Spring has arrived in the lowcountry, however I am not yet feeling the warm fuzzy feelings that should come with it. Work, the weather and other responsibilities seem to have given me a serious case of the blahs….

I have hunted a few hours here and there since Saturday’s opening of turkey season, but with out any luck yet. I have passed on two jakes and had one longbeard catch me unprepared for his arrival, so I am still at zero on my success rate.

However, even though it rained all night and now the wind is howling, I think that I am going to put in some time today any how. The turkeys are still there, and hopefully one of them is lonely enough to visit me…

And possibly some more time in the woods will help me to break out of my funk and get back to some serious writing ASAP. Until then, please enjoy the picture of our 100 year old pear tree that is in full bloom.

Also,  I would love it if some of my readers would be kind enough to write up a hunt they have had since opening day and either put it in the comments section or email it to me at jeff  @  jeffhuntphotography.com. I could then do a post on others hunting success or failures, and pictures are also always welcome!!! And since Florida opened this past weekend, I would love any stories or hunting reports from there as well.

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We finally made it home late Saturday night from our trip down to Florida for work, but not before breaking down in Jacksonville. Our van’s fuel filter had clogged up, and that shut the fuel pump down. Luckily we were able to limp to a station, and the the pump was fine after we changed the filter. Just a little excitement to make the trip home better!

Will came back with us, and we have tried to use these last couple of COLD days to hunt hard, but with no luck. We sat until 10am yesterday morning in the 21 degree weather and did not see a thing. And last night was more of the same - sunny and cold, but no deer. We just knew they would have to get up to eat in weather like this, but I guess not. The four months of hunting pressure probably does not help either.

We did see quite a few fresh scrapes over the last few days, so we were hoping to catch up with one of the late rutting bucks. Chip had one chase a doe by him on Cubbedge Hill this past weekend in the 80 degree heat, and then saw two good ones during midday chasing over at the Blount Place.  So we figured that the cold would really make them move for us. However just like the rest of the season, the deer have not done anything that they are supposed to.

We are getting Will on the road this morning back to Florida, and then I promise to get a few new posts up including one to fulfill my MEME TAG!

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I just got in from the woods, and the heat was crazy. It was 80 when I left for the stand, and I think it is only going to get down to the mid 60s tonight!

Fortunately the deer thought it wasn’t too bad, and I ended up seeing one buck fawn, two spikes and a medium 6 point.  But NO DOES. Kind of made me want to bag the decent 6. But since in one more year he could be really nice, I decided to let him go - all 140 pounds (give or take) of his nice, tasty, succulent flesh… ooohh, maybe I should have hammered him.

Just kidding… If I am patient more of those darn skinheads will come by. And who knows, the weather man says that a cold front should move in by this weekend; possibly the bigger bucks will get up on their feet too.

I’ll let you know!

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I have to admit that I did a stupid thing the other night while on the stand… I tried to kill two deer, and ended up with none.

The season is almost over here in the Lowcountry, and after passing up tons of does all fall, I now need to make sure we have enough meat to last through the summer.  We eat deer 80% of the time around here, so it is very important that this task be accomplished, therefore I am after a couple of fat does between now and Jan. 1st.

However it is very HOT right now, causing low deer movement. The long season is also taking its toll, so any deer is hard to get out in the open. That is why Friday night when a whole family group came by, I just knew it was time to get busy. I waited until they were very close so that I would have an easy shot on the lead doe as well as possibly another shot on one making its escape.

This is where theory meets reality…

My stand is in the middle of three trees, and I leaned out to the side of one of them and pulled the trigger as the first deer hit the road leading out the clearcut. She jumped straight up and kicked her feet out, then let out a loud bleat. However before she even hit the ground, I spotted antlers running off with the rest of the pack. I quickly shoved another shell in, leaned to the other side of the tree, and tried to pick him out of the group. By then, most were getting deep in to the bush, and I couldn’t find him. I did however find another doe that had stopped running about 150 yards away, and was now trotting.

I got on her, and pulled the trigger again. I saw her bound off with no problem… That’s OK I told myself since I already had one down. I then hurried over to where my deer should have been. It was not there! So I started looking around, but with no luck. I then started back at the beginning and tried to find the blood trail. Still no luck.

So I went up and down every path I could find as well as looking all over in the tall grass and dog fennel that surrounded my stand. NOTHING! I looked for almost 45 minutes until the sun dropped out of the sky making it even harder to find my deer.
I was pissed… at myself. Instead of killing one nice deer and coming back another day to get one more, I had tried to shorten the process by getting both at the same time. And to do that, I had taken my eye off of the first wounded deer to shoot at the second. And normally that wouldn’t have been too bad since I should have been able to still watch her out of the corner of my eye - except for the tree the completely blocked my view. Now I had no idea even which trail she had run off on, and in a dense clearcut like I was hunting, that was a sure way to lose one. And sure enough, that is what had happened.

