by Gaila Oliver | Mar 10, 2017 | Bird Watching, Hunting, sportsmen, Wild Turkey Hunting, wildlife
Back in the Good Old Days, we were permitted to shoot “Jakes,” which is the term most of us use for young turkey gobblers. Since the Mississippi River bottomland woods I usually hunted in was knee-high in bull nettle by early spring when the season started, I rarely looked for a beard on my turkeys. If a head stuck up out of the bull nettle, and it was red, that turkey was going to get shot at.
The which did not necessarily mean a fatal encounter for the turkey, because I have long been famous for missing wild turkeys – there’s even a book to that effect! They do something to me, and although in my lifetime I have honestly fired over 1000 shotgun rounds at turkeys, I can only admit to bringing maybe 250 back to camp. I used to take a box of shells (that was back when there were 25 shells in a box!) for a weekend turkey hunt on Woodstock or Montgomery Island.
Howsomever, the state Game & Fish people decided a few years ago that young turkeys needed to be spared to grow in statue and wisdom, so now a hunter has to examine (on the hoof, now: we ain’t talking ground-checking!) the bird’s breast before firing, to see if it has a long enough beard to legal.
Therefore, when a veteran turkey hunter is taking a neophyte along for the hunt, care must be taken to instruct the rookie on what comprises legal game. Sometimes that ain’t enough either. I once took a neighbor with me, and we were seated against a big sycamore, me facing south, Rick facing west, which let me cover to the right shooting left-handed, and him cover to the left shooting right-handed. I’d been calling a little over a half-hour when I heard, “Psst! Psst!” and cocked an ear to hear him ask softly, “Is-that-a-turkey?”
This was a farm boy, so turkeys had been a part of his life forever. So I assumed that whatever he had sighted was far off, and started scanning the woods. “Not out there!” he hissed. “Right here!” Sure enough, a big gobbler stood in the logging road, thirty yards away – but he didn’t stand there long, he took flight!
“So, that was a turkey, huh?” Rick mused.
“What did you think it was, a penguin?!” I snorted. He later said he meant to ask if it was a gobbler, legal to shoot. Sure.
I took my bride with me one time, and had a turkey coming, gobbling every other step, so we were ready. I thought. When he stepped into a clearing in range, Betsy exclaimed, “Isn’t his head red?!!” Out loud! As the big gobbler spun to take flight, she calmly noted, “Wonder how much he weighs?” Out loud, again!
We ought to introduce our children and grandchildren to blood sports as soon as possible, and here again, we must take pains to describe beforehand what turkeys look like, how they approach, and which ones are legal game. Oftimes, the youngster has much better vision than the adult anyway, so the extra pair of eyes is really appreciated, and the kid is urged to watch carefully and report movement to the adult, so that the elderly one may be aware of what’s out of peripheral vision.
The youngster in question was only five years old, but had hunted deer and doves with granddaddy, so a spring turkey hunt was a natural progression. They got to the woods and hooted, and a gobbler answered immediately from his roost close to a small field. The hunters snuk within 150 yards of the roost tree, and the adult stuck up two hen decoys in the edge of the field, then blinded himself and the boy nearby, sticking up branches before them. He loaded his gun as the dawn came, picked up his call, and clucked. Across the field, the turkey double-gobbled, and sailed out of the tree, landing in a half strut right before the decoys! The youngster jumped to his feet, pointed, and shouted, “THERE’S ONE NOW!”
The rest of the day, the man complimented the kid on how well he could see and identify a wild turkey gobbler, as he should have. But they didn’t see another.
by Gaila Oliver | Mar 3, 2017 | Bird Watching, Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
I told you about Stoney, the half-grown barred owl Joe and I rescued from an automobile accident (actually, he flew into the side of Joe’s pickup) with the help of Dr. Richard Griffin, the late vet who was allergic to feathers. After almost a month of recuperation, helped along by antibiotics for the first week or so, Stoney faked me out during a morning feeding session, and proved that he was healthy enough to be released into the wild again.
For the next week or so, he hung around the house, probably hoping for more feeding or scratching sessions. He’d gotten addicted to having the back of his head scratched, during which he’d keep bending his head backwards into the scratching fingers until he was facing plumb the opposite way – from over the top! I knew an owl could turn his head slap around sideways, but had never known (or read either!) that he could turn it backwards from straight up. He loved being scratched!
