Well the bags are packed once again and this time I had to pull out the long underwear!!!!! I’m heading to Northern Saskatchewan for a whitetail hunt with Jim Benton and my good friend Chris Douglas. The weather will be very cold, but the reports are that the deer hunting should be the best it’s been in years!!! I will be back next weekend to give you guys the run down of the hunt!

 Have a great week!

Hunting season is a very busy time of year for me. Out of the past 7 Thanksgivings I have been home for 2! I have spent the other 5 in Canada sitting in a box blind eating frozen Roast Beef Sandwiches.

This year once again I was on the road, but this time was different. I got to stay in the States. While on the hunt in Wisconsin we were invited to eat Thanksgiving lunch with a local family and then we watched the Packers play the Lions.

I was not home with my family, but atleast I got the Thanksgiving feast and got to watch some football!

I think I will schedule Thanksgiving week off next fall so I can spend it with my family!

Well sorry this took so long, but here it goes!

 We go back to hunt where we hunted the first afternoon. We had seen plenty of deer and a very nice shooter, but that buck got into the cornfield before I could get the camera on him and Allen did not get a shot. We arrived at 1:00 p.m.

Instead of sitting in the shooting house like we did the evening before, we sat on the ground against some trees on top of the hill so we could have a good field of vision of the valley below.

We had not been there 10 minutes before a young 4 pointer came bouncing down the hill not 30 yards from us. Once he got to the bottom of the hill it started to rain. I quickly got out my rain gear and covered up my camera to try and keep it from getting “vapor locked”!

We sat there another 10 minutes in the rain and then it changed over to large fluffy white snow flakes. It was getting colder by the minute, but I was warm and dry since I had my Gortex bibs and jacket on.

The snow got harder and harder and it was getting hard to see the valley below. Allen tapped me on the shoulder and pointed out some deer coming out to our left. I get the camera on them as they are coming out of the woods. I film them (15 deer) feeding towards the cornfield when I hear Allen say, “There’s a shooter!”  I tell him I don’t see the buck. I listen through my headphones as he directs me to the center of the group. Then I say, “I’m on him, the wide 8-pointer with his head up right?” Allen confirms and then asks am I ready - We had already talked about if we saw a shooter we were going to try not to let it get to the standing corn.  Once I told him, “I’m on him,” he pulled the trigger on his .270 wsm and the deer scattered.

“Did I hit him, I couldn’t tell with the snow and the deer going everywhere if I got him or not,” Allen said. I told him he had made a good hit and that we needed to hurry down there and start tracking because we were loosing light and the snow was starting to accumulate.

We made the slippery walk down the hill (I only fell once) to where the deer was standing. At first glance it was obvious that Allen made a perfect shot, but we were getting worried because as we had feared the snow was washing away the blood trail and the deer ran into a very thick valley.

After a 15 minute tracking job we found his deer! It was a 19.5″ wide heavy beamed 8-pointer!

The buck is on the ground!!!! Shot him at 3:47 central time in the snow.

 Story and photos to follow as soon as possible!!!

We are finally hunting a place where I can get an internet connection during the hunt. I arrived at the Madison airport yesterday at noon. Allen had drove up from Missouri so he picked me up at the airport. We loaded up the car and headed to a small town along the Iowa boarder.

 We got to the motel where we are staying at 2:00 and we were greeted by the land owner who was gracious enough to let us hunt his land. We threw on our camo, headed to the store so Allen could purchase his hunting license and then headed to the blind.

It was a good afternoon. It was cool, foggy and rainy. We got into the blind at 3:30 and got the camera equipment set up. Ten minutes later we had deer entering the field we were overlooking. We ended up seeing plenty of doe, and 3 bucks. One buck was a 145 class 10 pointer, but he walked into a small corn patch before I could get some good footage of him and did not come back out. 

This morning we went to a ground blind that was set up in a hardwoods bottom. We saw 6 deer and only one was a doe.

 It is now 1:00 and we’re getting ready to head back to the field. We are going to the same place we hunted yesterday afternoon. Maybe I will log on later tonight with some good news!!!!

I recently got home a few days early from a hunting trip. My 4 year old son Kolby asked me if I would take him hunting and of course the answer was yes!

