Hunterella
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Hunterella

Shoot.

Double Time

11/4/2018

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     My rangefinder said 42 yards, and I knew it was worth the shot.

     Quartering away as he filled his belly with my alfalfa and clover, he had no clue I was turned sideways in my stand at full draw, kisser button pressing at my mouth while the thump-thump of my heart echoed off my sternum loud enough I was certain he would spook in an instant. Draw, aim, release. I watched my orange Luminock find home, heard the satisfying smack of metal on meat, and watched him wheel up and over the crest of the hill, glowing arrow bobbing in the distance.

     It was the last I would see of him. No blood, no matter how much I looked, how many leaves I touched, hoping their dusky red was warm and sticky and not just the result of photosynthesis gone wrong. I must have had a tallow shot, and the temper tantrum that ensued at losing my October buck was reminiscent of a petulant child. I’m not proud of it, but I don’t fail well. Thank God I did, or the following story would never have happened.
     The deer have been thick as ants on honey all summer and fall. My family farm sits in the middle of 150 acres of timber and pasture, but the hot spot is always right out the back door, eleven acres of rolling hayfield bisected by a five-foot grave marker memoralizing the property homesteaders - hence, the name: The Tombstone Field. Deer and turkey migrate to the Tombstone Field year round, and as you wash dishes from the kitchen sink, you can count furry hides and feathered fans morning and evening. I can be in one of three stands in less than five minutes, and it rarely disappoints a hunter willing to drop a meaty doe or two. On an overcast Halloween afternoon, coming in hot from working later than I wanted, the double stand in the Tombstone Field was my best option to grab a quick evening hunt and clear my head from my abysmal mess just two nights before.
     Calm, so calm and still, quiet enough that my growling stomach almost spooked a doe that walked under my stand, so close that had I been eating crackers, she would have wandered away in a halo of crumbs. As the gloaming hour set in, deer migrated to the field, first young bucks to spar and feed, then young does with spring fawns in tow - 23 in total, before the night was through. I sat stonelike as bucks chased and does trotted, nothing worth drawing back on this early in the season. Settling in for the show, I relaxed, leaning on my pack and resolving to enjoy yet another evening perfumed by the scent of an Earth Disk under a crisp fall sunset. And then, I spied with my little eye something unusual.
     He came in from the northeast, slowly moving down the fence line as he stopped every 50 yards at a fresh licking branch, nudging and rubbing his way towards me as if he owned the place. Bigger than any of the adolescent bucks that had been chasing females like teenagers at a junior high dance, he moved slowly, sniffing the air for any sign of a female ready for some rut season lovin’. This...this was it. I knew I was going to take this buck, if I could only be patient enough to take the good shot.
    He casually walked in my shooting lane at 20 yards, and I stood as he stopped to sniff the ground, healthy rack and meaty neck clearly visible, making my mouth water and hands sweat. “Do a good job, do a good job” I repeated over and over, smoothly drawing my bow and settling on his vitals from 20’ in the air. Squeeze. Pop. Kick. Drop. I watched him crumple like an old newspaper and knew that the biggest buck ever harvested at home was down baby down.
    As the leg shakes set in and I began texting my buddies the obligatory “big buck down” message, I could not believe how my luck had turned from 48 hours earlier. A solid shot through the lungs, with no tracking needed - I couldn’t have ordered up a better hunt. I’d have plenty of time to load up my deer and head to the bow shop to celebrate and shake my metaphorical peacock feathers with pride. Plot twist...my night would not go down quite like that. No, not at all.
     I had been taught one cardinal rule of hunting was to never leave your bow unloaded, and come to the stand with plenty of “bullets.” As I climbed that night, I had only two arrows, one of which was rib deep in a carcass and the other casually resting in my quiver amid the flotsam and jetsam of my pack. My empty bow laid on my bouncing knee, forgotten until the “snap snap” of something big behind me brought me back to reality. One glance over my shoulder and my pulse skyrocketed; the biggest damn deer of my life was twelve yards behind me, and there I was sitting with an empty bow in my lap and phone in hand like a noob. Silently thanking myself for having the foresight to purchase two either sex tags five weeks previously, I quickly fished my remaining arrow from its tangled nest, nocked it, and fluidly stood and drew as he trotted along the path of the first buck.  Desperate to stop him, I called a series of three “merps,” each one louder than the last. Number three caught his attention at 20 yards, and he paused broadside just long enough for me to lay my my pin on his vitals and shoot. Squeeze. Pop. Kick. Drop. Again.
     He crumpled the same as the first, an encore performance synchronized to the last detail, just in a different weight class. In the span of ten minutes, I had drawn and dropped on the two biggest bucks of my life, and only the second and third deer I had ever shot with my bow. Within 20 minutes, I was on the ground with them, face to antler with my trophies. I held it together in the stand, cool as a cucumber to get the job done, but as I walked to the house to get my truck, I lost it. No tears or vomiting, no pants-wetting or shaking, just a pure release of pent-up joy from four years of hard work, recounting every detail with each step.
     I had to call for help, not just because I physically couldn’t lift my deer into my truck, but also because every good hunt needs an audience, friends that appreciate a worthy harvest and are just as excited as if they were the ones behind the string. For me, those friends were Scott and Angie and their van of kids festooned in Halloween costumes and candy, happy to abandon a night of Trick or Treating to lend a hand. As we bounced through the field, adults in the cab and kids in the bed, cheers of excitement rose with the first glance of headlights off antlers gleaming brightly in the night. Hauling first one, then the next into the bed took a team effort, two to lift and one to photograph, because a story isn’t quite complete without pictures to make it real.
    And it doesn’t seem real, not quite yet. Even though I have the pictures, even though I field dressed my deer with a pocket knife under the glaring headlights of my truck, even though I’ve paid the deposit on the taxidermy bill - semi-sneak mounts on both, facing each other - it still doesn’t seem real. But then, does it ever? I’ve watched enough hunting shows to gather you never quite get over the shakes, the adrenaline rush after a conquest concludes. But what I don’t know is the after...after the hunt, after the trophy comes home, after you’ve told the tale. Does it ever hit home that something exceptional really happened to you? Never would I have guessed that I would fill not only one buck tag, but two. Never would I have guessed that I would harvest a mature buck from my family farm, let alone ones scoring in the 140s. Never would I have guessed that I would become a bowhunter and that my heart would belong to the stick and string. But it does, and the two racks I will pick up tomorrow and take to the bow shop for show and tell prove otherwise.