He apparently formed another habit: late in the afternoon I’d carry him in his large milk-crate cage to the Swimming Hole with me. I kept a metal stool out there that I’d submerge in the shallow end, then place Stoney’s cage on it. He had a brick in there to stand on, and I’d ease the cage into the water to where just the top of the brick was out. Stoney would drink his fill, and snatch at dragonfly nymphs that came out right at dusk. It was a regular ritual for the two of us.
The first few times he came back, I saw him perched above the patio, where we usually fed him venison or dove gizzards (it being dove season when we hosted him). Then I heard him on several nights, hooting his low “Who-who-who cooks for you” calls from the pecan tree outside our bedroom window, or from the dead locust tree in the persimmon grove. One night he was being regularly answered by another owl from the ditchbank at the back of the yard, and so I knew Stoney must be reaching puberty.
With all our young wild pets over the years – a dozen possums, half-dozen coons, four screech owls, etc – we’ve had a hard and fast rule: we’d turn them loose when they reached puberty. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a coon, possum, screech owl, or teenaged boy – when they fall in love, you can’t tell them another doggone thing, so you might as well turn them aloose!
Obviously, we had turned Stoney loose in the nick of time, and I figured we’d never see him again, at least, to know it was our Stoney we were looking at.
Then our neighbor came over one day, a full month after the owl’s release. “I just saw Stoney!” he cried.
“How’d you know it was him?” we asked Jim, hoping it was so, but doubting proof.
“Well, I drove up to my pond, and there was something over at the shallow end, just standing there. So I eased up closer to see what the heck it was – a new type heron, or something, I figured – and durned if it wasn’t an almost-grown barred owl, sitting there in water up over his legs just as calm as you please! Where else except Brownspur would you expect to find an owl wading around in the pond?”
Had to have been Stoney, we reckoned. He’s obviously adapted to a new method of feeding, and my bet is that the dragonfly population will decline drastically here at Brownspur for the next few years. What will his kids end up doing – living on tadpoles and minnows?
Oh, No!! What about our neighbors to the south, who have catfish ponds? They’re having enough trouble now with cormorants – what if they find out I’ve adapted the owl population to wading in ponds and eating the inhabitants thereof?
Will the Brownspur owls then begin to grow longer legs, like flamingos or whooping cranes, to further adapt to their feeding places? Will their beaks get longer? Where are the evolution theorists when we really need them?! Will their majestic hoots become just loud gargles? We need help out here, you biologists!
So, if in the near future you spot a barred owl wading in your fishpond – well, offer to scratch behind his head. If he likes that, it’s got to be Stoney, or one of his progeny!
by Gaila Oliver | Feb 27, 2017 | Dogs, Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
Joe was somewhat wary when he called. He’d had a large bird fly into the side of his pickup on the way back from the airport Monday night, and had gone back the next afternoon to try to locate it. “It’s an owl, and he’s just sitting there on the side of the road. Do you think you could catch it? I hate for it to just die out there!”
I done my duty and informed him that, actually, the law is that we were supposed to leave it there to die. Matter of fact, we weren’t even supposed to put the poor thing out of its misery – legally, we were to let it die slowly and painfully.
Having done my duty, I then declared, “Heck, yeah! Let’s go get him!”
To cover ourselves, Joe called the late Dr. Richard Griffin, a nearby veterinarian, who had one of those Federal Animal Rehabilitation Licenses. “Bring him on,” he invited. “I’m the only vet around who will fool with these things – and I’m the only vet around who is allergic to feathers!” He agreed with me, however, that recovery was unlikely.
Cage and heavy gloves at hand, Joe drove us to a lonely stretch of woods and parked. “He’s somewhere close, if he’s still alive,” he declared. I quickly spied a half-grown barred owl sitting down in the ditch by a stand of ragweeds. He didn’t protest as I donned gloves and gently lifted him up and into the two-milk-crate cage we fashioned.
Dr. Griffin pronounced him apparently unbroken, as far as wings, legs, and keel were concerned. His left eye was cloudy, slightly bloody, and he seemed sore on his right wing and side, nipping at my hand as I stroked him on the right. The vet prescribed a week of antibiotics, and asked us to bring him some owl food. Chicken livers and gizzards to start with, then live mice or lizards later. “Set your traps now,” he advised.
