.My hunting buddy was busy today so I went solo. I had a great day just spending time enjoying God's amazing creation. I made it to the lake a little before sun-up and found that the spot I wanted was already taken (I knew I shouldn't have hit the snooze). I was beat by real duck hunters that were probably out there a couple of hours before me I don't know how well they did, but they sure did a bunch of shooting. On my way to plan B, I saw what I thought was a cow running towards my explorer. Turned out it was the biggest hog I have ever seen, as he ran across of the front of my car I could see his back over the hood. The hair stood up on my neck as I was thankful I had not encountered him face to face out in the woods. He was HUGE and unbelievable how fast he was. I do carry a sidearm, but I don't know if I would have time to even get it out. Anyway, I continued on to LZ Bravo hoping that it would be more active than the last time I was there. I setup with only one decoy because it seemed the larger spread was causing them to flair last time. Turned out it was a good move, I was there for about 30 minutes and had a single come in; one shot, one kill. I'll pause here to say every duck hunter needs a hiviz sight on the end of their boomstick. I am shooting much better with this simple addittion. As I walked across the water to retrieve the duck I jumped the same buck I saw in the area the last time I was there. That little stinker sat in the brush even after I was shooting at the bird, and didn't jump until I was about 20 yards away. He is a pretty nice deer, 6 or 8 point, and would make a great first deer. I made a mental note of where he jumped from and watched where he headed to. The conditions for ducks couldn't have been much better. The sun didn't come out from the overcast until around noon. The first bid was a gadwall hen, I was a bit bummed that I took a hen, and made sure that I checked my fire a little better after that. I passed on a few more hens that came in and then had a group of mixed mallards come in right next to my single deke. I picked out a drake and again, one shot, one kill. I was setting behind a tree and could not get a good shot on the trailling drake as he turned and flew away on the other side of the tree I was on. As I was sitting waiting for more friends to show up, I had the fattest raccoon show up and play around at the water's edge for a while. It was fun to watch him work around the water. He was lucky I didn't have my furbearers license or I would be working on a coon skin cap. It was really neat to just observe all the critters, I had a woodpecker show up and provide some entertainment along with crows, robins, and a ton of finches. I only had clearance from the boss for a half day hunting trip, so I folded up the shop around 10 and headed back to the car to trade the gunpowder for the longbow. On my way back into the area, I ran into 3 pointer's with two worn out guys behind them. They had been out all morning without seeing a single quail. Numbers are low this year, I could have saved them some time, there aren't any quail on the 6k acres I've been on up there. Anyway, after scratching some ears and shooting the breeze I headed back to where I saw that buck take off. I was hoping that after a couple of hours he might work his way back to his favorite spot where I would be waiting. On my way in I spotted a deer back in the woods a little bit, and the stalk was on. I didn't expect to be able to get close enough for a shot but I thought I'd give it a shot. I never had a complete look at him but we had a little cat and mouse game for about a half hour. It was a blast. The area I was in was all sand, so I could get around with relatively low noise. I did my best to stay down wind from him but he eventually outsmarted me and got to his teleport and disappeared. I made my way into a good spot with concealment and sat for the last couple of hours there. I'll be dog gonned if another coon didn't come meandering around to within about 10 yards of me. He was a fat & healthy one too. I tossed a stick at him and he looked like he had been shot, and away he went. I didn't want him to get any closer than that, I didn't really want one of those cute cudly buzzsaws in my lap trying to fight my way out. As I was waiting out my white tailed friend, I was watching the slough I had been hunting earlier. Wouldn't ya know the ducks were just pouring into it now that I had put the scatter gun up. Don is working on making some flu flu arrows that we are going to attempt to take some quackers with them. That should be a load of fun, and needless to say, a bit challenging. Well, I had completely enjoyed my day and all God's awesome little critters, so I headed back to the car and headed home. There is just nothing like a day in the woods, especially when you can bring home supper!
Brian
