Fall 2005 Deer Hunting Season
Well, it appears that another deer season has come and went. 

For me, it started October 1st when Ohio’s archery season opened.  I had scouted Tycoon Lake Wildlife Management Area back in September and though I had found a few key spots the big buck never showed himself that day nor any day thereafter.  The area was relatively small, with a little over 600 acres available for hunting.  Yet, I never saw a single hunter the entire season.  I did see several deer, but the big buck I had hoped to see never showed himself.  I spent several days bowhunting there as well as checking the Crown City Wildlife Management Area out.  This area is around 11,000 acres of broken tracts in the Ohio River Valley foothills of Gallia and Lawrence counties.  I focused my efforts on two small tracts of around 100 acres a piece.  I would hunt one area and then scout the other until my Kentucky archery hunt took place in a few short weeks.

On October 14th I was on my way to the Green River Wildlife Management Area in south central Kentucky.  This was my third trip ever down there and I was anxious.  I would be hunting the first two days with my brand new White 50 caliber inline muzzleloader.  I purchased this gun about two months prior, topped it with a Burris Fullfield II 3-9X scope and worked loads up with the hope of getting to pop a whitetail with it.  With over 70 rounds fired through it and the magic recipe found, I was confident it would do its job.  However, the opportunity never came.  I had plenty of deer during the two days of muzzleloader hunting, but again, no shooter buck.  The weather during those two days would be the best I would see for some time.  I continued to hunt through the heat, bugs, long hikes, early mornings and late evenings, for the next 5 days to no avail.  The big bucks were certainly there though.  Earlier that year, my buddy Ryan shot a 150 class 9 pointer with his bow and saw several other shooter bucks since then even though his season was over with a 1 buck per year limit.  But things weren’t going my way.  There was food everywhere.  Acorns were abundant and the corn hadn’t been cut yet – making bowhunting extremely difficult.  Add onto the fact the widely ranging temperatures (literally 34 – 86 degree swings) and full moons on clear nights, the deer just weren’t cooperating.  It was a challenging hunt and one that I’ll probably do again but also a disheartening one as I thought that my third trip down to Green River would produce a trophy whitetail for me.

Then came the hunts at home.  I returned from Green River with a few days of bowhunting before work called me back.  It was October 20 and the weather was much more cooperative.  I went out one evening behind the Milk House food plot and saw 3 shooter bucks along with two others.  It was probably one of the best days of bowhunting I ever experienced.  The knowledge that the huge 8 pointer I saw on our farm was out there gave me the fire to keep going.  I continued to see deer and though my Game Tracker caused me to miss a doe (I forgot to remove the first 100 ft from the fresh spool of string so as to let it spool line out freely), I didn’t lose faith.  You never know unless you go.  November came around and it was time to do some killing.  With our annual hunt, we saw 5 deer taken:  two does and three bucks (a 10 pointer, an 8 pointer and a spike).  It proved to be a great time as always but I have continued to watch our harvest rates and hunter participation slowly fade down.  It has always been and will continue to be a great social event regardless.  November also saw Lou Imundo show up to kill some “deeyah”.  He managed to miss twice at a Monster buck, kill a button buck, kill an 8 pointer, miss once at a turkey, killed a turkey and killed another turkey.  So he missed 3 times and hit 4 times.  He came out ahead in the end.  Rifle Season continued to be busy with a few deer being taken.  Jeremy killed a small shooter 8 pointer off our place before it got zapped by some jackass of Lewis as it was about 150 yards from a border hunter.  I killed two more deer – a doe and a small 8 point mistake.  The buck was a shooter but nothing huge and I had passed over bigger deer in the past.  Alas, a split second decision on my behalf appeared to be the wrong one.  Several more deer were taken off Lewis.  But again, the big boys were never seen.  There were some nice deer taken but no monster bucks this time around.

Following the West Virginia regular firearms season, I headed over to Ohio for their traditional firearm season in which hunters are required to use shotguns.  I toted my Remington 870 12 gauge throughout several pieces of public hunting areas in Gallia county.  Though I saw some deer, I didn’t see any bucks but I also didn’t see any hunters!  Just amazing to me I thought.  Sure, I saw hunters’ vehicles parked here and there but never while I was afield.  I suppose I was successful in avoiding other hunters this time around as well.  The firearm season in Ohio came to a close with no bucks being taken by my hand.

With December, comes the slowing down of hunting in general.  With the Christmas holiday and family visiting, it’s pretty difficult to find the time.  However, I did manage to go on a few other hunts.  The 2nd week of buck season found me and Beernut in the Lewis Fields looking for deer on the very last day.  We went out past the 2nd gate and sat on the point where I spotted a small 4 pointer.  Chris couldn’t see the buck through his scope so I handed him my sniper rifle and he took a shot and the buck disappeared.  Then, a monster buck and several other deer seemed to come running to the same spot.  Chris couldn’t find the buck in the scope till it was nearly over the top of the saddle and he took a hastily fired pop shot at it without cutting a hair.  Little did we know that he had done the same with the 4 pointer.  We found hair but no blood and after an extensive search, no sign of deer or blood led us to believe it was a low brisket shot.  The lesson was a hard one for Beernut to learn though – quality optics are worth their weight in gold!  After Christmas, he and I would team up again for the late season firearms antlerless hunt.  I still hunted the Hardy Neal field in the morning by myself and saw several deer but I couldn’t get a shot through the brush.  The field itself was a hotspot.  Where the “brush” had been mowed, new browse had started to come on and the deer were using it heavily.  It was a HOT area, loaded with droppings, rubs, scrapes, tracks and trails.  Amazing what a little strip mowing will do for an area – it allows cover and food both in a relatively compact area while still keeping your fields in control.  Later in the evening Beernut came up and we hunted down the area again and saw deer but no shots as they were running away.  We set up inside the trailer and overlooked the clover field in front.  A small fawn came out but since it was small and alone, I didn’t want to run the risk of shooting a button buck.  That would be the only shot opportunity we had for the day.  Deer were still plentiful with several sightings but we just simply didn’t sit still long enough. 

That ended the fall 2005 season.  My Ohio license is good till the end of January and I may still get after the deer over there.  However, my eyes are turned to new hunting opportunities out of state – Maryland, Tennessee, Colorado, South Carolina, Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Kentucky are all being looked at by yours truly.  I’ll probably only do one or two this year but we’ll see how the finances work out in the end.

I hope you’ve got a little better idea of how this year’s season went after reading this article.  It was fun, but I am not content with the harvest – more does need to be harvested and a better quality food and cover program needs to be implemented.  We’ll see how it goes this year!  I suppose that’s the one thing that makes every year a success – the knowledge that there’s always another season and a whole year to prepare for it!