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The One That Got Away

1/25/2017

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"This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but with a whimper." -T.S. Eliot

     A bit melodramatic, yes, but with the good also comes the bad; for every boat, there is a buck. I was hoping I wouldn't have to share this story as the main illustration of my deer season, but when January 16th came and I found myself empty handed (yet again), the tale of the one that got away was bound to come up.
     Saturday, November 13th was a great day to hunt in West Central Illinois. The night before, I had laid out my gear and planned the morning down to the last detail: leave the house by 5:30 am, lucky apple in hand as I head for the farm. I had picked The Southie as the stand for the morning--the rut was in, and I had steered clear of it for the most part since putting it up a few weeks earlier because, as they say, if you think it's a good place, then don't hunt it often.
     The silent walk to the stand is my favorite part of a morning hunt. The excitement builds with every step, and treading silently in the dark is a race against the sun as stars dim and color begins seeping onto the horizon. I trailed estrous scent behind me for the last 100 yards, soaking the spent seed head of a wild carrot weed for good measure. Waving at my trail cam, I ducked my head and carefully wove my way through honeysuckle bushes to my stand, strapped myself in place, and settled in to wait.
    I had a good feeling about this day. Clear and crisp, but not brutally cold, the blacks and greys of early morning slowly gave way to violet, green, and gold as the sun rose over the eastern tree line. I watched my frosty footprints fade, erasing all visible evidence of my early morning disturbance. I was so distracted by watching the world awaken that I almost missed him.
     Nose to the ground, he came in quick along the field edge below me, tracing my scent trail like it was going out of style. I didn't even have enough time to get the jitters; I drew as he hit the clearing, called to get him stopped as I looked down my sight, and released just as he quartered slightly away, directly in front of my trail cam. In disbelief, I watched my arrow strike home halfway between back and belly, lodging itself deeply in his hide as he turned and bounded away, stopping once to look back in my direction before he drifted into the ravine to my west. I listened to him crash around through the brush, and with every clumsy sound he made, my heart finally remembered how to beat until the thudding in my ears drowned out any noise he could have possibly made.
     I knew well enough to wait before I went after him, but after an hour, I couldn't take it anymore. I climbed down and immediately picked up a blood trail, strong enough that I didn't need to leave any markers to find it later, for even in my excitement I remembered that I should wait a few more hours before going to retrieve my deer. Happily, I pulled my trail cam card and headed to the house for breakfast and farm chores.
     Later in the afternoon, I returned with a friend to track my buck. I had already sent the poor guy on several goose chases that turned up nothing, so I tried to contain my excitement, keeping the horse in front of the cart as best as I could. Bright red blood, foamy and plentiful, brought a smile to his face and boosted my spirits. I learned more about tracking that morning than I had before under the benefit of full sunlight: how to tell that I had hit both lung and liver, where to anticipate the buck's movements, how to look far in advance for a trail, when to look high instead of low for the next blood sign. My arrow was still in the deer, and we could see where his movements became more erratic as he crossed first one way over the fence line, and then back again. Large pools of blood and streaks of tissue were scattered amidst the leaf litter. That deer was mine.
     Until suddenly, he wasn't. We emerged into a field and immediately, abruptly, lost the blood trail. We looked for a full hour in one small area, combing the ground for any stray drop. After three hours and 400 yards of tracking, my deer was lost on a neighbor's property. We called it quits for the day, but I just couldn't leave and sat for a good long while, alone with bow in hand, hoping the clouds would part and a shine a spotlight from above on my buck. My first archery deer.
     I called the neighbor and got permission to search more extensively the next day after the morning hunt. I worked my way through draws and ravines, snaked my way under thorny thickets and around overgrown trees. I searched for water, hoping my deer worked his way to the bank of an abandoned farm pond to lie down and die. Nothing, nada, zero. I politely called the landowner back when I gave up the ghost, asking her to keep her eyes peeled for a carcass with an arrow still stuck deep, two pink and one white fletching marking my kill so I could at least recover my skull.
     As January marches on, I still hold out hope that one day, that rack will be mine. Maybe spring shed hunts will uncover the nice symmetrical rack that I would have given my left ear to find about eight weeks ago. The time is coming to trade in my bow, and I do it reluctantly, thinking about the fact that I will part ways with it without an official kill and recovery, almost like waving the white flag of defeat. But then again, I know I hit my deer. I know I can track him. I know he is out there, somewhere. And as I checked my trail cam card later that night, licking my wounds, I found an image that both soothes the burn and fuels the fire for next year: a beautiful broadside photo of the one that got away, seconds before I released my arrow on an (almost) perfect morning.