A week later, Stoney was recovering enough to be released to our care here at Brownspur. Since we’ve raised or rehabbed (under Dr. Griffin’s supervision) two full-grown hawks, a great horned owl, and five screech owls, in addition to a dozen possums, half a dozen coons, shrews, snakes, and many other critters, we had experience. Son Adam and I made Stoney comfortable in a larger cage, and thawed venison to feed him. Then dove season opened, and we saved all the hearts and gizzards for him. He loved the gizzards!
Like all the other injured birds we’ve nursed, Stoney seemed to instinctively know that we weren’t going to hurt him. Though he’d pop his beak threateningly, we’ve raised enough owls to realize this was but a part of owl language. The only one to get hurt was me, naturally. When I transferred him to the smaller cage to go to the Swimming Hole with me one afternoon, one of his toes slid between my ring and finger, and I didn’t know it until I tried to put him down, and apparently bent his toe. An owl’s toe is actually a talon, and when he flexed it, it went all the way to the bone. My finger bone, we’re talking! I bled like a stuck hog, slid my ring off, and went for the iodine and a bandaid. Stoney seemed contrite when I returned and we went to swim.
This was his favorite time of day. I’d set his cage on a stool, so that just the top of the brick he stood on was out of the water. He’d drink his fill, and stare fixedly at the hummingbirds working the trumpet vine flowers at poolside. Right at dusk, the dragonfly nymphs would hover nearby, and I’d catch some to feed him. Joe would come visit, as would Jim and the neighbors, bringing dove gizzards.
Adam discovered his love for being stroked. We’d gently scratch him on the back of the neck, and he’d close his eyes and begin to tilt his head straight back, until he was actually looking the opposite way! We knew an owl could turn his head completely around from either side, but didn’t know they could do it going “over the top.” If he’d been a cat, he’d have purred when we did that for him.
We intended to release him that Sunday afternoon three weeks later, and had alerted Joe, Richard, and the neighbors, but Stoney had his own agenda. As I was feeding him that morning, he dropped a piece of venison, and when I reached down to the bottom of the cage to pick it up, he sprang past me to freedom. He flapped across the patio to light on the antlers hanging from the Store (our guesthouse) porch, swung there for a few minutes, then flew to the bay magnolia. From there he soared to the top of the cypress, and that’s where he was when I left for Sunday school, thankful to have hosted him.
by Gaila Oliver | Feb 21, 2017 | Dogs, Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
ELIJAH BUD
That was the name I knew him by. He was impressive, about six feet tall, when he wasn’t lying down, and built heavy, but certainly with no pot gut atall on him. He had a bit of an attitude when teased, but who doesn’t? He was extraordinarily thin-skinned when we first met, but got over it quickly when our friendship warmed up.
He wasn’t really black, but was pretty dark brown. His eyes had a faint yellowish cast to them, and he had a habit of sticking his tongue out at you when frustrated. He was fast, too, though he had a deceptive speed; just when you thought you were catching up, he’d suddenly spurt forward in a dash for the finish line.
We called him Elijah, because his Coming was prophesied by the Ex-Tex. We added Bud later, because of his drinking preference, though it made him ill-humored quickly. Elijah Bud couldn’t hold his liquor very well atall.
I’m not sure how long Elijah Bud had been hanging around our house before I came home unexpectedly and caught him sunning on the patio. I was pretty sure he hadn’t been drinking at the time, but he was almost comatose, nevertheless. Of course, I don’t know much about drinking, myself; you can pour it all back in the horse, far as I’m concerned.
At any rate, his condition led to his obviously being thin-skinned, as mentioned, so he didn’t get to stay inside at first. Later, we suspected that he had at times snuk in and enjoyed the warmth of our bathtub, but at the time, we had no way knowing that. We fixed him up a place to sleep it off on the guesthouse porch, and a neighbor who claimed to know something about needing a little “hair of the dog” brought him a friendly bedtime libation that first night. Actually, our own son seemed to know a great deal about that condition, too. As did the Ex-Tex, when I got around to mentioning a prophecy fulfilled.
