Florida Muzzleload Hunting Report 10-23-12

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Monday Oct. 22,12 AM Hunt

I was able to scrounge up just enough provisions to make it one more night in camp so I decided to stay Sunday night and Hunt Monday morning and drive to work from there.



I found one white potato that had been in the bottom of my floor board just a couple days to long and I knew I had a couple top sirloins in the cooler that I could not wait to get on the cook fire. Unfortunately, they were just a little to old also and looked like something that was more fit for my coon hound than me. However, it was all I had so I shaved off as much as I could to get down to red meat and rolled the dice.



Well, I am still here to recount the story and didn’t poison myself. I hunted the next morning at the west fence stand but did not see any deer movement. All the other creatures seemed to be feeding and doing their thing but the deer were just not cooperating. The squirrels were really active, feeding and chasing each other all over the place.



I was dying to get back into this stand as I could not hunt it Sunday evening due to the wind direction. I had to hunt a stand I call Rick’s stand in a little scrub oak hammock but did not see any deer on that hunt either. When I pulled the trail camera card there. The deer activity was weak with on two deer there during the day and none were bucks. There was a tall 3pt there in the dark and I got some great pictures of him raring up on his back feet to stand straight up in the ait to smeel and hook some oak limbs over a scrape.



Monday afternoon had me back in Bunnell and I wanted to watch the last Presidential debate so I hunted at the property and camped at the house that night. That was the first night I had been home since Thursday. Besides, I needed some clean cloths.



The hunt was a bust and I didn’t see a single deer. I pulled the camera card there and found that a number of does had been there but only (2) bucks and both in the dark. One was the big 5pt and the other was a 5” spike. Both are deer I knew and I had actually saw and got just a little video of the spike. The 5pt is a least a 2.5 yr old buck and has only been on trail camera once in the daylight. That was at 12:30 in the afternoon.



Tuesday morning, Oct. 23, I went back to the pond stand again but only hunted until 8:30 AM as I needed to get the meat from Saturday’s kill in the freezer. I cut up another batch of jerky from the scraps and got it marinating in my special Jerky seasoning formula. That is some awesome stuff. I literally, can’t stop eating it.



Anyway, I had found a really interesting spot Sunday and hung a test camera there to see what is using there. I pulled the card Monday morning and discovered no less than 4 different bucks had crossed there between midnight and daylight! That was all I needed to see. I couldn’t wait to get in there Tuesday afternoon.



Tuesday afternoon Oct. 23,



I took the climber in to the new fence crossing spot but was much later getting in the tree than I wanted. Also, daylight is getting less and less everyday now. Besides that I was in a hammock strand with a heavy canopy which cuts the hunt down even more.



I did not see and deer but I and camping again tonight and will hunt it in the morning. It promises to be a good one!



Wednesday Oct 24,



Well, so much for the morning hunt being a good one. I got into the stand well before daylight and listened to the mosquitoes buzzing around for a half an hour until I could begin to see the ground. The morning came and went without seeing a single deer.



The feed time was good, the location was hot but no deer. Strangely enough all activity, squirrels, birds etc. was very weak. By 8:45 my gut feeling was that this was just not going to happen so I jacked down the tree and packed all my gear out.



It’s about a 3-4 mile 4wheeler ride back to the camp and I was humming right along when I passed a little sink hole filled with some waste high weeds. I looked over just in time to see some deer piling out of the sink. I slammed on the brakes, whipped it sideways and grabbed the rifle out of the rack all in one more. By the time the bike settled out I had the cross hairs on the lead deer. Deer after deer piled out and up the hill until 5 in total were visible. I could not find a horn on a single one.



This is interesting as I have seen a total of two does all bow and most of the muzzleload season! Last year I saw one. I guess an optimist might say, sightings are up 50% but something is wrong with the deer herd. Last year I blamed it on the massive acorn crop. Deer sightings are always low when large mass crops are available. The deer can fill up quickly and go lay back down. Of course the bucks are still going to be visible when out looking for receptive does.



However, this year the acorn crop is off and we are still not seeing does? The only other thing that I can fall back on to figure this out are the trail cameras which are all set up on feed stations. They are telling me the doe population is off. I am seeing very few does and yearlings on the cameras. The camera at the stand that I killed the two bucks is seeing ONE doe a week! Incredible.



It’s not over yet but I might not inflict the hurt I was planning.



Best of hunts,

Larry S.