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Movin' On Up

11/5/2016

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     George and Louise Jefferson would be proud of the changes I've been making lately. East side, west side...all my sides are better covered now that I've gone vertical.
     Let me be clear: this is not the first time I have hunted from a tree stand. Actually, my first shot with my Winchester, my first deer, and my first buck all happened from a stand we simply refer to as "The Single," which still hangs a short walk from my parent's back door. All of our stands have pet names: The Single, The Double, Old Faithful, The Honey Hole, The Six Acres, and The Secret (which only my dad and I know the precise location). Only two sites, Hogback and Hedge Grove, have ever been hunted strictly from the ground. These stands have been in place for a decade and a half, hung by my dad and his best friends as a new hunting partnership developed between the three men that now spans Illinois, Ohio, and Florida. 
     I used to climb recklessly, gun tucked under my arm, no safety harness attached, often forgetting to clarify with anyone where I was headed or how long I would be there. I remember one chilly morning in The Single, as my head nodded to my chest despite my best efforts, when I realized that one fall would leave me as a shish kabob on the fence at my right. A pretty serious accident from a family friend a year and a half ago left the ultimatum of "no harness, no climbing" from my dad, and as I picked up a bow instead, hunting from the ground was just easier and more practical; I had enough to worry about with learning a new skill without fighting gravity as well.  In season #2, I have the bow thing fairly well under control, and it's high time I got high again (figuratively, of course).
     Bow season has been unseasonably, ridiculously hot so far, and there have been several afternoons where, rather than go on an irresponsible hunt, I had to find something else productive to do. I hit the jackpot when a friend of mine also shirked responsibilities in favor of an afternoon outside. The chore of the day was to move two stands, The Double, due to a dead tree issue compromising its safety, and an unnamed stand that was just never productive enough for us to ever care about using or naming. Six hours of cutting, cleaning, hoisting, strapping, sweating, swearing, and spending money, and I had two great new locations. The Double, retaining its old name in a new home, now sits facing eastward at the intersection of food, beds, and water. The useless single, packed full of ants in its old home, is now The Southie, nestled into a tree line between two fields in one of the highest-traffic areas on the farm. The late-season hedge balls ringing the bottom of the stand will make a nice draw for deer desperate to mix up their diet in December and January.
     To add the cherry on top, I ran across a former student who was looking to unload a climbing stand. It worked great, but he just didn't use it anymore, and I jumped at the opportunity to try something new. My friend and I tinkered around with straps and ropes, both unfamiliar with how to operate it, but we had watched enough hunting shows that surely we could figure it out. I sent him up in it first, and when it proved to be both sturdy and idiot-proof, I took my turn at climbing. I was surprised that yes, I could actually do it without falling out of the tree, and was quickly reminded that I should probably start working out again. The sense of accomplishment of getting vertical on my own was well worth the burn. Last week, my friend shot a nice six-pointer out of it, so we know The Climber produces results. Now it's up to me to use my new tools to do the same, and I'm planing to do exactly that as the rut hits Illinois.