That next morning, a raw egg was prescribed for our guest, and that did a lot to restore him to good humor, for a while. Adam really teased him a little more than was necessary later on. It probably didn’t help that the ladies around the house didn’t cotton to him atall, even after I made an attempt to get them closer together. Matter of fact, Betsy even threatened to take a stick to him if he showed up like that again. And Joanna simply withdrew frostily from his presence, which wasn’t entirely ladylike, I felt. Actually, the other guys who weren’t from Brownspur expressed their preference for keeping their distance, too. In retrospect, I guess Elijah Bud did have reason to be upset.
He stayed around a week or so, and actually got relatively clean and sober before he left. I meant to surprise the Ex-Tex by bringing Elijah Bud for a visit to the Sin Den, but I guess our example had spurred a true repentance in him. When I announced my intention to take him to see the Prophet who had foretold his coming, he mulled it over in silence, but took his departure sometime during the night. Adam and I hunted all over for him. Though all our vehicles were still in the driveway, we were certain he had not left on foot. However, he disappeared without a trace, not even a thank-you note.
Elijah Bud wasn’t like us, you see. He had a different raising. He was a different religion, that was obvious from the start. He was also a different skin color. While I claim to be fairly unprejudiced, and have tried to raise my kids to be thataway, I got the impression that Elijah Bud didn’t like our company, in spite of our efforts on his behalf. Was it our skin color? I like to think it was not.
He was pretty low-down, actually, when I stop to think about it. We tried to make friends, but in the long run, he took our food and hospitality, and left without even a word of thanks. But then, his type has always had that reputation, deservedly or not. Will his actions make us prejudiced against his kind from now on? I suspect we’ve all had a deep seated dislike for those with his type skin. Obviously, the ladies felt that way right from the start. At least, we menfolks tried to meet him halfway at first.
Well, as far as we know, he didn’t steal anything when he left Brownspur, if he left. He might be still hiding somewhere around, sneaking in for a quick lay in the bathtub again. I reckon we’ll have to start locking the doors at Brownspur. Betsy even declared that we should consider keeping a loaded gun close by, in case Elijah Bud shows back up.
But then, she’s always had a prejudice toward his kind, especially six-foot chicken snakes who are shedding their skin on her patio! Oh well, he seemed to like Jim’s beer!
by Gaila Oliver | Feb 10, 2017 | Cooking, Dogs, Hunting, sportsmen, wildlife
Our oldest daughter lived in Noo Yawk City for fifteen years, only coming back to Brownspur every couple of years for a visit. She called the Opening weekend of Dove Season (which we celebrate as New Year’s Day!) to say she was getting some vacation time, and would be home for a Thanksgiving visit. Betsy naturally asked what she might request to be on the menu while she was at home, figuring that she might be ready for some good ole homestyle grub.
Christie considered only briefly: “Oh, I’d really like to get Adam and Daddy to save me some dove breasts, and have some marinated, wrapped in bacon, and grilled. Then of course I’d like some of them broiled in your sherry sauce, served over rice, okay? Maybe with some boiled new squash and baby butterbeans? And the grilled doves, obviously Daddy will cook mixed sliced zucchini, peppers, and mushrooms on the grill too, with that balsamic vinegar and olive oil baste? And Barbequed Bananas for dessert.”
She continued, “I’d really like one meal of Adam’s fried venison steaks, rice and gravy, and blackeyed peas, if you’d make a pan of cornbread, too. Do y’all have any ‘sogum molasses’ so we could have hot buttered cornbread with ‘lasses for dessert?”
Betsy was nodding, writing all this down. Christie was just getting warmed up.
“What about one night a venison loin, marinated in soy sauce all day and lightly introduced to a hot fire? And of course, I’d want Daddy’s shish-ka-bob duck breasts, with that orange sauce baste he won the cooking contest with. Do y’all have any rabbits, since the last beagle died? I’d really like some rabbit shish-ka-bobs one night, with that mint sauce baste Daddy invented, and saute some mushrooms to go with the rest of the vegetables on the skewers. Maybe with some homemade wholewheat bread and dewberry jelly, unless you’ve made muscadine jelly this year, then I’d like that. Heck, maybe both!”