I never ask my kids to go hunting. I let them ask me. Once we get in the stand, I don’t care if we are there 5 minutes or 5 hours, when they ask to leave - we leave!

We left for our stand on my dad’s farm @ 3:30 p.m. and made the 30 minute ride. Once we arrived, we had about a 500 yard walk to the tower stand that is overlooking a harvested peanut & cotton field. Arriving at the stand, Kolby climbed up first and I followed closely behind him. We hadn’t even got settled in good, when I looked up and saw a doe trotting out into the field. We got settled in quickly and spent the afternoon watching 12 does and 1 buck.

Kolby did an excellent job at being quiet and had fun watching the deer in the field. He has even asked if I will take him hunting again.

It was a memorable day spending time with my son in the field. I think he will be an avid outdoorsman and I look forward to helping him learn what Mother Nature has to offer!

Well I just got back from another successful trip! This time I went with Allen Treadwell of Bass Pro’s Outdoor World on a Black Powder hunt for Montana Mule deer. I left Friday for Great Falls, Montana and met Allen in Minneapolis. Then we flew into Great Falls where we met up with Chad Shearer of Central Montana Outfitters. We left the Airport in Great Falls at 2:30 and made the hour drive to our spike camp.

Once in camp we changed into our camo and went to the rifle range to make sure Allen’s scope did not get bumped during the flight. With one shot we knew we were good. We had 2 hours of daylight left so we went to try and get on a deer.  We covered some ground and saw a good Mulie, but we didn’t have any luck. We headed back to camp and Chad cooked us a great steak dinner.

The next morning we got up and ate a quick breakfast and headed to our glassing point before light. Once the sky started to turn orange we could see some deer silhouetted on top of the hills. Then Chad spotted a good buck on top of the hill. We sat and watched the deer for a while and then drove around the hill so we could make a stalk on the buck we saw on top of the hill. As we rounded the hill we saw another nice buck in the alfalfa field at the bottom of the hill. He saw the truck and ran around the side of the hill out of site. We grabbed our gear and went after him.

Chad started off with a fast-paced walk. I made it a total of about 30 yards before it felt like my heart was going to pound out of my chest. Not only did it feel like my heart was thumping like a drum, I also felt like someone was squeezing the breath right out of me. I didn’t get this winded on the entire 3 week hunt in the Yukon back in September.

Allen and Chad kept up the pace and I lagged about 20 yards behind. We kept the pace because we were trying to get on the buck. Once at the top of the hill Chad spots the buck one hill over, bad thing is he’s 170 yards away and going in the wrong direction. We sit and watch the buck check a some does and he finally goes over the hill out of sight. Then Chad checks to see if he can find the first buck we spotted on top of the mountain. Once again, Nothing.

We head back to the truck and we go to town to grab some lunch. We see a few bucks along the way, but nothing worth chasing. After lunch Chad takes us to the back side of the ranch. He said he had seen some great bucks on that part of the ranch earlier that week. 

As we a driving we are seeing lots of does and some small bucks. Then we get to an area where we see a group of small bucks together and no does. Chad says that this time of year you shouldn’t see that and he thinks there is a bigger buck in the area pushing the little bucks away. He says we should get out and ease around the hill and see if there are any bucks on the other side of the hill.

Boy was Chad right. As we eased around the hill, Allen spots a great Mulie buck. We get set up and I start filming the buck. The buck knows something isn’t right, but he doesn’t spook. We are in the shade and he can’t figure out what we are. Allen let’s me get some pre-roll of the buck, 6 minutes worth to be exact. The the sun starts to shine on us and the buck gets uneasy. At that point I tell Allen, “If you want him you better shoot him!” No longer than I had gotten that out of my mouth, Allen pulled the trigger. I could hear the bullet hit the deer, but all I could see was smoke once the CVA Electra ignited. We jumped up to see the fatally wounded animal stumbling over the top of the hill. We eased up to the top of the hill to find Allen’s deer laying just on the other side.

Boy were we surprised. We knew it was a good deer, but he definitely didn’t have any ground shrinkage when we got to him.

What a great hunt. Another successful trip and this was another 1st afternoon harvest. It has been a great hunting season so far and this one is special. As far as we know this is the first Mule Deer harvested with the CVA Electra. 

Great Deer Allen and a great way to go into the CVA history book with an awesome buck!