Deer vs Chevy!

Talk about a freak accident......I was driving across my hay field after dark last night when a young doe busts out from around an island of trees and dead centers the nose of my Chevy pickup! BAAAM!

I had been floundering the night before and speared a few fish. The fish parts were in a bucket in the back of my pickup and I intended to stop by the property and dump them in the pond for my catfish to enjoy.

Unfortunately, I got off work pretty late and by the time I got to the property it was well after dark.

I turned in the dirt drive between two small hay fields and headed for the pond. As I neared the end of the road I saw a doe take off across the field ahead but quartering away to the NE. I had to turn a 90 to the west along a small island of trees that is only about 30' long. Just as I was getting to the end of the trees another deer bolts out from behind the island running full out! This happened so quick I barely got my foot on the brake.

The yearling crashed dead center into the nose of the truck and busted about half of the license plate cover off. The deer was running so low to the ground she did not even impact any of the grill and ended up just under the left front of the truck. I couldn't have been going more then 8-10 mph.

The deer was dead by the time I got out of the truck. The collision had broken its back in 2 locations.

There was nothing that could be done at that point except to salvage the meat. I had a cooler in the back of the truck so I pulled the deer out and skinned and quartered her right there on the ground like it was a pack job.

I thought I was done with any deer cleaning chore, at least for another year!

The whole thing was such a fluke that I shot a little video of the aftermath to post here.....

 

Be careful out there,
Larry S.

Bull Elk Survives Battle with Antler Tine Embedded in Skull!

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Bull Elk Survives Battle with Antler Tine Embedded in Skull!

My good friend Brady out in Idaho sent me this email with a pretty incredible story of a bull elk that was recently harvested in South Dakota with another bulls antler tine broken off in his skull that penetrated through the back of the eye socket. The elk survived and was apparently healthy at the time he was harvested.

Here is the note that was attached with the photo's. (from unknown source)

"2011 S.D. Rifle Elk



2011 South Dakota bull elk taken during the current rifle season. The additional pictures show evidence of this bull previously being in a fight with another bull elk. The other elk broke his antler off in this elk’s head. The taxidermist is guessing that the broken antler had been embedded at least one, if not two, years. The “extra” antler was found to be piercing the skull just behind the left eye of this elk but the surface had healed to the point of not being noticeable."

(Hunter is unknown)

That's a great bull and a pretty incredible story of survival!

Larry S.

Of Gobblers, River Cooters and Alligators!

A recent cool spring morning found me laying for a long bearded Gobbler in a river swamp on the banks of the St. Johns River.

I had found the Toms strut sign two days earlier on a sand spoil pile and I knew he'd be roosting in the swamp within ear shot of his strut zone.

Unfortunately, the morning dawned partly overcast and just a bit breezy, not good conditions for gobbling and this morning would be true to form. Actually, the gobbler only gobbled one time that I ever heard and it was from the ground. He never gobbled on the limb despite my owling along with several excited cutts and cackles at fly down.

Once I heard him gobble I knew it was only a matter of time before he would be strutting in front of me on the little sand hill. I stopped calling at him and changed to the soft purrs and clucks of a contented feeding hen. I had my video camera rolling when he stepped out of the cabbage palm hammock. He immediately saw my hen decoy and broke into a half strut. He cautiously made his way towards the decoy as a wary old gobbler will do.

Against my better judgement, I could not  resist a few soft purs and clucks to try to pull one more gobble out of him for the camera. About 15 yds or so from the decoy the old gobbler realized something was not right with the motionless hen and turned around to come to my calling. Things were pretty touch and go there for a minute as he approached to within 10 yds, head stretched high looking for the source of the calling. Anytime you let a bird get that close you run a real risk of him escaping.  Absolutely no movement goes unseen. A tight choked turkey guns patter at such close range is very small and a turkeys head is always moving. Its a very difficult target to hit, especially if he spooks to flee. A body shot is about all you can hope for if your in a tight spot. IF the woods are open you might be able to let him get out to 20 where you have a better pattern before shooting but he'll be hauling the mail!

I got lucky with the shot and just caught him with part of the load and put him down. He was beautiful tom and make for another great hunt, all on video

Well, I told you that story so I could tell you this one.