Now she was getting enthusiastic. “Duck gumbo! You’ve got to make some duck gumbo, with the deer sausage cut up in it, served over wild rice with some real New Orleans (she went to Tulane) French bread for sopping with! Oh, Mom! I can smell it when I walk in the house, after you’ve been cooking on it the whole day!” By this time Betsy had her over the speaker phone, and I was getting hungry myself.
“I know you’ll have on a crock-pot of venison chili when Daddy brings me home from the airport, that goes without saying. Could I maybe try some of those jalapeno goose breasts that Adam said were so good last year? I’ve never had those, but I’d love to try them. And surely you’ll be making a pot of squirrel and dumplings, like we always have around Thanskgiving? Speaking of Thanksgiving, is Daddy going to slow-smoke a wild turkey over sassafrass coals, like he usually does? Gosh, I can’t wait for that! Be sure you’ve got plenty of Jezebel Sauce made up to go with it, and a pan of cornbread dressing. Did you know that these yankees call it ‘stuffing’? I told them that’s what you do with a big buck when you hang the head on the wall!
“And it wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without your Oysters Johnny Reb casserole. Could we have spaghetti squash and some of those baked acorn squash with brown sugar and nutmeg for vegetables? Oh, and one night a big pan of your zucchini lasagna. For breakfast, I’d like your egg, cheese, & sausage casserole, that Tommy Paterson used to call ‘Miss Betsy’s Opening Day Slop,’ every morning, with the homemade wholewheat bread and your strawberry fig preserves!”
Then the crowning feast: “Then, for the last supper before I leave, of course we’ll have fried quail on toast with dewberry jelly, rice and gravy, and lemon meringue pie!”
Betsy was a little sarcastic when she paused. “Okay. Anything else?”
Christie was having no part of it. “Yes’um. Plenty of mint tea, and Daddy’s boiled coffee every morning when I wake up. Can he bring it to me in bed?”
What’s that old saying? “You can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the girl!” This one had been Raised Right! Hardly anything she had named could be bought in a grocery store.
But I draw the line at taking her my Famous Boiled Coffee in bed. At least, not every morning!
by Gaila Oliver | Feb 6, 2017 | Dogs, Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
This is not a religious column.
At a Wednesday night prayer meeting devotion, our preacher was talking about how God knows each of His children so personally, and he likened it to a mother’s being able to tell her own child’s cry from amongst a dozen other kids playing together. “Scotti always knew if one of ours was squalling, even if they were a block away,” he declared.
I had never thought about it thataway before, but now that Jon had called it to my attention, I considered that he had made a rather sexist statement. After all, it takes a daddy and a momma to make kids, so why didn’t he just say that a parent knew the kid?
But he failed to correct himself, so in the car going home, I called it to Betsy’s attention. “Now, I’ve had Lyme Disease, so can’t remember, but I reckon when one of ours was crying amongst a bunch of others, I could tell it, couldn’t I?” I queried my bride.
She snorted, “You couldn’t hear ours cry when they were the only ones in the house and it was two in the morning!” Then she made a further point, sarcastically: “But when that pack of beagles was running a mile away, you could tell each one of their voices!”
Her sarcasm went right over my head. A man is supposed to know each of his dog’s voices, and if these genetic scientists would work on breeding better hunting bays into our kids, instead of trying to breed up left-handed pitchers or nuclear engineers, we’d be getting our money’s worth. Who cares if they can clone sheep? But if they could have cloned the Belle of Brownspur, it would have been a million-dollar deal.
Belle was the matron of our beagle pack, and had one of those classic bays that people write books about. She passed it down to only a couple of her pups, Sam and Miss Adventure, but I could tell the three apart when they ran together. Sam’s was a deeper bass, and Miss Adventure’s was a little more soprano than Belle’s contralto, and Sam drew his out a little longer, though not as long as Bellowin’ Buford’s bay. Buford was a Plott hound, not a beagle, a contemporary of the great Jupiter Pluvius, who had the finest bay a Black-and-Tan ever bayed. Trouble, a Redbone of their age, also had a wonderful bay.
