Game camera pictures.

Okay, I thought I had looked through the game camera pictures and didn't see anything interesting, but when I went back through them I found a new buck that really looks promising. He's a 9 point this year and I would guess him to be a 3 1/2 year old. Not sure if he will stick around until next hunting season, and he isn't quite as nice as the 3 1/2 year old 11 point that I passed up during this season, but he should be a very respectable buck next year.

On first glance I would have to say that he must share some heritage with the buck that I had named Double Wide. If Double Wide wasn't his daddy, then he must have been his brother. Maybe I should call him DW jr.
The bucks are starting to use the protein feeder, but not like usual for this time of year. I guess the combination of the wetter than usual winter and the food plots that turned out really good this year is making them less dependent on the protein pellets. Last year I was going through 300lbs of pellets every 3 weeks, this year I only added 50lbs the last month. Here's a decent group at the feeder together.
The pigs are coming around pretty regularly. I got pictures of 2 different sounders that both had over a dozen pigs in them. I saw 2 pig beds where they had made a nest to have their babies when I was stomping around trying to spook up some quail this weekend. It really is amazing how nice and neat they make their beds, they tear up grass and layer it all around the perimeter. It ends up looking like a giant birds nest on the ground. I should have taken some pictures.

This is the biggest boar that I've got coming around on a regular basis. I would guess he is in the 200lb range.
The brown one in the middle of this picture is about the same size. He has a huge scar on his right side probably from fighting with another boar over a hot momma pig!
I think the guy in the middle in this picture was the one I shot this weekend. Looked about like this group when they came in, and he was the biggest of the group.
When I was cutting him up and putting him in the cooler it was already dark and I could hear the other pigs wanting to come back to the feeder. Some of them didn't sound really happy and the piglets would squeal occasionally. Actually made me a little nervous.

I really need to get some kind of night vision scope or something because they are very comfortable in the dark, they were probably within 100 yards of me and I had my car right there and was working with a light on, so they knew I was there. They probably hung around grunting and crashing through the brush for 10 or 15 minutes and decided I was taking too long so they must have went somewhere else. A thermal imaging scope would be AWESOME but the cheapest one I've found was $8,400 so I don't think I need one that bad.

Couple other pictures that I thought were neat. We've had more snow this year than any time I can remember living here over 20 years now. They said it was the 5th white Christmas in Lubbock's history. Here's a Christmas eve doe.

This guy is not a huge buck or anything, just a standard 2 1/2 year old 9 point, but I really thought the sky in the background made this picture turn out neat.

I really think these trail cameras are so neat. Amazing what you can see out there when you have someone looking for you 24/7/365.

That's it for now.

Nathan

First pig of 2010.

I got a chance to go down to the land this weekend and picked up my first pig of 2010. Nice, medium sized boar.

The cooler is just over 2' long for size perspective. This guy came in with 3 large sows and several smaller pigs of various sizes and I just picked out the largest one and pulled the trigger. My guess (based on weighing other similar sized pigs) would be just under 150lbs.

I actually didn't make a very good shot on him, although he dropped in his tracks. Hit about 6" forward from where I was aiming at 140 yards. After the shot one piglet actually hung around long enough for me to get another shot off and I missed it. Not sure if I pulled the shot or if my scope is off again. I guess I'm going to have to put some time in at the range and get it figured out.

Here's a picture from my hunting blind after I shot the pig. You can see the pig smack dab under the feeder! My blind is 140 yards from the feeder and about 60 feet higher. Occasionally I will end up putting a spot and stalk on some pigs if they are in one of the fields, but generally I wait for them to show up at the feeder. With only 160 acres to hunt it's pretty hard to go find the pigs, you have to get them to come to you. With deer, the mature bucks have the feeders figured out, so you have to figure out where else they might be.

I also ended up shooting a couple quail, as well as checking my trail cameras. Nothing too exciting, but I'll probably post of few of them. One of my cameras ended up getting wet so I'm hoping it is repairable. I remembered on my way home that I had turned off the camera at the feeder where I shot the pig and forgot to turn it back on after I had the pig cut up and in the cooler.