I told myself to just calm down, go and get my truck and pick up the guy hunting with me. We could then come back and look some more. However my newly fixed truck took a s..t about half way back to the front of Cubbedge Hill, and I had to walk on to get him. The two of us then walked out to the front gate while I tried calling everyone I could think of to come and get us (when my wife did not answer, I knew the kids had turned off the ringer again, so she wasn’t going to be coming to get me anytime soon).

I finally got a hold of my cousin, and he and J.O. came to get us about an hour later when they finished picking cotton. By then, it was getting pretty late. I decided to go ahead on home, hope the temperature dropped enough in the night to keep my deer from spoiling and come back tomorrow. Unfortunately it did not, so I just ended up feeding our coyotes…I am now so bummed with myself.

Of course that is only my human emotions talking, since whatever ate it surely did not think it had gone to waste. And it is not like we don’t have one of the highest deer populations in the country. But, again, I DO NOT like to lose a deer. And if you count my lost/missed buck early in the rut, that would make two. And I usually do not lose one, much less two.

The lesson here: no matter how good of a hunter you are, there is always something new to learn. And even if you have learned that lesson before, you may forget it and have to be reminded.

So remember -  Never take your eye of off the deer you are shooting/have shot! We owe it to these wonderful creatures.

Lesson learned - AGAIN!

Jeff

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I apologize for not posting more this week, but I have been busy as anything since Thanksgiving, and I have been sick all of this week!

Fortunately I am making a full recovery. And we have quite a few members up this weekend as well as a camera full of pictures ready to be checked, so that should allow me to provide some new reading material here at LowcountryHunting over the next few days…

As for me, I did feel well enough to make it out to the woods tonight and decided to go down in to the bay on Cubbedge Hill. Right off of the bat, I bumped a medium (I think, it was a quick look) buck going in. I could see him tip toeing around trying to locate the source of the sound he heard, so I just kept trying to get the cross hairs on him to get a better look at his rack. I could have shot him, but I just could not ever tell for sure what he had on his head, so I passed. He finally got spooked and trotted off; I then snuck on to my stand.

I settled in and figured after that, the deer must be moving. I also heard distant shots all night, so I figured the deer must be moving. Plus it was a perfect night in the woods, so the deer should be moving… The air was cool with a bit of fog, and it was gray and overcast. I just knew something huge was going to come by me.

However the night passed without another single sighting until, with just a few minutes of shooting light left, I heard something responding to my grunt calls - running quickly my way! I jerked my 30-06 up and quickly turned off the safety. Here he comes I told myself! I prepared for a snap shot as the sound of the crunching leaves got closer.

Just then, a beautiful doedillo (for those of you who do not know, that is a female armadillo) bounded in to my sights followed by a monster buckdillo. The rut was in full swing, and this guy was giving her a run for her money…

I almost threw up as my adrenaline rush vanished!  Oh well, it was a great night in the woods…

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I just came in from loading up the corn on Aunt Mary’s tract over in Scotia, and I saw a GIANT buck run across the road at 11:30 on the dot. He was only 75 yards from one of their stands, and he was a true monster!

Like I have been saying, if you want to kill a big buck right now, you have to be in the woods during the midday hours. The big ones just do not seem to be moving until at least 8:30am, and often much later. I believe that most of the mature bucks are tending does right now, and the only times they are moving are when they are chasing the doe they are with, or when they move around during the midday looking for a new doe.

As for the weather, it is like summer here. And it is not supposed to get much better over the next week. About the only thing we can look forward to is a small cool down this Saturday. However the cold weather did not help us last weekend, so I am not counting on it now. I think everyone just needs to accept that the abundance of acorns still in the woods along with the heat is KILLING the deer movement… and is going to for the rest of the season!

So just remember it is the RUT, and hunt hard especially during the midday, preferably as deep in the woods as you can get, and you might just luck up. If you are not willing to do that, then just go ahead and cut on the Outdoor Channel because that is as close to a big buck as you are going to get.

And as if I needed more proof of what is going on with the deer movement, two friends of J.O. were down last weekend hunting on Palachacola, 6500 acres of prime WMA land. And one of them had this to say about his hunt:

Jeff,

Buddy and myself were down this weekend staying at the house hunting the Palachacola Drawed Hunt. Just dropping a line to let you know it was terrible. There were 21 hunters hunting 3 days, the result for the whole weekend equaled 7 does, 1 button buck, NO antlered bucks. The weather was bad Thursday night with 22mph wind but Friday and Saturday the weather was no excuse. I have read your notes and you are probably right, the bucks are in the woods with the does. I saw 3 bucks Friday night but they were small basket racks. Mr J.O. invited us back in December to help you guys take a few does out of the herd when yall start doing so. Have a good week and good luck

   Thanks, Bryan
So there you go… Now suck it up, get up here and hunt like you mean it!