The rest of Belle’s pups, when they ran together as a pack, were easy to tell apart. Eric the Red was coarse-mouthed, more a bawl than a bay. He was the pack’s strike dog. Little Seven had a chop-mouth, and her sibling Thirteen was, to put it frankly, squeaky. One of those pups was unlucky growing up, and the other was uncommonly lucky, but they were a wonderful duet when they ran together, sort of like pulling a harrow with two bad bearings on it. Beaudine, whose brown-spot hairline resembled my brother’s then, had a squally-mouth voice, and was the one who cold-trailed best. Sam was bad to over-run a bunny’s trail, but Beaudine could be depended on to work it out when Sam went astray.
Aunt Rose used to resent being awakened by that pack of beagles running a rabbit through her hedges early in the morning, but Uncle Sam took me aside after her lecture on keeping the little hounds penned up, to say that he enjoyed their concerts, and not to worry about Aunt Rose’s tirades. “Her bark’s worse than her bite,” he winked.
Trigger, the daddy of that pack, never got to run with them, joining in with his high-pitched “Ki-yi-yi!” He caught a truck not long after conception, and never saw his progeny. Angel, his sister, and the pup’s aunt, never saw them either, though Seven inherited her chop-mouth. She was struck by a huge stumptail moccasin, right in our front yard, and died in my arms. The fang marks were over an inch apart, above her eye. Why it didn’t break the little miniature beagle’s neck, I never figured. Never found the snake.
Miss Adventure was the last of that wonderful pack to depart this earth, living to a ripe old age, though only having one litter of her own. We thought she was barren, but late in life she managed to conceive, and bore five pups. They were only a few days old when I found the mother coon that had been run over, leaving two babies orphaned. I brought Smokey and Bandit home and introduced them to beagle mother’s milk, and, lo and behold, Miss Adventure adopted them willingly! The little coons grew up with the little beagles, and the dogs learned to climb trees (at least, as much as their basic equipment allowed), and the coons learned to run rabbits, though they never bayed atall.
Betsy and I talked all this out on the way home, and though I enjoyed the memories, I reckon she made her point, and in doing so, reinforced the preacher’s sermon. I gave up.
by Gaila Oliver | Jan 26, 2017 | Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
The hunter had positioned his tree stand on a little knoll above a well-used deer trail, and upon mounting the stand to survey the area, noticed an old cemetery at the top of the hill behind him. Being a tad superstitious, particularly with Halloween right around the corner, he was considering moving the stand, when a couple of does appeared, feeding up the knoll. Our hero readied his bow in trembling anticipation.
However, just as the does moved into range, he noticed a movement in a switch cane thicket behind them, and a moment later caught a glimpse of antlers. A trophy eight-point was trailing the does, as bucks so often do. The hunter remained frozen as the does fed by him and continued uphill, hoping that the buck would follow in their tracks, which led almost up under his stand.
And so it happened, almost too good to be true. The buck never suspected an alien presence, and the hunter made a great shot at close range, the broadhead piercing the eight-point’s heart. Dead on its feet, the buck broke into its death dash, jumped the low fence, and collapsed in the cemetery, never knowing what had hit him.
Hurriedly scrambling down the ladder and nocking another arrow just in case, our hero approached his fallen trophy, but no coup de grace was needed. That’s when the hunter noticed the fallen tombstone.
In its blind final run, the deer had knocked over one of the old grave markers, a heavy one at that. Not only had the stone been rolled away, so to speak, but the buck’s heartblood had splashed all over the white marble. Glancing around fearfully to see if any ghosts had been disturbed, the man saw that several other tombstones also had telltale red droplets staining their pristine faces. Grunting, he reset the fallen stone.
Obviously, all kind of questions spring to mind when confronted with this type situation: What are the laws concerning graveyard desecration? Would the hunter, or the deceased deer, be charged as an outlaw? Were any of the bloody tombstones marking families that he knew? Or worse, his own family? Were the residents of the cemetery liable to rise up in fury over this intrusion into their peaceful sleep? And most important of all, would darkness catch him before he could make restitution?
Quickly loading his deer on his nearby four-wheeler, the hunter headed full speed for home, where he dumped the trophy in the yard with his bow, grabbed the needed supplies, and high-tailed it back to the scene of the crime.
So, if you were out in the woods just at dusk one evening, passing by an old cemetery, and happened to notice a camouflaged person feverishly scrubbing tombstones while glancing over his shoulders in rising panic at the horrible things that were gathering to wreak vengeance upon him for the desecration of their peaceful resting place – well, now you know.
