Illinois 2011 Bow Hunting Report #1

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Illinois Bow Report 2011 - #1


Friday, Nov. 5,11

We took Gerry’s chariot to Illinois today. We overnight'd at his farm in South Illinois, just across the Kentucky line. We got up early and finished the last 5 hours of the trip and got in about 8:30 Saturday morning.

Saturday, Nov. 6, 11

Gerry (GG) and I arrived at the farm this morning. The temperature was in the 30’s and the high was 58. The wind was South 12-15mph with gusts to 21 and partly sunny.

Gerry had never hunted with us on this farm before so I needed to show him some of the stands he’d be hunting. We hiked in to the cow’s head stand and found a pile of fresh pawed scrapes and even a few acorns on the ground. We pushed up the hill to the grassy lane and jumped a doe and one hell of a buck! This thing was world class. I only got a fleeting glimpse as he bounded across the open lane but I saw enough to know he was a real monster. We also jumped (3) deer above the well stand and Gerry saw a buck on the top field.

That afternoon GG hunted the mud hole stand and saw (8) deer, (2) bucks and (6) does. One was a real nice 9pt with a sticker off his left G2 that came into 18yds but caught a whiff of Gerry, turned and headed up the hill without offering a good shot. Gerry thought he’d score in the 140’s

I hunted the Kill Zone stand which over looks a big bean field, a new cut over bottom and a CRP field. It’s a great observatory stand as I can see a total of over 1,500 yds of a variety of cover and crops. I saw a total of (13) deer, (3) were bucks and two were possible low end shooters. The largest was an 8pt that came off the neighbors hill to the east and moved down the old township road. The other was in the field with a doe near the green tree but it was to dark to ID him.

Big Illinois Buck Rub on Large Cedar!

Gerry and I saw two good bucks with a couple does in Ashwood’s field at dark. One was a definite shooter.
It was a pretty good first day. The bucks are still in the scraping phase,  everyone you see is fresh pawed.

Here's a few pictures from today:

The creek at Steve's Stand!

Accessing the a new stand from the creek!

I kind of expected this but it was still a little shock to see it. The farm was logged while we were gone

and I knew the cotton woods on this creek were going to get wiped out but it was still hard

to look at it after hunting the heavily wooded creek for the past 10 years. The only tree left

standing was the one with my stand! Talk about sticking out like a soar thumb!

Nice hardwood rub!

I started deploying trail cameras today so well see what kind of intel we can gather with them.

My gear for 2011:

This year I'm again hunting with a Mathews Switchback XT at 62 1/2#
Vapor Trail bow string
Easton Camo Hunter shafts, 2213, 4" AAE vanes
Muzzy 4 blade, 100gr broadheads
Trophy Taker rest
Limb Saver vibration dampers
Nikon Monarch 10x36 Binoculars, Crooked Horn Outfitters Bino System
Bushnell Range finder

API Bowhunter treestand (Only when I have to)

I have high hopes for the up coming next week. It's been two years since I've taken A big buck on the lease and I'm getting an itchy trigger finger, Illinois bucks beware!

More to come.

Larry
 

Illinois 2010 Muzzleload Report #4-The Last Day!

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Illinois Muzzleload Hunt
Dec. 2nd thru 5th , 2010

Sunday December 5th
Temp: Max Temperature 25 °F, Min Temperature 11 °F
Wind: 9 mph (North West) gust to 23
Snow: .3” overnight
Overcast
pressure: 30.41

The Last Morning!

I decided to go back to the “Kill Zone stand” again this morning in hopes of catching a buck headed back to bed.

Just after shooting light I was sitting down when I glanced over my right shoulder and caught sight of a chase coming down the CPR. I stood as quickly as I could, staying as close to the tree as possible. I started swinging on the doe as she came out from behind my tree. A small buck was chasing her and turned out to be the tight 8. At 80yds out I dropped the hammer on the doe and she went down. It looked like at hit to the ham and when I got down to have a look that is exactly what I found. The “Shockwave” bullet had broken her right femur. It was not text book but I had a deer down.