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The weekend hunt did not produce any big bucks or big buck sightings. Hell, it only produced a couple of deer sightings period. The big bucks seem to be hunkered down with the does, and only the small ones are moving. I saw three spikes Saturday morning, and C.J. passed on the 6 point in the first picture over at the Blount Place. He also saw a 6 point standing in the new road when he went to pick his dad up at 10 am this morning.

And that fits the pattern I have seen lately. Many of the bucks I have spotted have been later in to the morning, and while they are not monsters, these two bucks pictured show that. Like I said, the big 6 point was on the camera at the Blount Place several days in a row at various times during the day. And the smaller 6 point was in the bay on Cubbedge Hill every day at different times during the daylight. Of course I also did not shoot my buck last week until close to 9am.

So to help everyone get through the tough times, I thought that I would post a picture of a button buck trying to mount a doe - demonstrating how strong the urge to breed is for a whitetail. Combine that with midday movement (when most of our hunters are long gone) - and that shows why no matter how hot it is, how slow the deer movement, how tired you are - during the rut, you should be here sitting in a stand waiting on a monster!We also finally have proof that we occasionally have hogs on the Blount Place. I knew I saw their prints every once in a while, and Chip and I definitely heard one squeal two weeks ago, so it is no surprise. But it is nice to prove it…

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While it had warmed up for the last few days, a big cold front is rolling in tomorrow. And that should put the bucks back on their feet for the weekend’s hunt. We should also have another full house, so hopefully we can kill one of the nice deer caught on the camera at the Big Oak over the last week.

Check out the heavy 9 point working the scrape by the corn in the first picture. In the second, a good buck shows off his broken tine due to fighting for his place in the pecking order. The third is a very rare picture - it captured a middle aged buck ejaculating after working the scrape! The fourth picture is of a HUGE buck with a mediocre rack at the scrape. That thing looks like a cow, and has to be at least 3.5 years old (if not older), but just does not have a very good set of horns (very similar to the 5 point I shot a few weeks ago). And the fifth image is just a cool looking 2.5 year old 3 point working the licking branch.

I just thought these were all great shots, and all truly show off how different a buck’s rack can look on deer in the same age classes.

I also thought I would have a report from this morning’s hunt, but Will obviously did not go due to the rain since I still see his car out by his trailer. And we did hunt last night, but did not see ANYTHING in the 80 degree weather.  So check back in the morning for a fresh hunting report…

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No big bucks were killed this past weekend, but several good ones were seen and one was missed!

After a big “Day out with Thomas” on Sunday, I just had to call C.J. to find out what went on without me. He said that he had missed a good buck from #6 at the Blount Place Saturday night, and that Richard had seen a good one chasing does at Cubbedge Hill but that he would not stop for a shot… Ugh! I was sure hoping that they would have put down a good buck or two while I was gone, but that is hunting.

Another cold snap is coming in this weekend, so it should help keep the bucks moving. And the two nights of frost last week should also help spur some movement since the deer will have to move more now that all of the natural browse is dead. I just hope they run out of acorns soon too! That is what has really hurt us, and everyone else too. There has just been so much food down in the woods that the does have not had to come out for corn, so the bucks haven’t had to follow them out either…

Please check back since I should have daily reports up for the rest of the week. Will is coming tomorrow, and we are going to hunt hard until he kills something BIG. And a few more members should be joining us by Friday, so hopefully we will have new monster down soon, and we can put his pictures up!

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The trailcam at the Big Oak caught these bucks last week, and I thought I would put them up - Because that is as close as I can get to showing everyone  a good buck at the moment!

We just can’t seem to kill anything good at the moment due to the abundance of food in the woods. However at least we are getting some opportunities (Raymond’s grandson Josh missed a chasing buck Monday am at the Bulldozer), and it should really pick up now that the cold has arrived. It was right around freezing this morning, and then has not gotten above 58 today, with more cold all week!

Raymond, Josh and Carle are hunting tonight at Cubbedge Hill,  so  along with their  deer sightings and some fresh pics when I check the cameras tomorrow, I will have one last  hunt report before we go to Florida this weekend (We are taking the boys down to visit their grandparents in Melbourne as well as the Thomas the Train Day in Orlando). However I am going to try and set some other posts up so that  there will be something new over the weekend too!

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