And by the way, he says a mixture of one part bleach to three parts water works quite well for cleaning tombstones.
However, there was one other problem, he discovered when he visited the scene the next day during full sunlight. One can’t just clean a few of the stones in an old graveyard; the contrast between the newly bleached markers and the rest of the ancient tombstones was too evident. For the rest of the deer season, he cleaned a few more old stones each time he hunted, until now it’s the gleamingest old cemetery in the whole South!
And just to be safe, he moved his stand a couple of hundred yards away, even though it had produced a trophy buck on that spot!
by Gaila Oliver | Jan 19, 2017 | Hunting, sportsmen, Uncategorized, wildlife
I have long maintained that New Year’s Eve doesn’t come on December 31, at least for us Sporting Types Down South. Our New Year begins when Dove Season opens again in September, which is generally over the Labor Day weekend.
We oil and put away our guns in early May, after Turkey Season. Some of us get them back out in late August to shoot a few skeet and sharpen up our shooting eyes (and some of us need more sharpening as we get older!), but that is just playing, not real sport. The real sporting season begins when you can hunt again, and the first time we can do that (legally, anyway) is on Opening Day of Dove Season. That’s the beginning of a New Year, for afterward comes squirrel season, bow season, rabbit season, deer season, bird season, duck season, and then comes turkey season again in the spring.
This past few decades, with the advent of thousands of acres of corn being grown in the Delta, we’ve had problems getting the old-time concentrations of doves, like we used to get. When cotton was king, and you had a 25-acre millet or sunflower field in the middle of 10,000 acres of cotton, you had all the doves on 10,025 acres. Nowadays, the millet field is in the middle of 5,000 acres of cotton and 5,000 acres of corn, the latter being harvested three weeks before Opening Day. That spreads out the concentration.
This fall at Brownspur, we hadn’t had a rain in nearly two months. I could sit out by the Swimming Hole and get a limit morning or evening (did that the last two years, matter of fact). My neighbor, another Sporting Type, had a dried up pond last year that he decided to reactivate for Opening Day, since it was dry last year, too. He took a 1,000 gallon nurse tank, filled it up, and drove it to the dry pond, where he drained it. When he returned with the second tankful, the pond was dry again. It took 10,000 gallons of water before the bottom of that pond was even muddy, and 10,000 more just put maybe an inch of standing water in it for a day. The next morning, it was dry again!
The weekend after Opening Day a couple of years ago, a young friend called to invite me to come down for a hunt. “Uncle Bob, there are TONS of doves in our field!” he exclaimed. “Bring Adam, and Cuz, and the Jakes, too.”
I done that. We showed up with boxes of shells and spread out across the field, which was maybe ten acres. We loaded up and got ready for a hot shoot.
An hour later, most of us were gathered under a shade tree next to the water keg. Collectively, we had seen three doves, none close enough to shoot at. We began an exercise in mathematics for the benefit of our young host, who was still sitting across the field, so we had to figure loud, to include him. We figured that doves, unplucked and on the hoof, so to speak, ran about three to the pound – this was an estimate, since we had neither scales nor three doves, you must understand. This meant that doves would therefore run about 6000 to the ton, and since our host had proclaimed he had “Tons” plural, we figured that a minimum of 12,000 doves were due to come to that field that afternoon. In order to help him confirm his estimate, we began to count off and subtract to help wile away the long evening. “There’s one, Will – only 11,987 more to go!” “Watch, Adam, here comes Number 19 – only 11,981 to go, Will!”
Cuz, a compooter genius (self-proclaimed), whipped out a calculator and helped our host determine that, if he averaged hitting one of every three doves shot at, then it would take 18,000 shells to bring down his ton of doves, which would cost at bargain prices, just under $2000 per ton of doves, unpicked. However, he could then eat 16 doves per day, so would save grocery money in the long run, for his meat for the entire year would run him only about $5.50 per day, unless of course he wanted a steak once in a while for variety.
Understand that all this helpful figuring was at the decibel level of a shout, in order that our young host could hear, for he steadfastly refused to join us at the water cooler, where most of us spent the entire afternoon, doing mathematical exercises. When the evening was over, we were still 11,376 doves shy of the quota, though Cuz pointed out in all fairness that any doves over the first ton might be classed as plural, so we may not have been but 5,377 doves shy of the declared quota for the field.