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Happy Anniversary to Me

10/31/2016

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     I celebrated my one year anniversary this week, very quietly and with no ceremony. One year ago, I wrote a $50 check to buy a used youth bow to dip my toe into archery. Little did I know that with the first pull, I would be hooked. That first fall, I shot daily, wearing a cut on the edge of my lip from the kisser button and slowly learning the rhythm of shooting that I still follow. Draw, pulling shoulder blades together, resting the kisser button at the corner of my mouth. Wedge knuckle in the soft spot between my jawbone and my right ear. Close one eye, focusing on the target through my lime green peep. Find level, opening my left hand on the grip and extending fingers down towards the ground. Look past the pin, waiting for the natural waver in my arm to settle over my target. Exhale, release, and retrieve my arrow from the ground (in the beginning) or the foam (as of late). Repeat.
     I never could have guessed where I would be today, 365 days later, but a chance encounter over the summer made me reflect on what I would tell someone taking similar steps down the hunting path. Her name was Domi, and she came to shoot at Seven Hills Archery on the recommendation of the local bow shop guru. New to the course, and shooting alone, the range guides asked if I would take her around and show her the ropes (quite literally--Station 3 is the bear on a rope pulley that I've finally figured out). Her enthusiasm was infectious and we had a great morning shooting the breeze as well as the foam. Suddenly, I was the "expert," heavy emphasis on the quotation marks and spoken in a sarcastic tone, and my nuggets of wisdom to her that day included the following sage pieces of advice.
     Tidbit #1: If you want to shoot well from 20, practice at 50.
This is the single best piece of advice I have received, and I believe it with all my heart. I'm not an expert long distance shooter, but practicing at 50, 60, and 70 yards has been a game changer and made me far more confident and accurate for the shots I will actually take on game in the field. Maybe someday in the far, far future, this type of practice will pay off on an elk or mule deer hunt. Someday.
     Tidbit #2: Aim small, miss small.
I stink at golf, absolutely stink. I can putt for days, but driving befuddles me and I have shanked enough golf balls to confirm that it is a sport I shall never master. However, give me a fistful of tees and I'm happy as a clam, wedging them into targets and shooting to my heart's content. Aiming at a 1/2" target from 30 yards is maddening, but will make you a better shooter. Period.
      Tidbit #3: Always check your level.
Shooting left? Check your level. Uneven ground? Check your level. In a stand? Check your level. See a monster buck? For the love of all that is holy, check your level. When you get the shakes and your heart is pounding in your ears, check and recheck your level.
     Tidbit #4: Watch the arrow, not the target.
I still struggle with this one, and am miserable at retrieving any arrow that hasn't found its intended  home, but I'm working on it. Watch the flight of the arrow and track where it lands, and listen closely for the telltale pop of metal hitting flesh compared to the sad, sad crackle of carbon on branches. And invest heavily in Lumenocks...and perhaps a metal detector. Seriously, it's on my Christmas list.
     Tidbit #5: Adjust for your angle.
Shots uphill add yardage, shots downhill subtract. This is such a hard concept for my brain to master, and I still rely on dumb luck and guessing for how much to fudge. Shooting down from a stand requires special attention to form, bending at the waist instead of dropping your arm. I hope to practice this more in the coming weeks, and I pray that if the opportunity presents itself, I manage to get it right the first time around.
     
​     None of these tidbits were original, thought of by yours truly. I wholeheartedly credit the group of hunters that took me under their collective wings as a Very Special Project to try to teach an old dog some new tricks. To MR, GM, SS, CF, TB, RH, JF, and all the pro staff on Bowhunt Or Die (who have no idea that I watch them religiously and study their every move like a creeper), I can't thank you enough for your role in making me better. To Domi, I wish an outstanding fall with arrows that find their home more times than not. And lastly, to myself, I wish for that one day where the stars align and I get it all right, all at once, and I can text my friends those three letters that get our heart rates going: BBD.

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Broken and Busted

10/16/2016

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     I'm not quite certain how something that can bring me so much joy can make me furious, dejected, impatient, and poor, all at the same time. I have thrown shameful temper tantrums, complete with gear being pitched across the room, after a botched evening hunt. I have woken up at 4:30 am on one of my infrequent days off, intending to go to the woods, only to be beaten back by weather that, quite literally, rained on my parade. However, these lows have been offset by some pretty fantastic experiences, and when I measure my hunting memories on the scale of life, the needle most definitely tips in favor of the positive. 
     And then, we have these past two weeks.
     If you asked me "how's your bow season going," I could sum it up with "I'm riding the struggle bus, but thanks for asking." For those of you unfamiliar with the expression, I'm not doing so well; in fact, this may have been the worst window of my hunting experiences to date. I've been having terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad hunts. And the worst part about it is that, with just a little tweak here, better timing there, things wouldn't be so bad and I wouldn't find myself broken and busted at the end of week #2.
                                                           Broken
     I am a very careful person. I still have college t-shirts in mint condition, I have yet to don a cast or require stitches (yes, I just knocked on wood), and I take all my morning multivitamins as a good grown up should. This careful nature is directly at odds with the streak of bad luck in which I am currently swimming. During the past fortnight, I have managed to break or lose more equipment than I have in the previous eleven and a half months combined. Five, count them, five arrows are MIA, wedged in thickets, grass tufts, passing zeppelins, or space-time continuums for all I know because they certainly aren't in my quiver, in a deer, or neatly on the ground where I thought they would be. To help me better locate my errant arrows, I bought some new Nockturnal luminocks--one of which I promptly snapped in half trying to insert it into my arrow shaft, eliciting a string of expletives that would make a sailor proud. During a practice session, I managed to crack an arrow shaft on an wild shot while trying to figure out why my bow was suddenly shooting one and a half feet to the left. Even more infuriating was the shot that was just a tad high, skimming the top of a target and somehow shearing the fletching from the shaft, cleanly snapping the arrow in half, flipping the sections in the air like some kind of bad cartoon segment as I watched in disbelief. By my rough calculations, I am currently $160 in the hole, not counting the cost of replacements or the new blinds and gear I picked up in late September. Oh, have I mentioned I am also cheap, so this is a particularly painful figure. I am one lost arrow away from developing a permanent eye twitch from incredulity at my bad luck.
                                                              Busted
     I pride myself in my scent concealment, although I am a novice compared to my hunting friends. I have a scent-free bag, but it is a DIY version and is more scent-free due to location (outside) than technology. I don't own any Ozonics, but have a wide range of Scent Killer Gold products for every possible application. I developed a habit of eating an apple before every hunt to cover the smell of my breath. Last fall, I had a coyote track prey within five feet of my ground location before he noticed my presence. I have years of experience telling me that I am able to go undetected, which infuriates me even more with the number of times I have been busted this fall. To date, I have hunted 21 hours, seen 22 deer, and have been busted all but two times, which accounts for all the missing arrows. Have I mentioned that there are FIVE of them? The worst part is, I am getting busted in ridiculous ways. One doe walked up behind my friend and I through dense woods, stopping five yards away before either of us noticed each other, my eyes turned toward the field rather than the brush at my back. Another doe was lying directly in my hunting spot as I walked in one afternoon at 3:30, the soonest I could get there after school. Trapped in the open, I stalked up to her within 20 yards before she finally noticed and bolted. Three other does paraded through the field that evening, just to bust me one at a time, much to my chagrin. One doe and her fawns busted me as I tried a new spot, seated just a little too near the trail for the amount of cover I had to work with, a rookie mistake. The final, and most embarrassing, happened as I left my blind at the end of the hunt, gear packed away, only to emerge to face a doe at what I figured to be fifty yards--I couldn't tell for sure, because like an idiot, I had packed away my rangefinder. I shot anyway, and hit her, but never recovered my deer. I believe "crestfallen" best described my mood that evening, and to some degree, still does.
     Yes, I know season has just begun. Yes, I know the Rutting Moon has yet to come. Yes, I am aware that even the hunters I watch on YouTube have bad outings and their own fair share of misses. To be honest, the laughter and consolation of my friends has eased the sting, but hasn't healed the burn. I'm ready for a win, a shot I'm proud of, a deer that is humanely harvested and recovered. That day will come, I'm sure, but until it does, I will keep plugging along, flinging arrows and writing checks to support a hobby that has become a life that I can't do without.

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Opening Day

10/2/2016

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     Anyone who is passionate about a thing, regardless of what that thing actually is, has a countdown. Baseball fans, deeply engrossed in playoff fervor, are already thinking about April. Christmas fanatics have customized calendars on cell phones, ticking off every Friday from now to December 25th. Movie buffs anxiously await the next blockbuster release and search for spoilers online, and tech geeks camp out in long lines for days for the release of the next iPhone. We all have that one thing that brings us to to our knees in anticipation, filling our days and nights with daydreams of when we can get our hands on "our precious."  This urge is in our DNA; resisting the call is a fool's game.
     My day is October 1.
     I have been waiting for my thing since 5:02 pm on January 17th, the precise time when the sun slipped below the horizon and closed the door on whitetail archery season in Illinois. The day was brutal cold, eeking out only 13 measly degrees, and yet I dragged my gear out to the woods, hoping and praying for one final shot, one last chance to fill an archery tag during my first season. Sadly, I walked away empty handed, replaying every mistake from the previous three and a half months. Had I checked my level on that first doe, I would be able to feel my fingers right now. Had I used my rangefinder on that second doe, my feet wouldn't feel like lead blocks, tingling with every step back to the house. Had I waited just a bit longer on that last buck, tempted him in closer with a bleat or call, I wouldn't have ice crystals at the corners of my nose. I left that season with scales balanced between great experiences and heavy regrets, two sides of my hunting coin that I slipped into my pocket to revisit throughout the upcoming weeks, flipping it between my fingers to pass the time.
     In my off season, I trained like I had a paycheck riding on it. Weekly league nights. New equipment. 3D targets. Weight training. Competitive shooting. Research. Distance shooting. Bigger. Faster. Stronger. I watched does and fawns from the tractor as I mowed field edges, enamored with their quiet movements and mentally estimating how far they were away. Seven an a half months passed in the blink of an eye, and as the weather warmed and I added fishing as a distraction, I almost lost sight of the calendar as my thing quietly approached. 
     What snapped me back to reality was a smell, all too familiar, and gone for all too long. As I drove through town one sweltering September evening, windows down despite temperatures still in the 80s at 9 pm, the smell of fall was suddenly, briefly, in the air. We all know that smell--something sharp, with a hint of woodsmoke, and the promise of cold winds under stars snapping bright and clear. The smell of endings and beginnings as summer's heat gives way to winter's chill. The smell of hunting season.
     That smell pushed me to action. No longer was my countdown an arbitrary thing marking a day too far away to be real; I was past the month mark, rounding the corner on two weeks, reading the signal to head for home on a day count that could almost be done on two hands. The past few days have been spent on final details--the broadheads that needed sharpened, the field pack that required reorganizing, the quiver that didn't fit quite right on my bow. The scent-free chemicals came out of storage, and every piece of camo fabric in the house was appropriately removed of traces of my human stench. I spent an embarrassing amount of money in a moment of weakness on an array of equipment to improve my chances this year (or at the very least, improve my comfort). It was time.
     As the calendar flipped from September to October, I drove to my family farm, ready to start a new season. The weather really was too warm for good hunting, and 2016 is predicted to have a later-than-usual rut. None of this mattered. I headed to the woods with a friend, mentally flipping my 2015 season coin in my mind. I'm sure this year will bring its own bevy of successes and failures, some I can expect (my lack of food plots and trail cameras are weighing heavily on my mind at the moment) and others that will come as a surprise. But I take it as a good omen that we had a doe appear behind us at five yards, practically in our laps, and settle by us for 45 minutes until she and her fawn bounded across open ground, heading for the only corn field in the area. On day one, I picked the right field, the right time, and the right direction. Although my Opening Day didn't lead to a kill, I'm still fairly certain the coin has landed heads up.