Oh well, that's it for now. I think I'm going to try to make some ham out of this one.

Nathan

Side Yard Mule Deer

Okay, these guys weren't exactly in the yard, they actually weren't on "our" property, but it is only about a 600 yard walk over to where they were.

There are sure getting to be more and more deer around, that's for sure. In the first 5 or 6 years we lived out here we saw 3 deer total, all years combined. Now It's getting to where I can see some deer about anytime I want to take a little walk. Last time I counted 8 and this time I saw 10.

The largest buck and a couple does ran off before I got a chance to take any pictures. There were 3 others down in the bottom that I took pictures of also, but I thought this group of 4 turned out the best.

I think if it was just me they might stick around a little longer, but my dogs have been going with me and the deer aren't sticking around long. About time to go.And they're off.. They really didn't run off that fast, just a nice trot. I'm hoping I'm not spooking them too badly that they will quit bedding down there. They have been pretty consistent the last couple months. I thought this picture with the cliff looked pretty cool.
Oh well, not much of a post. Just went out for a walk, took some pictures and thought I would share.

Nathan

Now I need to decide on a scope.

Okay, I think I'm going to go with the Rock River Arms Varmint A4 flat top model with a 20" stainless steel bull barrel.

Now I have to decide what I'm going to top it with....

The ACOG scopes are very interesting, but I'm just not sure how well they are going to be for long distances. I regularly see coyotes from 300 - 450 yards that I would like to be able to reach out and touch with some confidence and the ACOGs are only 4X or 5.5X magnification versus 10X - 16X on a traditional scope.

The ACOG sounds like it would be perfect for lighting up a sounder of hogs on the run though!

I'm mainly looking at the 4X 32mm version. Here's a picture of it.

In all reality most shots I would be taking would be within 200 yards and the ACOG should be fine for that range. I doubt it would be up for 400+ yard shots at prarie dogs though like I could probably play around with with a 4-16X 50mm Nikon Monarch.

Pretty much just looks like a standard rifle scope.


The ACOG would be better in low light from what I understand and no doubt it wins in the "coolness" department. ;-)

I better slow down on my research, at this rate I might actually end up buying something before next year!

Decisions, decisions...

Well, after sitting in my hunting blind and watching 2 bobcats walk by me at 125 yards but not wanting to punch big holes in them with my 7mm Mag I've been debating on getting something else to use specifically for varmints (coyotes, bobcats, raccoons, maybe even pigs).

I've been researching buying an AR-15 style gun and it is pretty daunting. There are literally MILLIONS of different choices out there. Dozens of manufacturers and all of the parts are pretty much interchangeable. Buying the parts and building your own is an option that many folks end up going with. I kind of like the camouflage stocks and stainless steel barrels though, and there aren't that many options in those. Most manufacturers are even putting them out in several different calibers instead of just .223 or .308 now as well.

I'm leaning toward Remington's R-15 in .223/5.56mm with a 24" stainless steel barrel. Here's a picture of one:

I know the last thing you should be use to decide on whether to buy a gun or not is based on looks, but I really like the way the camo guns look and there is a chance that the camo may help me when I'm out coyote hunting vs a big black gun.

Bushmaster makes a camo version as well but they don't have stainless barrels and I'm all about low maintenance. They do have a 2 stage trigger that sounds like a step up from the Remington though. Here's the Bushmaster:

If I wasn't stuck on the camo versions, Rock River Arms has about the best reputation for AR-15 style guns and they make a varmint gun with a 20" stainless steel bull barrel that runs about the same cost as the camo versions from Remington and Bushmaster. It also has a 2 stage trigger that should help with accuracy. Here's the Rock River Arms varmint gun.

Of course deciding on the gun is just the start, then I need to decide on a scope to go with it. If I stick to my usual timeline on making decisions maybe I'll decide one way or the other by this time next year!

If anyone has any input one way or the other I'm all ears.

Thanks, Nathan

First time down to the land in 2010....