Right after I shot the doe I realized there was another deer coming behind on the race but he was not a shooter. It was just the half rack and at that point the two bucks split up. About an hour later the tight 8 came back down bottom from the sanctuary with a 4pt following him. They ended up smelling me and went off to the east to the breaks on the hill.

On the way out I was slipping along the edge of the corn field at the golden oaks when I jumped three small antlerless deer. They ran down the edge of the woods and I could see they were angling to enter the field. I just kept walking and readied the rifle. The deer entered the field single file quartering away at about 100yds. I thought I’d just go ahead and dump the middle deer. With all confidence, I swung on the deer and fired. All three deer just kept loping along and exited the other side of the field some 400 yds away. A clean miss, not even a flinch. All I could do was just watch in disbelief. I just can’t seem to get in front of them far enough with the muzzleloader.

I pressed on and headed back to the truck to get the pack so I could retrieve the doe I had killed in the CRP.

I had the doe skinned, quartered and in the pack in about 20 minutes. Rick drove the pickup to the top of the field and cut the pack job down to a manageable 150yds.

Rick had taken a stand at the “Knob” but saw zero deer from the stand. He did jump three on the way out and that wrapped up the mornings hunt.



The Last Stand!

The PM hunt found me back at the kill zone stand hoping the visibility would pay off.

About 4:00 PM. I was glassing across to the neighbors hillside and spotted a group of bucks moving down the hill to come into the field. One was a decent shooter. There was another possible, the half rack and 2 smaller bucks. They moved east down the edge of the field to feed in a cut bean field across the dike. I only had one deer enter our corn field and my muzzleloader hunt was over.

Rick hunted the wood lot and saw 8 does but neglected to shoot one as he just has a difficult time bringing himself to shoot a doe even though it’s necessary. The herd is just to large and we have to take out as many as possibly or the farmer will bring someone in during the summer with permits to do it for us. They all but wiped out the corn last year as it was so wet they could not get it harvested until January.

The big bucks were pretty elusive this year and we had much fewer sightings than last year. We caught a few shooters on trail camera and saw a few nice bucks but all in all it was a tough year. We have tentatively planned a cull trip for the week between Christmas and New Years, depending on the weather but it will be a real long shot to see a shooter that time of year as we will not have a good food source this year.

There’s always next year!

Here's a few more trail camera pictures from this hunt:

Best of hunts,

Larry S.

Illinois 2010 Muzzleload Report #3

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Illinois Muzzleload Hunt

Dec. 2nd thru 5th , 2010

Saturday December 4th
Temp: Max Temperature 31 °F, Min Temperature 25 °F
Wind: 7 mph (NNE) gust to 23
Snow: 2.60”
Overcast to partly cloudy
Pressure: 30.10

I let a big one get by me today without a shot! That don't happen very often and this one sure hurt my heart. Here's how it went down;

It was overcast and unusually calm when I parked the truck in the ditch at the big corn field. The weather was not to good otherwise, freezing rain until mid morning and then light snow the rest of the day, off and on.

My plan was to wait for enough light to glass the corn field and still hunt my way to the kill zone stand. However, there were no deer feeding on the corn this morning. I made my way to the top end of the field to the overlook where I could see down into the west end of the CRP, no deer.

I looped back into the field so as not to be skylined and quietly picked my way to the N.E. corner. I glassed the CRP for any sign of a deer. In the dim light and mist I spotted a horizontal line in the grass thru the tangle of trees that grew along the edge of the field. Naturally, the deer just had to be behind the thickest section of trees along the whole stretch. With the aid of my Monarch glasses I could see a second deer facing the first and them a third stepped into view. Just as the third deer came into view I heard the unmistakable sounds of antlers clicking together…..they were all bucks and the third deer I could see looked to be the half rack, we call him, as his left side is missing just below the brow. He was timid about getting into the fray and I suspected the other two bucks were larger than him but I still could not make out what kind of bone they were sporting.