Turtles like to crawl up from the river to lay their eggs on the sandy spoil pile and as usual there were numerous nests that had been dug into and eaten by various varmits. Probably, mostly by Coons.

I was doing some tracking in the sand to see if I could tell if all the strut sign was from one gobbler or if maybe there was another bird in the area. As I neared the weeds down towards the water I noticed a large turtle shell. It caught my attention and I slipped over to investigate. The shell was upside down and i immediately saw a golf ball size spot in the center of the shell that had been broken and crushed in. This however was not the cause of his demise. It was from a previous gator attack and had healed up. When I picked the shell up I immediately noticed two broken off alligator teeth in the top of the shell. Incredible!

Studying the shell it was obvious the turtle had survived many encounters with large alligators. There were lines of dots where rows of teeth had pocked the hard shell. Along the radius ed areas of the shell there were gouged lined where the gator's teeth slid down the shell.

The broken off gator teeth were absolutely amazing. I decided to keep the shell, clean it up and spray it with some clear polyurethane. It really shinned up great and is an interesting conversation piece.

The River Cooter is a basking turtle are often sold as pets. Anytime you are on the river in the middle part of the day you are liable to see them perched on logs sunning. The females are larger than the males and can live to more than 40 years of age.

They mate during May and June and seek out an open sandy location 50-100' from the water to bury their clutch of 10-25 eggs. With a lot of luck, 90-100 days later they will hatch.  While the species is highly herbivorous, river cooters will eat anything, plant or animal, dead or alive.

Judging by all the scars from the alligators this turtle must have been around for quite some time and survived countless attacks. I think I'll call him Lucky!

Keep your eyes open, you never know what interesting things you'll stumble across in the woods!

Best of hunts,
Larry S.

Deer Hair Birds Nest

Well, this is not exactly a hunting subject but if you have been following my articles you know how much I enjoy unusual and interesting things I run across while out in the woods.

This one falls in that category and i thought everybody might like to see this little piece of natural art.

My good friend Steve and I were slipping thru the woods trying to make a loop around to the other side of a pasture where we had struck a strutting gobbler when I noticed this little odd clump lying under a small oak tree.

This is a Wren's nest weaved from deer hair, cypress bark and spanish moss. I'm sure the Wren did not know what an excellent insulator deer hair is but it sure picked the perfect material. Being a building designer, I can appreciate the ingenuity and construction ability of the tiny Wren that fabricated this unique nest.

You never know what your going to run into when your out in the woods!

Best of  hunts,
Larry S.

Trophy Boar Hog killed by black Bear!

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Over the last 35 plus years of stomping around in the woods I have seen a lot of interesting and incredible things but what I ran across while scouting for turkeys last Thursday ranks right up at the top of the list.

I had knocked off work early to head over to the hunting club to locate some gobblers for opening weekend. I had covered a portion of the road system looking for sign and it was about fly-up time so I stopped at a couple likely spots to owl and listen for a gobble. However, it was overcast and not ideal conditions to hear a bird on the roost. Since there was still a lot of road to cover I decided to push ahead and keep tracking in the dark. Probably not to many people scout for turkey sign at night and it sounds a little strange but tracking the roads for strut and track sign is without a doubt the best and fastest method for locating as many gobblers in the shortest amount of time there is. I have located a many a gobbler in the headlights of my truck.

I was actually on my way out of the woods, tracking a long sandy stretch of road that separates a creek drainage from a high sandy hill. The woods along the creek are super thick and almost impenetrable with palmettos over your head, ty-ty’s and bay heads. I have been on two or three crippled deer tracks into this hell hole and it is about as rough as it gets.

As I was easing down the road I noticed something black lying half in the road. As I got closer I realized it was a hog and it was not getting up. Not just any hog either, a brute of a hog! Probably 275-300 lbs.. He had been dead about 24-48 hours and the buzzard sign had stomped out all other sign for 30 yds either side of the carcass.

Of course I was curious as to what had killed him and why he was in the road. I looked him over a little and as best I could tell he appeared to be killed by a black bear! His head and neck were ripped up with deep claw marks. Part of his neck and shoulder and a ham had been eaten. The claw marks to the top of his forehead were all the way to the bone. Unfortunately for the hog his teeth had grown at an odd angle that did not allow them to wear against his top teeth and keep them sharp. He was actually pretty defenseless.

Here are some pictures of his body and some of his wounds. 

