2017-2018 season success

[mrbb]

OK might be a waste of time, but I figured I would start a tread for the 2017-2018 deer season
if anyone is lucky to kill one and WILLING to share here, by all means please do!

[00buck]

Been out had this one skirt around me https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20171020/ed7f0f347a368f3c6ee7fc8317e149cc.jpg

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[mrbb]

well best of luck getting him next time your out!

[00buck]

well best of luck getting him next time your out!I know it isn't a very good pic but how old you think it may be

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[mrbb]

rather impossible to tell age on that pic, to be honest, you need to see the body lines and such to even get a decent guess and even there it can be tricky
based on its head gear I would say its atleast a 3.5 yr old, or a really GOOD 2.5 yr old LOL

[zachc]

That's a good deer 00buck and good luck with him. I agree with mrbb, hard to tell agree from that but I'd say a good 3.5years old. It looks like the weather might break for us here very soon. Hopefully get these big boys on their feet during daylight hours.

[zachc]

114001140111402

I was able to fill a tag with this guy yesterday morning. With little to no luck on the new property with the stand I hung, I opted to take the climber in. I thought it was going to be a busier morning than what it was but oh well. He rolled through at 9:05 and he was the only deer I saw. Put a perfect shot on him and he piled up 35 yards later. The Grim Reaper laid literally a 3-4 feet wide blood trail!

[00buck]

114001140111402

I was able to fill a tag with this guy yesterday morning. With little to no luck on the new property with the stand I hung, I opted to take the climber in. I thought it was going to be a busier morning than what it was but oh well. He rolled through at 9:05 and he was the only deer I saw. Put a perfect shot on him and he piled up 35 yards later. The Grim Reaper laid literally a 3-4 feet wide blood trail!Congrats Zach I am hoping to make it back out this evening I have only seen smaller bucks since my last post and a 14 point with kickers of g2s but that deer wasn't writhing range hopefully that all changes tonight

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[mrbb]

congrats to you
and very glad someone here go a buck and shared the info on the site
been seeing bucks chasing does like crazy up my way past few days
got really cold too, had 3-4 inches of snow on Wed and really seemed to fire things up here

[nomad_archer]

There was no rut up at camp during the season. I got lucky to catch this guy going for a walk at 11am. Bad shot (liver) and 300+ yard recovery later.... I'm thrilled with him. First buck since 2011 and first deer with a bow in 2 years. Downside is I only saw 6 deer I 6 days of hunting.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20171114/d6ffa3b92c89f49456531c3d6b0f5d1c.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20171114/f3d63ee2d306d643af72180dd9228054.jpg

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[mrbb]

congrats to you Nomad
nice buck!

haven't seen many hunters in pa this yr with any luck, seems many guys just ain't putting much effort in around me, all complain about low deer numbers and not wishing to waste time sitting in the woods, rather do other things
Hunting traditions in PA I think are really dropping, as to just a few yrs back sadly!

[zachc]

Congrats nomad! That's a good buck.

I think I've seen the same as you as far as the rut goes. I spent a fair amount of time in the stand the first 2 weeks of November and didn't see much of any movement and the trail camera's haven't even been that active. Have some deer on them but nothing different from any other time of the season really. Talked to my brother and buddy a few days ago and same with them, no one is really seeing to many deer around here in daylight. I'm really glad I filled my buck tag before the Orange army hits in a couple weeks. Now it's time to try for a couple slick heads....

[nomad_archer]

Congrats nomad! That's a good buck.

I think I've seen the same as you as far as the rut goes. I spent a fair amount of time in the stand the first 2 weeks of November and didn't see much of any movement and the trail camera's haven't even been that active. Have some deer on them but nothing different from any other time of the season really. Talked to my brother and buddy a few days ago and same with them, no one is really seeing to many deer around here in daylight. I'm really glad I filled my buck tag before the Orange army hits in a couple weeks. Now it's time to try for a couple slick heads....

zach - I'm not done. Have 6 days of rifle doe season scheduled off work to maybe put another one or two in the freezer. OK two will be a stretch and really tough to do. But I will try anyway.

[nomad_archer]

congrats to you Nomad
nice buck!

haven't seen many hunters in pa this yr with any luck, seems many guys just ain't putting much effort in around me, all complain about low deer numbers and not wishing to waste time sitting in the woods, rather do other things
Hunting traditions in PA I think are really dropping, as to just a few yrs back sadly!

Stan, we saw about the same number of hunters as usual which wasn't much considering the amount of woods available up at camp. What was mind boggling was the fact that no one was hunting any of the leased timber company land. No one was hunting any of it. Must be opening day only guys I guess. Now that we went back to split seasons in 99% of the state, this is the first season I have had to sit out the opening week of the season. Thats a great problem to have. As for the low deer numbers in the mountains.... I dont know that its as bad as everyone is saying. I didn't see many deer but the sign tells me there is deer, they just weren't moving. I looked in some new woods and saw the best sign I have seen up there in 15 years. So they deer are slowly coming back in the northern tier. Hunting just isn't as easy as it was 20 years ago.

[mrbb]

Stan, we saw about the same number of hunters as usual which wasn't much considering the amount of woods available up at camp. What was mind boggling was the fact that no one was hunting any of the leased timber company land. No one was hunting any of it. Must be opening day only guys I guess. Now that we went back to split seasons in 99% of the state, this is the first season I have had to sit out the opening week of the season. Thats a great problem to have. As for the low deer numbers in the mountains.... I dont know that its as bad as everyone is saying. I didn't see many deer but the sign tells me there is deer, they just weren't moving. I looked in some new woods and saw the best sign I have seen up there in 15 years. So they deer are slowly coming back in the northern tier. Hunting just isn't as easy as it was 20 years ago.