Finally, the buck that was closest to me broke off and started walking off down the CRP to the N.E. like he was leaving. My rifle was leaning against an 8” oak tree that I was bracing off to steady my glasses. Thinking the deer was about 150 yds out, when he came into a break in the trees I bleated at him with an immediate follow up even louder. That was a mistake. With no wind he immediately pin pointed the direction of the sound and looked my way.

When he lifted his head and his rack swung around I realized he was a shooter with big heavy beams that stretched out 2” beyond his ears on each side. I had been deceived by his profile and somewhat short tines. I immediately went into action….dropped the glasses, grabbed the rifle, flipped the covers off (don’t ask me why I had not already done that) cocked the hammer and came to rest on the side of the tree, all in one fluid motion.

The first thing I saw in the scope was the Nikon reticle resting right on the bucks shoulder. Just then my mind said, settle down and tighten up, you rush this and your gona miss! Well, that was just the second the buck needed to make up his mind to get the hell outa dodge and I never got to drop the hammer. It was hard not to be disappointed in the missed opportunity at such an animal but I just had to have another second and a half. Had I rushed it and missed or crippled the buck I really would have been upset with myself. Often times for me the difference in hero and zero is pushing the envelope as far as I can...stretching daylight as much as I dare, shooting as quick as humanly possible, trying off the wall plans that most would not consider when it seems all possibilities are lost. One of my strongest hunting traits has always been my conversion rate on the opportunities I receive. If you have hunted very long you know how hard it is to get an opportunity at a big buck. When it happens you need to be able to capitalize on it. This opportunity was just one that couldn't be converted.

After it was all over I ranged the spot at 112yds. The fog, dim light and down hill fooled me just a little but it was still no shot to be rushed. The other two bucks had cleared the field when the big deer spooked. They must have run off behind the screen of trees as I never saw them leave and did not really get to identify the second deer. Oh well! Maybe we’ll meet again one day.

After all the excitement was over I decided not to climb there and instead I’d do some still hunting and hit all the known bedding spots. I jumped 2 does bedded at the sanctuary stand and another at the loggers corner up above. There was another deer feeding in the hornets nest field. I moved off the side of the ridge and down into the draw and jumped another 5 does in front of Steve’s stand.

That pretty much wrapped it up for the mornings hunt.

Here's Rick's big 7pt passing by "Steve's stand"....look at that neck!

The dbl. g2 buck....he's a shooter all day long!

Rick hunted the barn stand this morning and saw 1 small buck and 5 does.

The PM Hunt: 32 deg.

I hunted the kill zone stand again. Once again I saw another shooter about 800yds to the north on the neighbor's hill side. He had 5 other deer with him including one small buck. Sure wish I could get over there! In years past I have seen deer cross the creek back and fourth from over there but the neighbor's crop was flooded this year and deer have not been coming off the hill to feed in the hill. It is unbelievable how different the circumstances can be on 400 acres from year to year. It seems that every year is a new and different set of circumstances to unravel.

One nice 8pt showed up in the east end of the CRP along with another small buck. A doe showed up a little after that. The tight 8 appeared again and entered the field from the creek. I was watching him in the glasses when a yearling came walking right thru my view at about 75 yds.

I ended up climbing down just before dark to put a sneak on a deer I had not identified when a buck came into the corn field from the golden oaks but he did not look like a shooter.

Just as the last light slipped away I spotted a deer that was a possible shooter but I could just not be sure so I passed on a shot at him.

Rick hunted the well stand this afternoon. He eventually spotted the big 7pt he has been seeing, moving along a trail on the opposite hillside. He stopped for a brief moment but Rick could not see his head until he started moving again. The distance was about 120 yds and when the deer came to a small opening Rick took a shot. He looked for sign of a hit but in the dim light he did not find anything, even though there was snow on the ground.

