Frank's outdoors...

I got on my lease real close to the start of last season.  As I sat in my tripod one morning and looked over my barren field, I started making plans for the NEXT season on how I would prepare the field.  The challenge lay before me in acquiring/coordinating getting the work done.  I don't live near my lease, and don't have any equipment.  So basically, borrowing, renting, etc. was going to be the course of action.  As with everything else, life takes over and the season was upon us before I knew it.  I still had been planning but the execution and coordination was becoming the bigger challenge.  Throw in the fact that we hadn't had ANY rain for months and it was looking like it was going to be another barren field... Well, I blogged in the past about how it all came to be... the purchase of the drag harrow, and laying the seed in the first rain in months, etc. etc. etc.  Well, I turned my game camera towards the plot the week leading up to my ta...

Was looking at some pics of this buck from the game camera prior to him breaking off a few of his tines.  Pretty cool to see how it has changed.

After sitting in the stand and hunting hard since the season opened, I finally got a nice deer on the ground. He made me earn it for sure! The Details: I was in the stand by 5:45am, with sunrise at 7:15am.  It was a half moon, but overcast with slight fog so I had moderate visibility.  It was still dark around 6:40am.  As usual, my eyes are playing tricks on me with the fog and waiting for the sunrise, and I see something flicker behind the feeder (about 100yds away).  I grabbed my binoculars and there he was rubbing his antlers in the brush back behind the feeder.  I watched him for a minute or so, then grabbed my rifle when he started to walk towards me to the food plot.  He was starting to head to the left (where there is a game trail that heads back into the woods).  I put the cross hairs on him and landed a perfect hit behind the shoulder with him right at the edge of the food plot.  I was shocked and thrilled!  6:45am, 30 min to ...

What a cool thing to watch. My brother took this photo from my front stand.

My buddy Mark sat in the stand this morning at our lease.  He has a blind that is less than half mile from my back loop blind.  Around 8:10am a doe walked out and started acting skittish.  A few seconds later this bruiser walks out and gave Mark about 5 seconds to pull the trigger.  He pulled wasn't sure if he hit the deer at all.  He waited a few minutes to begin looking for blood and tracking.  No blood.  There is a trail that leads away from the feeder toward a creek bottom, so he thought that potentially the deer may have headed there for cover.  Sure enough, he was piled up 30-40 yds down that trail! Nice shot, Mark!  I am jealous that you now have meat in your freezer!  UPDATE:  I think I got a picture of this boy a few days before Mark took him.  Take a look:

Sat in the stand on Saturday evening in the rain.  Saw some does right around 4pm.  It was the perfect evening to be sitting in the stand.  Picked up my SD cards on the way out, and saw this monster coyote on film!  Huge!

For almost ten years now, my family has a tradition of going on a goose hunt the day after Thanksgiving.  A couple of things caused us to have to do this on Saturday this year.  Well, I'll cut to the chase, the hunt was an absolute bust (from a hunting perspective).  Its ALWAYS a good thing to get out with your friends/family and spent time outdoors. We got to Eagle Lake around 5:30am and were in the field and setup by 6:15am.  By 7 the RAIN was coming regular and steady.  It was raining hard and the wind was blowing.  The birds were there but they were certainly not coming to this field.  We saw lots of flocks and they were moving and even in the wind and rain they were still flying pretty high.  With the front moving through and the cold temperature setting in with the soaking rain (and the fact that we hadn't shot a bird), we called it a day at 10am.  Quite discouraging to say the least.  It is also probably the wettest I have ever ...