Tis the season… the season that makes “weekend widows,” as my wife likes to say. I’ve started a week or two ago setting random early morning alarms to train my subconscious to be alert when the time is needed, whether it be 3, 4, or 5 a.m. I’ll be ready, coffee thermos in hand, squinty eyed and bushy tailed, ready for what the day in the field will bring. The time is at hand for walking down cool, dark, and narrow dew-covered trails and spending the sunrise pondering things that can only come to mind after hours of sitting still, quietly meditating, looking deep into the wildness and thinking about nothing but the moment at hand.
Saturday morning kicked off yet another full-fledged hunting season and I spent the majority of the weekend focused on bagging a big buck. I started on Saturday morning by making the long trek down the St. Johns to where I parked the boat and walk another 1.58 miles to my final resting place perched above the swampy water overlooking a former cow pasture now covered in 6-8 inches of water. I saw 4 does and a few pigs but didn’t take any shots.
Sunday I was able to go with my mom’s husband, Jim, to their neighbor’s property in Ocala and hunt but again, no bucks-- just does.
On another note, it looks like this year, in stark contrast to last year, is going to be a bumper crop for duck hunting! I’m seeing really good signs that indicate the ducks will stick around for the majority of the winter. Good food, good air temperatures and great water levels are expected to grace us throughout the winter. So, you never know; I could go deerless this year and just concentrate on the mighty fowl. Time will only tell.
Here’s another report I sent out to a few close friends giving them a rundown of my weekend. Enjoy….
Assuming that you didn’t hunt here’s a little update:
I’m really, really sore today!
If you haven’t worked out your groin muscles lately, I suggest you start now! it’s like trying to walk through SNOW!!! But it’s not frozen…so it’s like trying to walk through WATER!!!!
They haven’t mowed the dikes since early teal and there are 3 places that the grass is over 6 feet tall for around 30 yards each. One of these areas is where I got ran off by a pack of angry pigs who seemed to have made their residence in the lovely jungle on the dike!!! Another of those areas is where I couldn’t see the trail anymore and FELL OFF the dike!!! Awesome! Right now the water is about 3 feet from cresting the dike and when you walk off the dike in the dark you don’t have much of a choice but to faceplant in the mud…YUCK! That is, of course, after your tree stand that you’re heaving along hits you in the back of the head. OUCH!
Anyways, I saw the same four deer that I saw during the archery hunts I went on, two big does and two little does/deer/not spotted (seems like a nice little family). And aside from the angry pig encounter, those ten or so I ran into on the dike is about it for pig sightings.
REMINDER: Watch out for SNAKES on the dikes!!! And watch out for floating ant blobs. While walking through the water, there are blobs of ants you will brush into and they make your waders their new home, complete with a Thanksgiving meal in the form of your legs and neck.
The ducks are EVERYWHERE! There huge flocks of teal, lots of Floridas, shuvlers, mallards (yes, I said MALLARDS!), pintails and everything in between. They are definitely looking for that 6 inch water. I was on a tree that overlooked a flooded pasture and the ducks were DUMPING into it; unfortunately it’s about 2 MILES from…well… everywhere. Get those waders and choke tubes and canoe paddles ready because it’s going to be a bumper crop this year.
The OLD canal (the filled in one) is questionable whether it can be run in a kicker boat right now; a few airboats ran it Saturday but it doesn’t seem to have a clear cut path yet. It DOES, however, look a lot better to canoe down than the ditch it parallels. Then again, my hatred for that ditch is still strong after I got stuck in the hydrilla during bow season. On Friday I would like to try to get from Lake Winder to the mud hut, so if anyone’s interested in scouting or bushwhacking let me know.
I was in Ocala on Sunday and saw 2 does and 1 unidentified, and oh yes, the owner of the deer stand I was sitting in…oops, little mix up there…I guess he WAS coming to his property this weekend…
Anyways, that’s my report.
CHEERS! Capt. Nate
www.natesoutdooralmanac.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment