Yea, yea, you’re practicing out to 40-50, heck maybe even 60 or 70 yards and you’re pretty satisfied with your shooting with only a couple of weeks to go before archery opener.

Photo courtesy of Summit Treestands.

But what happens when you trudge back to the hunting cabin on opening day with your head hung low after you just missed a 10-yard chip shot. You know it wasn’t because it was too far! Maybe you snagged your headnet or shirt sleeve with the string or bounced your arrow off a branch. But more than likely, you probably forgot to bend at the waist when that big bruiser buck walked within spitting distance of your perch up in that big white oak. Now, you will be the subject of merciless ribbing from your hunting buddies.

Go through your mental checklist before touching that release, and by all means - remember to bend at the waist!

Fellow SkinnyMoose blooger ‘Moose’ just got back from a Maine black bear hunt and will bring the exciting story to us in 4 installments.  The end result was indeed a nice black bear, but follow the link to read along with his great story.

I’ll post more links to a great hunt in the north country as they become available.  If you are real interested in doing a Maine black bear hunt, you can check out R&S Guide Service where ‘Moose’ killed his 2008 fall black bear.

Just wanted to pass the word along about a great website that I was just exposed to…The Sportsman Gear Daily.  They are a sort of retail website for outdoor gear, but the gear is at far below retail prices.  They generally feature one great hunting or fishing product each day and run their crazy low price until they sell out of that item, usually within 24 hours.  Also, you should note that on September 9th, they are going to start running weekly drawings for hunting and fishing adventures.  Oh, by the way, the entry for the FREE trips is FREE!!!!  So, go by the Sportsman Gear Daily website and see if you can’t spend some money on yourself for hunting season…I’ll bet you can!

Just wanted to thank alltop.com for helping out SkinnyMoose media and generating some additional interest in the blogs here at our network.  You can check out their website and see that they cover almost every topic imaginable.  Thanks guys.

We hit the grass carp motherload on Friday night.  Fishing with some friends, we took the airboat out somewhere in the state of North Carolina and absolutely found the grass carp.  The common carp and gar were sporadic at best, but every cove we cruised into had some big grass carp.  I stuck the first fish as it cruised out in front of the boat, but lost it when my buddy smacked a 54 pounder that was promptly double-teamed.  Good sign of things to come.

Next cove produced a few sightings before I again connected…this time a 67.8 pounder!  This size of fish was a state record just a few years ago.  I was stunned as I nearly doubled my previous personal best of 37 pounds.  Allan made a great follow-up shot to subdue the beast and the shouting started!

Next up, my other buddy whacked his first of the night.  This nice mid-40ish pounder.

We were picking up a few gar (shooting at lots, but hitting just a few) and a mirror carp was landed too.  We actually filleted one of the gar with pruning snips and I’ll let everyone know how they taste when my buddy lets me know.

The next cove was unbelievable.  12-15 grassies streaked past our boat before I nailed a 50 pounder at Mach1 and while I was fighting that one, my buddy was able to bust one that apparently missed the memo.  It was just sitting low in some weeds as the water was thrashing around it.  Mistake, another well-placed shot and fish #4 and #5 were in the boat.

After I lost another big grass carp, we were able to boat one more grass carp before we had to go.  Fortunately, no sooner did we leave the boat ramp, the bottom fell out!

All told, 6 grass carp that weighed 300 pounds collectively - a 50 pound average!  Big game bowfishing at its best!

Everyone, just wanted to wish you all a great holiday weekend.  I hope the extra time finds you out preparing for upcoming hunting seasons, or even shooting some early season geese or doves on Monday.  I’ll be bowfishing tonight, doing some work in the deer woods, and maybe doing a little dove hunting on Monday myself.  Tuesday should be full of updates, so check back in then and until then…have a great weekend!

I’m sure that almost everyone knows about Google Earth and maybe even uses it to do some scouting.  Personally, I prefer using local tax maps with the aerial features enabled.  That way I can not only do some remote scouting, I can find out who owns the property and get their contact information to ask permission for hunting.

Someone, in a hunting forum that I frequently interact with, introduced me to maps.live.com

I think the aerial features are about equal to Google Earth’s capabilities, but the ‘bird’s eye’ view feature is unbelievable and is great for distinguishing hardwoods from pines and other more detail-oriented scouting tasks that usually have to be done on the ground.  I even found a log on which to cross a creek from the ‘bird’s eye’ view feature.  Also, maps.live.com has a great 3D view that must be downloaded but is worth the time it takes to acquire.

Hopefully this tool can boost your scouting ability this pre-season as archery season is rapidly approaching!

Friday, I took a couple of hours in the morning to scout out a potential hot-spot that I found on some local game lands.  Why would I hunt game lands when I have 300+ acres in Alamance County on private land to hunt, a few choice spots in Raleigh also on private land?  Simple, it is dynamite! 

Hey look, mature pines, almost worthless deer habitat…no surprises there. 

I did find a great squirrel hunting spot though, a few trees with this many carved up pinecones under it could mean a limit of squirrels.

Over a half-mile into my walk, I stumbled across the first of several gems.  This 2-3 acre white oak stand was the first source of deer food I had encountered and bingo, 10 yards into the stand there they were.

The picture is horrible, but you get the point…3 does and a little buck stood around long enough for me to tell I was in the right place.

Another quarter of a mile and I stepped out of the pine forest to see this pretty sight, low water means fresh vegetable garden for wildlife.  Fresh green growth was absolutely pounded by the deer and raccoon and fox tracks littered the ground too.  Hot spot #2.

Another photo of some great deer groceries!

Now this is the big boy that I want a personal encounter with during October.  Five inches of track!

Also quite a few doves back in this spot.  They were constantly flying back and forth.  Must have been some source of seeds or fruit they were interested in. 

Hot spot #3 was a full mile back into the woods, but it by far the sweetest spot I had seen yet.  I jumped another deer between the “grocery store” and a hardwood ridge that was filled with hickory and oak trees, even a few black gum mixed in.  Trails were cut deep into the elevated ridge, buck sign was abundant from previous falls, and fresh droppings covered the leaf litter. 

This calf-sized cedar tree rub from last year was surrounded by 5 or 6 smaller rubs all within 10 or so feet.  Unbelievable funnel between a few topographical features which I won’t disclose and littered with deer sign…super secret hunting spot…all on public land!

It will be an evening hunt only and a heck of a long drag back to the road, but I will go out on a limb and guarantee that one of my buck tags is spent on this ridge before the season ends…

My wife Kara and I headed up to Kerr Lake on Friday evening with our friends to camp overnight and do some fishing.  After catching a little bait under one of the many bridges on the lake, we headed to a nice sandy beach and cooked some hotdogs and marshmallows. 

While we were relaxing by the campfire, I managed to pull in 2 channel catfish with a helping of Catfish Dynamite ‘Cheese’ dipbait.  That is some nasty stuff, but catfish can’t get enough of it.  One of the fish pulled the rod down off its prop-stick and we didn’t notice it was gone until it was almost too late…completely submerged and headed towards the depths, I picked up the rod at the last second and reeled in one of the catfish. 

The wind picked up a little, so we moved the boat to a sheltered cove and laid out the sleeping bags.  Great night’s sleep under the stars…woke up several times to critters swimming in the water, a barn owl hooting, and the startling grunts of a great blue heron. 

Next morning, we headed to one of our favorite fishing holes and tossed out 8 noodles and drifted with 7 baits of our own spread around the boat.  Nothing.  Next spot….noodles and drift….nothing.  Repeat 2 more times….nothing!  The catfish were absolutely not interested in biting.  It must have been a combination of a full moon, abundant forage source (baby shad??? EVERYWHERE!…gar were having a hayday!)  I’m assuming the catfish were bloated after a night’s gorging on prey, but who knows.  Bottom line, I’m glad the Catfish Dynamite produced on Friday night or we would have gotten skunked. 

A promising rocky point with nearby deep river channel, light colored specks to the right of the point are our noodles…’promising’ is the deciding word here….no fulfillment!

We did get the treat of watching 2 fawns play around the water’s edge about 150 yards away from one of our fishing holes.  In the photo, you can barely see one between the 2 logs on the edge of the water. 

All in all, it was a great trip and the weather was beautiful.  Great campfire food and some time spent with friends.  What more could you ask for?…except a few more catfish.

Well, my thesis deadline is rapidly approaching.  Just a day or two ago it was the start of summer, now I’m looking at 9 and a half weeks until I need to be done my graduate research and writing.  That being said, I apologize for the little bit of a slow-down in blogging posts…but I guess that is part of the territory.  Now with classes started and the distraction of preparing to move to Alabama in January, it may suffer even more, but I’ll try not to let that happen.  I can assure frequent hunt reports during deer season.  I’ll be slowed down a little in my hunting outings, but slowed down for me, translates into 40 or 50 hunting days instead of 70-80, so there still we be plenty to talk about.  Who knows, if the critters cooperate, posts may even pick up for me!

Just wanted to thank everyone for reading The Outdoor Smorgasbord, it’s been a interesting and satisfying way to reach other people who share in the same outdoor passions.  We recently passed our 15,000th page view and will be closing in on 200 blog posts soon.  Best of luck to everyone this fall and check in often to see how my hunting luck is going…hunt hard, hunt smart, and shoot straight!