I am sure some deer numbers are bouncing back due to lower hunter numbers if nothing else, but the big issue that will still remain is poor food quality in the big woods, there just is way too much mature timber that prevent new growth, which is what feed the numbers of deer we had back in the 70-80's, even into 90's, then things got stagnant, and quality food slipped and well, a deer needs to eat good food yr round, and being browsers by nature, lack of good browse(young growth), tends to prevent a lot of numbers of deer and will till forest get timbered more and new food become abundant in more places IMO

there will always be some that live there, but will never get back what we once had in numbers due to just lack of food, add in we lost well over 60% of farms in the past 20 yrs in PA, you start to see a LOT of food gone deer once had to live on!

the biggest saver IMO is actually lower hunter numbers , its helping numbers climb, but holding point will always be back to food, too many deer will again over eat what food they have and prevent forest from ever recovering!
dam state needs to timber more, more controlled fires too!
just sitting on massive amounts of land, doesn';t save wildlife! its destroying habitat not saving it, letting it over mature and then get over browsed, bad and bad management which IS and has been the biggest issue in PA! IMO!
they seem to just think things will fix them self, then take WAY too long to react when they finally see things going wrong, the past record of there misses are massive, from pheasant to deer to forest damage!

[nomad_archer]

There is a reason I dont hunt the ANF which is out our back door at camp. Its like central park. wide open. The places I do hunt have been timbered, have had selective cuts in the last 10 years or my favorite spot is timber company land and they have been doing clear cuts and selective cuts all around where I hunt. I could hear the saws running and tree's falling when I shot my buck. That coupled with lower hunter pressure has resulted in mores sign and more deer even if I didnt see them. The state forests, national forests could go for some timber cutting. It would do the deer heard and other wild life wonders. The latest decline is in the grouse populations. The state bird is taking a beating.

[mrbb]

HAHA< grouse, used ot have hundreds of them in my back yard and beyond, nothing to flush 25-50 an hour back in the 80-90's, NOW if I even see one its rare, I'd be scared to shoot it too, or at least feel bad,
as it might be the last one left here , and wouldn;'t want to be the one that killed it
LOL
lands here are mostlyu gun club lands and they do a lot of food plots(about a 150 acres on 2,000 acres of the one's clubs land)
but that doesn;t do crap for grouse
timbering and well, FIRE is whats needed on grouse habitat IMO< and that would again benefit ALL wildlife, accept Maybe coyotes, think lands make hunting harder on them IMO
all this open land we have now and smaller patches of woods in more rural area'
s just makes easier picking for them on game and what not's

forest fires when I was kid , were an every summer like deal, thousands of acres would burn up every summer, leaving behind lots of potash and that grew many things, from blue berry's to new growth , it just make things grow
NOW a days, a fire even starts to spark and its a race of Blue light trucks and cars to go put it out before it burns a few sq feet!
its a tool mother nature had, that we don't use any more, and its NOT helping wildlife or our forested lands at all IMO

too many folks scared of law suits to do controled burns, including the sate game dept!
one of there tools they used for yrs and yrs, and NOW< like so many other game animals, its missing in how often you seen it happen!

[zachc]

11403

Not a bow harvest but I was able to put some doe meat in the freezer Monday morning. Had 3 does and a button buck roll though at 8:00.

[mrbb]

11403

Not a bow harvest but I was able to put some doe meat in the freezer Monday morning. Had 3 does and a button buck roll though at 8:00.

well congrats to you, still a kill for the season!

and its been very quiet up here , very little shooting for a PA gun season going on?
and very few hunters been driving past my place(big gun club down the road from me<
sure seems like hunter numbers are dropping, or in my area for sure

[zachc]

Mrbb it's been quiet here also this season. I talk to a lot of guys who bow and gun hunt and not a lot of action this year so far. No one I talk to has shot a buck yet and only a few guys have taken does, deer movement seems to be pretty slow this year for some reason ?? Not sure what's going on?

[mrbb]

yeah been super slow as to last or yrs in the past here, did hear a bunch of shooting on Friday, think they started doing a lot of deer drives behind me, as all shooting was pretty 2-3-4 shot strings, which tend to be running shots here and misses more than hits LOl

Saturday was pretty quiet however, not even many trucks going by, as again to normal/yrs back first saturdays

on a side note, I had 3 bears show up last night, mother and 2 cubs, so looks like she made it thru the LEGAL part of bear season here, which to me is cool as she is about 11 yrs old now and got to watch her grow up since a cub , she's on her 3 litter of cubs(first was 4, second was 3 and third is now these two) and even crazier, I actually got to see her get bred the first and last litter, just dumb luck happened to turn on lights and they were going at it in my back yard LOL
first set of cubs was by a smaller male, maybe 350 lbs and this last set was a monster male about 600-625 lbs, he dwarfed her when he was on top, he dogged her for weeks too, and she would take refuge on my deck, as he was for what ever reason scared to come up on deck, it was a funny time watching them, and a huge bear to get to watch as well, she was/is a much larger than normal female too, all of 350 lbs

here is a pic of them together, during the chase stage