Big heavy beamed buck!

The next morning, after our hunt we hiked in to have a look in the daylight. We moved up the hill to the trail the deer was on and Rick said, he should have been about right here. I looked down and said your right! Your standing in a pile of hair! There was about a 2 foot long streak of hair on the ground but no blood. The hair was mostly white and I believe it was chest hair from behind the shoulders. We moved down the trail and finally found one spot of blood after 50-75 yds. After that there was no more sign to be seen. We walked out all the trails high and low and pretty much scoured the whole area. No deer. Hopefully, it was a superficial hit. The buck has an unusually up turned beam tip that will probably be seen in his rack next year if he and we, are lucky.

 

Here's some more trail camera pic's from this trip:

 

He's hard to make out but the deer in the back ground on the right is a monster! 

  The buck above was kind of neat. I saw him several times. I saw him come out on the big corn field pushing a doe one day. About that time a low end shooter I was watching was coming up the side of the field towards me and this cull buck with his doe. The 8pt walked up and stole the doe with out a fight. He and the doe went off into the woods and the cull buck left out the other direction.
 
Larry S.

Illinois 2010 muzzleload report #2

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Illinois Muzzleload Hunt

Dec. 2nd thru 5th , 2010
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Friday December 3rd

Temp: Max Temperature 30 °F, Min Temperature 19 °F
Wind: 5 mph (East) gust to 17
Snow: 0
Overcast to partly cloudy
Pressure: 30.17

AM. Hunt:
This morning I decided to divided my efforts between two stands. I would start the hunt at the kill zone stand hoping to catch a buck moving back thru the CPR to lay up on the timbered hill side or draws to the east. After that I would move to the sanctuary stand in the woods where I’d have a better chance of seeing later morning movement.

I ended up seeing six deer from the kill zone stand including the narrow 8 but no shooters. After about an hour I made my move to the “sanctuary”. I jumped three small type deer just inside the woods between the stand along the 8 acre field. I sat the stand for about an hour and a half without seeing a deer so I climbed down and decided to have a look in the 5 acre pine tree patch. I slipped into the mature stand but was not able to see the deer before they saw me and I ended up seeing 7 white flags waving good bye.

While I was slipping around the field edges I found the bleached bones of one of our big buck that had laid down and died right on the edge of the field just 20yds from my nibbin buck stand. Judging by his bases he carried horns with some serious mass. I would guess his age at 4 1/2, judging from his teeth. We don't kill many bucks over 3 1/2 years old so it was a great disappointment to find one dead like this. Apparently, he died sometime after hunting season had ended as he had already cast his horns.

Rick hunted the “well stand” and saw (3) does and one small buck but again, no shooters.

PM Hunt:

I dropped Rick off to hunt the “grassy lane stand” and drove around the west side of the farm on the hard top and spotted a doe standing in the end of Rick’s CRP at 2:30. Then saw another couple deer in a field on the neighbor.

Believing the deer would want to feed out onto the cornfield I wanted a vantage stand where I could see as much ground as possible. That was the “kill zone stand”.

On the way into the stand I jumped three deer in the bottom that drains into the CRP my stand is on. A shooter 8pt buck and a small buck fed off the hill on the neighbor to the north. Next I had four deer come off the hill from the east into the CRP. The tight 8 crossed the corn field from the gap headed to the N.W. to the culvert, followed by a yearling that I expect was a nubbin buck.
Little by little, does started to filter into the corn field from the golden oaks/gap area until there were 7 or 8 lippin' up corn some 400 yds down the field.

A doe slipped into the field in the N.E. corner and fed down towards the other deer. Finally, a respectable 8 that looked like might make a shooter entered the field from somewhere between the pines and the gap. It was close to dark so I decided I would climb down and try to get a closer look. As I made my way thru the timber at the back of the corn field it gave me an overlook into the west end of the CRP. Just about that time I saw three deer come charging into the grass and it was pretty exciting there for a moment until I realized it was just the tight 8 chasing a doe and yearling.