Whatever. We were trying to be fair, but haven’t been invited back, for some reason. However, our young host has announced his college major change, to a math science – engineering!
Outdoor experiences can be life-changing, can’t they?
by Gaila Oliver | Jan 4, 2017 | Hunting, sportsmen, wildlife
The following was reported to have been overheard from the Annual Convention of Whitetail Deer Instructors.
Chief Buck Instructor: “Now, students, listen up! If you flunk this course, you don’t just fail, you end up as the main ingredient in Venison Stroganoff. Okay, here’s the way to keep your antlers off someone’s wall.
“First, do your juking at night. Feeding, too. Humans mainly hunt during the day, and even have laws against hunting us at night, so if you get out at night and lay up during the day, you’ll have a great chance of surviving the season.”
Chief Doe Instructor: “He’s right, girls. And night life is fun, anyway. Accommodate the guys in this while the season is on, and make your buck take you out to some of the best night spots. Why, there was this one little persimmon thicket….”
Chief Buck Instructor: “Ahem! Enough of that, Edna. All right, here’s a report from the Recon Team Leader.”
Recon Commander: “Now, on this map, you’ll notice we’ve plotted all the tree stands, salt licks, and wheat fields. By promoting the use of tree stands, we’re able to keep track of 99% of all hunters, and avoid them. Use the salt licks and wheat fields at night, or at noon, when all the hunters come in to eat and take a nap. Notice we have indicated which way all the stands face. To keep hunters from moving their stands, our Special Forces Platoon will come up from behind at least once a week, or else do a trot-by in the brush right at dusk. Very Important: make rubs and scrapes each night, always within sight of a tree stand. That keeps hunters from moving around.”
Chief Doe Instructor: “Ladies, teach your fawns and yearlings to look up! Few hunters ever stand on the ground these days, so let the kids help locate new tree stands.”
Chief Buck Instructor: “Okay, you guys with the big racks – this is recommended procedure for this season. You can mosey along in brush, if you just have to move during daylight – but whenever you reach a clearing, haul tail! Dash away, dash away all!”
Chief Doe Instructor: “Ladies, we understand that there are doe seasons in some areas this year. You’ll notice that those areas are also marked on this map. If you happen to be crossing one during daylight, here’s the foolproof method. Just as you walk into range of a tree stand, stop, flick your tail several times, and look back. It works every time. If a hunter thinks there might be a buck behind you, he’ll let you go by, so put on a good show, just as if you were enticing Bubba to ask you for a date.”
Chief Buck Instructor: “You young bucks, that method can also work for you. If you don’t get to your brush top before daylight, then act like there’s one of us mossyhorns close behind you. Act nervous, keep looking back and flicking your tail. It also works well if, just before you get within sight of a stand, you hook a dead sapling several times. Make it sound like you’re fighting a big buck, then run by the stand like he’s chasing you.”
Recon Commander: “Okay, notice these roads and four-wheeler trails we’ve marked on this map. It is vital that we make as many tracks in them at night as possible. Matter of fact, for the first week of the season we’ve scheduled a battalion parade each midnight down this main road, crossing this creek here at the ford, and marching along this four-wheeler track. If it rains, we’ll double-time as soon as it gets muddy enough for our tracks to be deep. This will keep the hunters close to roads, and away from our hideouts.”
Convention President: “I’d like to introduce the Head Squirrel, who’ll have a few words to say about this season’s co-op efforts. Sam?” (Polite applause)
Head Squirrel: “Thank you. My people are fully alerted to begin scampering about in the dry leaves instead of trees as soon as the season opens. If you do get spotted from a stand, we’ll immediately start scolding and fussing in the opposite direction, to distract the hunter as much as possible. We’ve also enlisted the armadillo tribe and the wild turkeys in this effort. We’ll make as much noise as possible around each tree stand, in order for the hunters to think there are deer all around them, and to confuse their direction if you are there. And, we thank you for distracting the humans for us, during squirrel season.”
Convention President: “Any questions? Fine. Just remember, guys: you can survive hunting season, if you don’t get to thinking too much about sex! Adjourned!”
