Hunting 2020

I am happy to announce that we will continuing our tradition for the 14th year in a row of having fresh venison as a side dish for Thanksgiving dinner. Sadly, Thanksgiving 2020 will not be be the extravaganza it usually is because of Covid.

Opening day, Saturday November 21, 2020, was unseasonably warm with temperatures in the mid 50s. As often happens when it is too warm, the deer just weren’t moving.

Overnight, the temperatures dipped and when I arrived in my hunting stand it was 28 degrees with a heavy frost on the ground. I like to get situated in my hunting stand an hour before first light. That will give everything a chance to settle down before sunrise.

Just as it became light enough to hunt, I spotted a deer at the far side of the field. With the LASER rangefinder my target was 140 yards away. Through the crosshairs of my scope, it looked to be a rather large doe. Sometimes I question if they are big enough and I have passed on shots if I feel the deer is too small. But this one looked HUGE.

I took my time lining up the shot with my crosshairs steadily on the right side of her chest. When I released the shot, the doe took off diagonally across the field. She ran 30 to 40 yards and ducked into the hedgerow at the bottom of the field. Oh, no! I remembered two years ago when my buck tumbled halfway down the ravine in heavy snow and it was quite a chore to drag him out.

I waited about 15 minutes before getting down from my stand. When I walked to the spot where I saw the doe enter the hedgerow, I was quite relieved to finding her lying not 10 feet inside the trees. Praise and thanks!

It was quite dark inside the hedgerow where I found the deer, but through the magic of flash photography we captured the picture.

One can see how large the deer is by the way she fills the bucket of my tractor.

The next step is my least favorite part: cleaning the deer. In the picture above, you can see that I have already tagged the deer as per conservation department rules.

Having 28 acres of land is a blessing for deer hunting. I can bring the deer in the bucket of my tractor back to the house for cleaning. Once the deer is gutted, I have a hose and running water to rinse out the carcass. On more than one occasion, the people at Black Angus Meats (where I bring the deer to be processed) have remarked how nice and clean everything is.

Back from the Butcher Shop

Several people at Black Angus commented on how large the doe was. She was bigger than most bucks they were seeing. When we picked up the venison on Tuesday, we received 5 shopping bags full of venison.We were told that the typical deer gives you 3 shopping bags.