better since I'm already sending in my last one for repairs under warranty.

It got as many animals set out on a trail as some of my other cameras did set up on feeders!

I had a hard time deciding which ones to post so I'll just post a whole bunch of them and if you want to click on them then go ahead. I've had cameras out on the property for nearly 2 years now, and the scoutguard got my first bobcat on film in less than a month of being out there.

I got a bobcat and coyote on camera:





I got several different bucks on camera:







A couple young bucks decided to have a sparring match right in front of the camera:


I got several does with and without fawns:




And here is a video of a what seems to be a single doe walking by, but right at the end you see a shadow on the right of the screen and the next video is her twin fawns walking by. (I have it set to take 10 second videos then pause 5 seconds and take another 10 second video if there is still motion detected)





That's about it. Hope you enjoy the videos. There were about 50 good videos but several were of the same deer on different days and a few pigs and raccoons as well. Overall I was very impressed with my new camera.

Nathan

Weekend at the land

Well, Cathy went to visit her parents and help with her mom after she had knee surgery so I went down to the land this weekend. I wanted to shoot a pig to try out my new meat grinder making sausage and had a few projects to get done as well and I was supposed to meet a guy there who was going to buy my old trailer plus of course I wanted to check my trail cameras.

I bought a new husqvarna chainsaw last winter with the intention of using it to do some work down on the land as well as cut up some firewood to bring back to the house but never did get around to it until this weekend. I pulled it out of the box and read the instructions and mixed some 2 stroke oil and bought some chain oil and was ready to go. After 2 days of trying to start it I'm about to give up on it. The amazing thing is that one of the main reasons that I chose that particular model of chainsaw was because I read several reviews of how easy it was to start compared to other chainsaws. I'm going to take it in and hopefully there is an easy fix.

I ended up using the tractor as a chainsaw on some of the trees that I had intended to trim back and it actually worked pretty good. I just put the loader up on the tree trunk about 5 or 6 feet off the ground and gave it a good push and branches and trees up to about 5" - 6" would just break off. I may have got more done that way than I would have with the chainsaw. I also mowed a few shooting lanes through the brush to help me be able to see the deer when they are moving through. I may end up making these a little wider and plant some wheat or oats on them for next fall.

Here is a view looking south from my hunting blind:

Here is a close up of the shooting lane that I cleared:


I may end up putting in a few more shooting lanes at some point and maybe even plant some wheat and oats or clover or something in them. It is almost impossible to see deer moving through the mesquite it is so thick.

Here's a picture from the blind looking out into the mesquite. Believe it or not, I've actually done some clearing before this picture was taken.


I sat in the blind 2 nights and 2 mornings and saw deer each time except for the last morning. I saw pigs on the first morning for just a brief period moving through the trees and then shot a pig on the 2nd evening at the feeder when they came in basically after dark. I was BARELY able to see the pig through the scope and it dropped right in it's tracks so I didn't have to mess with tracking it in the dark. So, I was able to try out my new meat grinder and ended up making 30lbs of breakfast sausage. I made a spicy batch and a mild batch and it turned out pretty good. I didn't add any fat to the mix and it turned out a little lean for sausage but I'm not sure if that is really a bad thing or not. The pig ended up a little bloody so I won't post a picture of it.

I was really happy with my new trail camera. I had it on video mode and I got videos of a bobcat and coyote as well as several deer and pigs. It is on a trail and seems to work very well. The bad news is that I didn't get any pictures of stickers or double wide. They seem to have shifted their ranges and aren't coming to the protein feeder anymore. I have 2 other bucks that are both decent bucks that are still showing up sporadically but the consistent users of the protein feeder are now all young bucks.

Not sure when I'll be able to get back down there. Maybe for the opening of quail season, but I might not be able to get back down there until deer season starts.

I think that is about it. Nathan

Nothing exciting...

Well, back to the grind this week. Got the elk butchered and that took a little longer than I had expected but also got a new toy in the process, a small meat grinder that worked pretty well to make some elk burger and I'll hopefully be trying it out making some pork sausage sometime soon. When it was all said and done, we ended up with around 200lbs of meat in the freezer so that helps a little in justifying the expense of going on the hunt. It calculates out to some pretty expensive meat though!

I'm getting caught up at work and with chores around the house. The tractor still isn't running as well as it should, but I did get some work done with it, planted about 3 acres of wheat and oats and got some mowing done. The mosquitos are out of this world after that last big rain! They actually ran out of insect repellent sprays at nearly every store in Lubbock last week. You know the mosquitos are bad when there was over a 1/2 page article on the front page of the newspaper about them!

That's really about it. Just trying to get back in the habit of posting once a week again.

Nathan