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Lying About Lying...And Other Tall Tales From The Course

7/20/2016

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     "People never lie so much as after a hunt, during a war, or before an election."  Well, after today, I'd like to add "and at 3D archery shoots" to this quote. It's a good thing we were wearing boots on the archery course today, not for the 1.5" of rain that came down at 8 am, but for the tall tales and smack talk that were piling up in the woods just east of Bushnell.
     I thought it was going to be just my friend/archery coach with me on the course at Seven Hills, which was fine since he had been "too busy" to shoot since March and I was looking forward to putting him in his place with all my practicing. I was pleasantly surprised when we pulled up and noticed two slightly damp guys from the bow shop waiting out the rainstorm in their cars. With our duo expanded to a quartet, we started slip-sliding our way on the trail to target #1, starting out just as polite and serious as you please on a soggy Sunday morning.
     It didn't take long for the day to unravel. Without our serious archery friend, who was at a competitive shoot in Alabama, our game faces dissolved into teenage hijinks and the shoot took a sharp left-hand turn in the maturity department. Not only did you need to be wary of the slick footing and mindful of your ranged targets, but you had to watch your back for the repeated tree shakings that would send a cascade of rain down your neck if you weren't paying attention. Target #2 brought the first miss of the morning (not mine, thank goodness), which we harped on for at least the next five stations. There was mocking, rain shaming, finger pointing, gear bashing...you name it, we flung it. And we all loved every minute of it.
     By station #14, we started upping the ante with trick shots, tossing out the traditional 12-10-8-5 ring scoring and opting for the all-or-nothing approach of "hit the bear's tail" and other minuscule parts of the target that would make serious archers frown. By station #25, we invented a new sport, Hot Yoga Archery, which had us sweating and doing 180 degree turns while standing on one foot to take shots from 30, 40, and 50 yards. Station #30 had us taking blind shots through the weeds, balancing on elevated platform railings, and shooting between stairs that were never meant for arrows to pass through. Top that off with running through mud puddles like salamanders and repeated "do overs" from one of our group members (again, not me), and we had the collective maturity of a group of 7th grade boys. And I couldn't have had more fun.
     After the shoot, we sat around, sharing hunting stories and photos, making plans for a private shoot with our pooled 3D target resources. One guy has fishing kayaks on Spring Lake, another has a pool, pond, and puppies. The third hunts in Arizona and offered to take us all scouting for Mulies that would put our Illinois whitetails to shame. I offered my pastry expertise in exchange for some wild blackberries, which are just now ripe and will be perfect in a cobbler. What can I say, I like to bake (zucchini bread was the treat du jour for the range operators today) and have limited other marketable skills. As we parted ways, two for home and two of us back to the course,  we exchanged phone numbers and promised to meet up again this summer, and I couldn't help but think it was the best day of group shooting so far, hands down.
     I should have quit while I was ahead. Trip #2 on the course gave me a whiff on a target and a glorious slip in the mud that left me facedown on the trail, bow in hand but unharmed. Thank goodness it only happened in front of one guy, because the ribbing from the whole group would have done me in. But I ended the day without any lost or broken arrows (the only one to do so, I might add), and my score was still good enough to beat my buddy.  In the end, that's all that really matters. 

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"I Hear Foam!"

6/14/2016

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     Sometimes, all it takes is the reassuring thunk of an arrow in foam to make your day, regardless of if the shot was a 12-point ringer or a 5-point "participation ribbon" body shot. I have to be honest, people: I don't fail well, and I CERTAINLY don't fail well publicly. I prefer to make my mistakes in the quiet of my backyard rather than in front of others, and last Sunday I had to risk the certain doom of having strangers watch me stink it up at Seven Hills.
     I knew this could be an issue when I got a Facebook message from an archery friend. One simple line, "shooting at 7 Hills this Sunday at 8 if you are interested," brought both excitement (YES! CONTACT WITH OTHER HUMANS!) and dread (NO! I'M AN INCONSISTENT HOT MESS ON THE COURSE!).  But I'm not one to turn down a friendly offer, and I hadn't seen my archery buddy in a while, so I hit the road at 7:30 am to see how I would do.
     Things were looking pretty good as I pulled in. One club organizer had paid my entry fee in return for doing some soil testing, and I was toting a batch of homemade cheesecake for the guys running the course. Yes, it was already 82 degrees with a humidity level only seen in a sauna, but that's what everyone expects of a west central Illinois summer. However, I took a quick one-two punch to my confidence as I turned around: I was the last one of my group to arrive to shoot, and my group was far larger than I expected. Strangers were going to see me ride the struggle bus. Gulp.
     Two of the guys were regulars in the bow shop, but three others were new faces. After a quick round of introductions, we set off for the first target. I would love to say that my Bowtech and I performed flawlessly, but I believe the phrase "fair to middling" summed it up better. Aside from the occasional urge to puke a little and the fear that I had sweat through my shirt before we reached target #3, I managed to hit all the targets, even the moving bear that I had previously skipped because, honestly, I hadn't figured out how to run the damn thing by myself.
     I'm happy to report that I survived all thirty targets with no misses, and came away with some good tips:
  1. I need more practice shooting uphill.
  2. I need to actually study where the point rings are on the targets rather than guess.
  3. I need to bring not just the rangefinder, but binoculars on the course (and all the cool kids call them "binos.")
  4. I need to invest in a hip quiver. Immediately.
  5. Even manly men look good with flowers behind their ears...unless they are poison parsnips.
I hope I get to shoot with the same group next month, and until then, I'll work on calming those nerves and picking a new recipe to share with my buddies, because I may not have a perfect shot every time, but I can make a mean pie, and that's almost as good.

