Noland Outdoors

  Well we can finally close the books on the 2009/2010 hunting season.  For me personally, it was a good year.  I harvested 4 does and 1 buck with my bow and took the largest buck of my life, a 9 pointer, with my muzzleloader.  The season also included some heart-wrenching misses too.  I missed a very nice buck with my bow and let a few others get away as well.  But, that's hunting and it happens every year. 

  This season turned out to be the coldest deer season I can ever remember here in Alabama.  We usually have cold spells in Alabama sandwiched in between warmer days but that didn't really happen this year as it stayed generally cold the entire fall.  That was a nice change and I wish every hunting season was like that.  Was somebody talking about global warming?  I didn't notice it. 

  The rut seemed shorter this year but it was real intense while it lasted.  At least that was my observation. 

  Well, the long offseason is ahead.  Time to wash the hunting clothes and stow away the gear. 

Mike Williams and I went hunting this morning and I was fortunate enough to harvest a young doe in what may have been my last hunt of the season.  I was hunting on the edge of some flooded timber when the doe came slipping through at 8am.  I plumb missed on the first shot, shooting just underneath her, but she made the fatal mistake of hanging around long enough for me to nock another arrow (that PSE Bowmadness is pretty quiet!) and I put it in her boiler room.  If it was indeed my last hunt then I'm fine with that.  It's been a good year for me, having harvested 4 does and a buck with my bow and shooting the biggest buck of my life, a 9pt., with my muzzleloader.  Now comes the long offseason and, before long, the dreaming of the next season to come.

Mike Williams took this nice 7pt buck yesterday afternoon (1/9/10) with his new 12 gauge slug gun.  Mike and I were hunting about 200 yards apart and his shot nearly made me fall out of my tree.  It was the coldest afternoon hunt I'd ever experienced, with the temp never getting out of the 20's and a stiff NW breeze.  Mike's first indication that a deer was approaching was the crunching sound the deer made when it walked, and it wasn't leaves crunching.  It was the frozen ground near the water's edge!  Mike made a perfect 60yd shot at 3:20pm on this nice buck and it dropped in it's tracks.  It would have been a perfect 8pt had the deer not had one of it's brow tines broken off from fighting.  It was a classic January hunt.  Congratulations Mike!

Well I finally harvested a good buck this year.  But I had to put down the archery equipment and pick up the smoke pole to do it.  No matter, this was a great buck and I'm dang proud of him.  I shot this buck around 7:30am on January 3rd.  He was chasing some does around and he made the mistake of getting a little too close to me.  He is my biggest buck ever and he will adorn my wall soon.

After having a somewhat frustrating season with the bow, including a miss on a nice 8 point at 15 steps, I just had to take drastic measures.  The muzzleloader gives me the range and accuracy that I sometimes lack with the bow and, with the rut in full swing, I thought my chances of taking a good buck would be good and I was right.  The scary thing is that this buck, as big as he is, is apparently not the king of the woods, as evidenced by the numerous battle scars all over his head and body.  Maybe his daddy will fall before the season is over!

Well something just felt right about today so I took off and went hunting this morning.  My instinct proved true as I was able to arrow this nice 5 pt. buck.  I was really fortunate to get a shot at him because I was no more than a minute or so from lowering my bow and climbing down from my perch.  The cold east wind and the sub freezing temps was getting me chilled and I was set on climbing down at 9:30am, which is when I shot him.   I saw him coming down the trail, checking a scrape line as he came.  I arrowed him at 15 steps, hitting him a little back but not too bad.  It was a tough tracking job because the exit hole was a little back but I found him an hour later and 300 yards away.  All-in-all a good hunt on a good morning.  Man, I love this sport.

This morning was one of those mornings that only come along 3 or 4 times a year, if you're lucky.  An arctic blast shooting in from the north, accompanied by brief, pre-dawn snow showers, was sure to get the deer moving and it certainly did for us.  Jason "Goose" Eatman arrowed this nice doe shortly after daybreak.  As for myself, well, I missed a 5 step, almost straight down shot on a doe.  Bad angle, in a thicket, blah-blah-blah...no excuse.  Shouldn't have shot.  Anyway, had a buck come by before daybreak and work a scrape and jumped several deer walking out.  If only I'd stayed in my tree instead of getting down after my shot (I thought I might have hit her) I might would have gotten another chance because I jumped one up not 35 yards from my tree walking out.  That's the way it goes though.  Saw multiple fresh scrapes so the pre-rut is definitely in gear so maybe we'll have some bucks to display very soon.

The action has picked up recently, at least with the doe harvest.  After arrowing one of the largest does I'd ever taken two days ago, I shot another one Friday that may have actually been even larger.  She came right down the trail I was hunting and I made a 5 yard shot at 9:10 am.  Because she was so close and the angle was so steep, the shot went almost straight down and through her.  She ran about 100 yards before expiring.  Good morning and an overall great day!

We've been harvesting a few does so far this year but nothing with antlers so far.  I took this large doe yesterday afternoon with my PSE just before last shooting light. 

She was one of, if not the largest doe I've ever harvested.  For an Alabama deer, she was one big mama.  The weather has finally started to turn cool and it is feeling more like deer season.  Shouldn't be too long before the bucks start feeling that urge and start moving more in daylight hours.

Happy Thanksgiving!

  While the rut is in full swing north of the Mason-Dixon line, down here in Central Alabama, the action is slow right now, at least in my neck of the woods.  But it usually is this time of year.  The hot action that always accompanies the first week or two of the season is replaced by what I not-so-affectionally refer to as the November doldrums.  November is just the hardest month to kill a deer down here.  The deer have become skiddish because of increased hunter activity in the woods and the rut has not yet begun.  The goal is to gut it out until December, and the pre-rut arrives.  By this time next month the deer ought to be moving more during daytime hours.  And hopefully by then we'll have had some good frosty mornings and the skeeters will be dormant.  Them awful things are worse this year than any year that I can remember and they make hunting in the afternoons almost unbearable.

  Seth Renfro from Kentucky took this mature whitetail doe on an early season hunt in the Bluegrass state.  He made a nice 35 yard shot.  The doe weighed in at 120lbs.  They grow'em big in Kentucky.  Congratulations Seth!