Got a chance to run down to the land on and check on things. 2 out of the 4 cameras I had out weren't working and the 2 that were working didn't get many pictures.

Was thinking I might have a chance at shooting a piggie, and saw plenty of evidence they've been around but didn't see any while I was there. It is amazing how big of an area a pig can root up. Several huge spots were rooted up about 2 feet deep and around 10 or 12 feet in diameter. No idea what they were looking for, one of the areas they were rooting up was bare ground.

Saw a group of 7 bucks together. None of them were very big, and none of them were the nice 3 1/2 year old 11 point I had passed on either. Still no pictures of him on the trail camera either. I sure hope he made it through the season. Usually by this time they are hitting my protein feeder hard, but my food plots are still holding in there and I guess they must still be using them, because I only added 50lbs of protein pellets to the feeder and the last time I filled it up was in August I think.

Saw a lot of coyotes. 2 separate pairs and a couple singles for a total of 6. No real shot opportunities on the pairs but I did shoot one of the singles at 160 yards.

The big surprise was that I saw a pair of bobcats! And the male was HUGE! I guess it must be getting close to breeding season for bobcats because the larger one was trailing behind the smaller one. I would imagine that the one in front was a female and the big one was a male. I guess I'm didn't hurt the population of bobcats too bad by trapping one.

Not much else going on. Very busy at work so far.

That's it for now.

Nathan

Snow Week!

Well, I've been meaning to post on our Snow Day that we had on Christmas Eve, but since there is still plenty of it left on our road, I guess I need to call it a Snow Week!

We generally don't get much snow here, maybe an inch or two a couple times a year, but we got about 4 or 5 inches this time, pushed by 30 - 40 mph winds so we ended up with some pretty impressive drifts in a few spots. The main road that we get to our house on runs east and west and is below the normal lay of the land it ended up looking more like a snow drift than a road!

Here's a picture of our mailbox last Thursday evening. The line you see in the snow between the 2 tire tracks is the rear differential of our 4x4 pickup dragging in the snow.

We didn't get out to play in the snow until late Friday afternoon (Christmas Day) but the snow wasn't going anywhere. Cathy had fun getting to the mailbox to see if there was any mail since we hadn't checked it on Thursday!

Nope. No mail! The old saying about come rain, snow, sleet or hail isn't really that accurate, we are still picking up our mail at the post office a week later! The joys of country living. This kind of gives you an idea of what the road was like. Going West the drift was at least 3 feet deep for a couple hundred yards.
Not as pretty of a picture, but I took this one this evening. The snow is still a couple feet deep! (still no mail!)
It was actually worse going to the East. The drift was 3 to 4 feet deep to start with, and it goes a full mile in that direction.
Here's the same drift today. It is still over 2 feet deep along the North side of the road.
Here's the road that is actually passable. Those ruts are about 8" deep. My 4x4 Trailblazer occasionally drags high center going through them. You feel like you are in a pinball machine bouncing back and forth in the ruts.
While the roads haven't been fun to deal with, we have had some fun in the snow. Eli had a blast! He loved every minute of it. He said "My skin hurts" after he had been playing out there for a while, it really was the first time he actually got to play in the snow in his life, since it normally melts right off.

First thing he did when we got outside was plop down and make a snow angel. It is amazing what they pickup on their own, we hadn't even mentioned making a snow angel before he did it. The snow had melted a little and refroze so there was a crust on the surface that made it a little harder to play in than when it was soft and fluffy. You could almost walk on the top of the drift, but then you would find yourself breaking through and being waist deep.

After I broke through in one spot I dug it out a little and dropped Eli in there. It was pretty much as deep as he was and it wasn't all the way down to the ground. At one point Cathy looked over and couldn't see him and got a little freaked out, but then he popped back up and started trying to climb out.

That's pretty much it for 2009.
There are a bunch more pictures of Eli playing in the snow if you are interested http://padens.com/v-web/gallery/album09?page=9
They start in the middle of that page and go onto page 10.

We've had a great 2009, hopefully 2010 will be just as good if not better. Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

Nathan