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Welcome Home!

5/27/2016

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     For most people, the arrival of summer means cookouts, vacations, and gardening. For me, it means a break from the never-ending struggle of not being able to have my bow at my home. As a teacher, schools tend to frown on having weapons in vehicles, and my school is 30 minutes away from my home, but only 10 minutes away from the bow shop. To solve the problem, a friend of mine was gracious enough to let me keep my bow and targets at his place throughout the school year to save me miles on my car. Summer vacation started two days ago, and with the settling of my bow in its 3-month resting place, I set out Jake in the yard tonight for my first at-home practice.
   To be honest, I've neglected my shooting a little bit over the past two weeks. And by a little bit, I mean completely. I went to the bow shop one evening with all intentions of practicing, but it turned into social hour instead. Whoops. All the excitement of fishing, learning to fillet (finally!), and attempted crawdad trapping has pushed practice to the back burner, but that stops today. Oh, and having a WORKING rangefinder should make things go a little easier in a new practice spot--thanks, Amazon! If I'm going to sign up for any ASA competitions this summer, I have to get serious about shooting.
     I set Jake up in the backyard, with a small berm of soil at his back to catch any errant arrows that don't find home. Thank goodness for that backstop, because looming directly behind my target are two grain bins, just poised to blow up any arrow I send too far out of the way.  I live in the middle of prairie country, so the wind was a new factor to contend with, but I'll chalk up the frustration to good real-life field practice.  Drawing back felt so good, and hearing the thunk of field tips sinking into foam at 20, 30, and 40 yards complimented the sounds of birds in the trees at my back. It's not quite as pretty of a practice site as at my friend's house, but it will do in a pinch and is right out my back door.
     One side perk of shooting at home is that I got to give my first lesson. My husband, who is not a hunter, wanted to give shooting a try, so I gamely walked him through the steps and tried to adjust him as best as I could considering I was teaching someone to shoot on a bow that was at least 4" too short in the draw length department (not to mention the out-of-proportion peep sight and release). We had success, and he has a new appreciation for how difficult using a bow really is. After a 45-minute practice, I relished the short walk to the house over the 15 mile car ride and started eyeballing the second-story bedroom window as a potential way to practice adjusting shots for altitude. I think I need more targets!

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Sister's day out at seven hills archery

5/16/2016

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     You can only fly solo for so long before you need a sidekick, and my Sunday Funday buddy was my sister as we hit the trails at Seven Hills Archery for some outdoor 3D shooting. The bow shop guys had been waiting on me, apparently, because we took some gentle ribbing when we signed in that they were worried we weren't coming. I may have cut it a little close managing my time to get there--whoops!
     Seven Hills is an outdoor archery club outside Bushnell, Illinois, with monthly shoots open to the public. I stumbled across them during my winter indoor league and gave it a try on opening weekend in April. A range finder is a must as you travel a 30-target course, varying in elevation, terrain, and species to shoot. My personal favorite is a bear, suspended on a track, that swings at you as you shoot, but the over-the-creek shot at stop #30 is pretty sweet, too. My nemesis is the badger, usually at stop #9--that little jerk's 10-ring is the size of a penny.
     We could not have asked for a better day, with birds chirping and the sun shining just enough to be beautiful without sweating. Sammy kept score (and kept me honest) through the course and even took a few photos. Her favorite part is the Dairy Queen stop at the end, but after shooting a 209, I was pretty happy as well. The only fly in the ointment was my fickle rangefinder, which works about 40% of the time on a good day. Thank goodness I have Amazon Prime--someone just ordered herself a new Bushnell as a graduation gift. 

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