It was pretty amazing to find something like this but even more incredible was the teeth on this old boar. I have not measured them yet but they are the largest I have ever seen in person. The cutter on the right side actually grows back into his mouth and down into his gum. Its so deeply embedded I cannot find the end  of it. I am going to boil and clean his skull and  I’ll post some pictures when its done.

There is no way to know for sure if this same bear is responsible but two deer dogs have been kill by a bear in the club in the last two years. That is pretty unusual it self.

Another interesting point about the hog is how old he was and how he managed to survive so long with all the hunting pressure there. A big boar hog can be even harder to kill than a trophy buck and even more nocturnal. This hogs front and jaw teeth were just about worn to the gum line. As far as I know, no one ever laid eyes on this old brute, amazing.

Just another day in the woods!

Larry

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post script:N
This is a follow up post to this story. I decided to clean the skull on this beast as he had such an amazing set of teeth. What I found was nothing short of incredible!

This boars right lower cutter curved back into his gum and actually grew right thru the middle of his jaw bone and was rubbing his tongue! There was cartilage built up around the tooth's entrance and exit as though it was a normal tooth. I don't know how he survived, Surely he developed an infection from the penetration of the bone. Anyone that thinks a hog is not one tough critter dot know much about them. What a survivor this brute was.

Absolutely unbelievable! I've never seen anything like it. Have a look at this.

Notice the mass, unusual bone formations below and behind the penetration and the amount of ware on the teeth compared to the jaw on the right from a boar I took that weighed about 175#.

L.S.  

Osceola Turkey Faces off with Coyote on Trail Cam!

. If you hunt turkeys and know anything about coyotes you will find this to be one interesting picture.


You don't see a turkey and a coyote in the same picture very often. Actually, I would bet you have probably never seen it your self and probably not even seen a picture like this before.

(click on photo to enlarge)

This photo was caught on a trail camera by my friend Rick Edwards and was taken in central Florida. Everything had to be exactly right to catch them at the same time in the same frame, pretty much a miracle! Here in Florida it is legal to feed game and I believe Rick was using a feeder in combination with the trail camera. This is a great way to get some really good pictures and a lot of them. I have literally thousands of photos and will be posting them as I have time.

One of the things that make it such a miracle that Rick's camera caught both animals at the same time is that the camera would have been taking pictures of the turkey as it milled around feeding and would time out in between shots for typically one minute. Turkeys are constantly moving and seldom stand still so the camera would immediately take another photo as soon as the time out period was up. At that instant the coyote would have had to come into the frame. It is possible the turkey had seen the coyote coming and had been standing still watching it and possibly the coyote tripped the camera but it would still be unbelievable timing regardless. If you have ever been fortunate enough to see a coyote in the woods you know they seldom stand still either. They are almost always on a trot or lope. Many cameras do not have a fast enough trigger time to even catch a coyote in the frame before he's gone.

Many thanks to Rick for sharing the photo. I know he has more and I’ll be prying them loose from him to post here!

Turkey season opens Saturday,

Good luck, send me a picture!

Larry S.

Hunter Harvests 19 PT. Velvet Antlered Doe!

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I received an email from one of my friends today with this story of a 19pt. Antlered doe. I hear about one of these oddities every once in a while but they are pretty rare and thought everybody might like to see it.

The hunters name is Mike Tomey of Lewis County, West Virginia. The deer was killed on a Friday of the first week of the buck season near Sleeth’s Run, near the Gilmer-Lewis County border.

The hunter was aware of the deers presents and had numerous trail camera photo’s of what he thought was a non-typical buck.

It was a Friday afternoon and pretty miserable out and the hunter had decided to call it a day and was on his way out of the woods when he walked up on the deer. He anchored the animal with one shot but was pretty surprised when he got to the deer and saw just how many points he (she) was sporting.

Apparently he field dressed the deer and realized something wasn’t right but did not know the deer was actually a doe until he got home and a neighbor saw the thing and pointed it out.

The bad thing was it’s the biggest set of horns the guy has taken and…..it’s a doe!

Apparently a doe does not create enough testosterone to cause the antlers to come out of the velvet stage. I believe they just continue to grow at a slow rate for the entire life cycle of the deer.

Her fawns must really catch hell from their little fawn buddies!

Best of Hunts,

Larry