The big 8 was south of the grassy slew in the corn field so I used that as cover for the stalk. I could see a yearling feeding just south of the slew but did not know there was a second deer there. I slipped thru the high grass just as a buck walked into the field from the golden oaks. He proceeded across the field headed my way but the second deer that I had not seen caught me moving and blew the whistle and the game was over. By the time I had made my way down there and all this happened the big 8 had made it into the next corn field. I slipped that way and when I came out of the ditch, to my surprise he was standing only about 150yds from me. It was so dark at this point I still could not decide whether to shoot him or not. I decided to hunch over and duck walk straight at him to close the distance and hopefully get a better look. He let me get to about 100yds before he decided it was time so vacate the area. I could not make my mind up to pull the trigger and that’s a good clue to whether you should.
I think I saw 26 deer in all that evening. That was a pretty exciting hunt.

That's one big buck rub in the photo above, one of the biggest I have seen. He did not break thru the bark
but he had to be a stud to even think about tackling this tree!

Rick saw 13 does from the grassy lane stand but almost everyone of them smelled him and no bucks ever made an appearance.

That was it for day 2! Hopefully tomorrow will put a big deer in my cross hairs.

Here's some more trail camers photo's from the trip:

Larry S.
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illinois 2010 muzzleload report #1

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Illinois Muzzleload Hunt
Dec. 2nd thru 5th , 2010

Wednesday morning Capt. Rick and I met at the Daytona Beach airport to catch the first flight out headed for Illinois, 6:40am. We always fly Delta but it is quite a journey these days as now it’s a three leg flight and no less than four airports! Delta has eliminated the flight from Atlanta to Peoria and we now have to go thru Detroit or Minneapolis. Most all of our gear was left up their from the Bow hunt so we just needed o get our guns there and that went pretty smooth. The check in persons did not even ask to look inside the case.



We finally made it to Peoria about 4:00pm. And we grabbed our shooters and headed for the truck. The Peoria airport has free parking and we leave the truck there between hunts so its right there when we get back. it’s a 45 minute ride to the farm to pick up our gear trailer and then its to the house to spend the rest of the evening unpacking everything and getting ready for the mornings hunt. After 10 years we’ve pretty much got it down to a science and it only takes a couple of hours.

Thursday December 2nd
Temp: Max Temperature 31 °F, Min Temperature 22 °F
Wind: 3 mph (West) gust to 14
Snow: 0
Overcast to partly cloudy
Pressure: 30.20

Thursday December 2nd was the opener of the 2nd firearms season and after a light breakfast we loaded up and headed for the farm. The temp. was 27 deg. But the wind was light and out of the west at 3-5 so it was not to bad.

I decided I’d spend the first morning at the “Sanctuary” stand. It was a little slow getting started but I managed to see a total of (12) from the stand but only one of those had horns and he was small. The real excitement did not happen until I climbed down. I thought I’d slip out to the corn field and glass the field before I headed to meet Rick at the truck. I crossed the bottom, scaled the barb wire fence and came up to the corner of the little 8 acre corn field. Before I tried to cross the field I thought I had better give everything the once over. At the south end of this field is a tree line with a fence. Beyond this is a steep grass hill that rises up about 75-100’ with a small knob on top that is planted in corn also. As soon as my glasses settled on the hill top the first thing I saw was a big shooter buck looking down into the field I was in! My brain screamed S H O O T ! I dropped down on the ground for the shot but immediately realized he was a good 250yds and there were too many limbs from the tree tops at the fence to even attempt it.

About this time I see the buck wheel around and lope off about 30yds. Wondering what that was all about, I glassed back to the right to see an even larger buck that had just charged him! A big white horned 8pt with 14” G2’s that leaned way in at the top and were just a few inched from touching at the tips. From that reaction I immediately knew there was a hot doe involved with this and they had her hemmed up on this little knob.

