december is upon us

I have definitely been slacking on updating my blog, no doubt about that.  As promised I will explain all the intricacies of the rut, but that will have to wait for my next entry.  I kind of had a long day and I'm just sitting at home listening to some music, unwinding I guess, thinking about the days events and figured I would share a little hunting experience with everyone.  Right now is what you call the "late season" or "post rut" stage.  Hunting can get tough this time of year, or it can be a cake walk, entirely dependent upon whether you're on a food source or not.  Food is getting scarce this time of year for deer, and if you're not on a food source, good luck.  However, for those hunters that  have a reliable late season food source on their hunting land, such as a "food plot" which they planted and maintain, they know exactly where the deer will be.  I myself haven't yet jumped onto the food plot bandwagon, honestly I think I will though.  Having a food plot not only lets you know where the deer will be late season but it supports a healthy deer population. I have typically never had any problem finding what the deer are eating this time of year, but this season I haven't been as lucky.  In the past, once the rut ends and the temperatures drop, I could always count on finding deer eating honeysuckle and honey locust.  However this year the honeysuckle is abundant, yet hasn't been touched by deer.  This is odd.  One other thing to consider about late season hunting, at this point every deer has had some form of hunting pressure on them.  Back in October, during bow season, and even into early november, muzzleloader season, a lot of deer hadn't seen a human all year and if they did that human probably meant them no harm.  But once rifle season comes in, every asshole who owns a gun heads for the woods and tries to shoot bambi.  So every deer in the woods has either seen a hunter, smelled a hunter, heard a gunshot, or been shot at.  So they will be much more cautious about when they come out of hiding to feed, and where they go to feed.  Rifle season is fun and all, but if you want to get serious about deer hunting, I promise you bow hunting and muzzleloader hunting is where it's at.  And for the record, modern muzzleloaders are basically just single shot high powered rifles, so if you choose to muzzleloader hunt you're not really losing the experience of shooting a deer long range with a rifle.  Just something to consider.  In my next entry I promise I will explain the rut, also talk a little about my hunting trip in the mountains. Until next time, I leave you with a latin proverb, simple but powerful:
"Fortes fortuna adiuvat" which simplies means "Fortune favors the bold."