The little wheels started spinning and before I knew it I had dumped all my gear and was across the fence and headed up the bottom as fast as possible without making to much racket. This bottom ties in with the toe of the hill where the deer were and as I got closer I slowed down a bit trying to be as stealthy as possible. Just then a coyote goes streaking across the bottom from the back of the 8 acre field and the gun was half way to my shoulder before I realized what it was. The coyote comes back into the story in a little.

The grass was still frozen on the open hill and had a few large oak leaves in it but I did the best I could. As I neared the edge of the corn field on the knob I went into a crouch until I was far enough up slope that I could see over the crest in the field. With hammer cocked I rose up but there were no deer on the field? I quickly scanned everything, nothing. I took a couple slow steps up and immediately, head a deer blow. I went into auto mode and the rifle was shouldered and I was swinging on the running buck. It was the big white horned 8. He had been standing behind some rose bushes along the west fence. It was about 125yds. and he was haulin’ the mail! The buck came into view in the scope and as I got to the front of the deer I touched her off! Unfortunately, a split second before and with my brain already committed to firing, the buck made a 90 and jumped the fence. It felt like I had missed him by a deer’s length when I felt the report of the shot. “damn it! I just missed that deer!” was my first thought. Little did I then know that this would pretty much be the hallmark of the rest of the hunt. I never saw the other buck but the doe came into view as I lowered the rifle and she shot straight ahead down the planted fence line.
The though came to me to try to salvage the situation somehow. The doe was obviously hot to go and there may have been a slight chance after things settled down that one of those bucks may have circled around to try to cut her track but I let it go and headed back to grab my gear and get back to the truck.

It just so happens that to get back to the truck I was headed the same way the coyote had gone and as I passed thru the gate into the nubbin buck corn field I saw him break from the high grass down the edge from me about a hundred yards. I dropped to one knee, swung on him and fired. I looked like I just caught him in the right front shoulder but he was able to make it off the corn field.

Rick hunted the “Well” stand and saw (13) does and no bucks.


PM. Hunt:

This afternoon I made for the stand at the “Green Tree”. Actually, it’s a stand located on the fence in the bottom, behind the green tree that the farmer cut down a few years ago but we still refer to is as the green tree for lack of a better name. Actually, I should say I started for the Kill Zone stand but ended up at the Green Tree.


As I drove in thru the west corn field that fronts the gravel I saw (3) doe type deer running off the big corn field. I parked the truck in the ditch separating the big field from the west field, grabbed my gear and headed for the “Kill Zone” Stand.

When I got to the back end of the corn field I slipped up to the edge of the timber and glassed down to the CRP below. No deer. Just as I turned around something caught my eye some 300yds down the field along the east edge, right about the gap area. It was a deer and as it came into view of my glasses I could see it was pretty nice buck that warranted further scrutiny. I could see his mouth was hanging open and I glassed ahead to see (3) more bucks all ganged around one doe at the golden oaks. All the other bucks were just year and a half old things with not much for horns. I glassed back to the big deer and could see he was an 8 that looked to be in the 120-130 class and not quite what I was looking to shoot.

This did however, change my destination and I decided to go to the green tree which would put me close to the action if they looped back or another buck came along on the deal later.

I ended up seeing a total of (11) deer including the half rack in the CRP at dark and a small buck in the bottom from the stand. The rest of the deer were all does and yearlings.

Rick hunted the “Barn stand” at the top of the pines. He only saw (5) does and no bucks.

That was pretty much it for the first day. I was glad to see there is still a little rutting activity going on.

Here are just a few of the trail camera photo's I collected during the hunt:

I collected hundreds of trail camera photo's between the three trips. I'll post them as time permits.

Good Luck,

Larry S.

(All photo's by Larry Stephens)