Muzzle Loader Camp 2011

What a difference a year makes.  Last year we had great cold and clear weather and a full meat tree, while this year we had warm weather for two days along with Rain and fog and a damn near empty meat tree. 

This is our annual after Thanksgiving Muzzle Loader hunt down in the Delaware Water Gap area of New Jersey and it is always greeted with great anticipation and excitement.  Much of this excitement and anticipation is the fact that we have almost 30 miles of state and federal land to hunt and with that much land to hunt you never know what is going to happen.  The trip starts out early on Sunday as members of our Connecticut crew pile into the trucks and head south to our camp which is a cabin at the Mohegan Outdoor Center where we meet up with friends and family from New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York. 

Once our gear is unloaded in our rooms, some guys will sit around telling stories, others tart preparing some snacks and dinner while the rest will usually take to the woods for a last minute scouting trip.  Once it gets dark, it is time for a great dinner and then time to prepare out packs and lunches for the next day's hunt.  Of course a little night cap is always in order to help fight through the restless night that we all face.

Wake up Monday was 4am and about 4:05am, someone heads out side to see what the weather is like and the report was not good.  It was already in the 50s and temps were expected to get to the mid 60s.  The first of the crew that are hunting off the mountain head out at 5am and the rest of us are out the door by 5:30am.  It was a short hike to my perch for the morning, same spot that i shot my 8 pointer last year.  I was all snuggled in and anxiously awaiting shooting light a good 25 minutes before it arrived.  As the sun started to rise I was already greeted with bugs buzzing around me.  This was not going to be good.  Pennsylvania has their deer season opener on the same day and this usually makes for plenty of shots heard through the morning, but this morning things were usually quiet.  I should have known then that this was going to be one of those trips.  Few deer were sighted that morning, of course none by me.  Chuck scored a nice 5 little 5 pointer and we joked about this being the big buck pin winner, little did we know it would end up to be not only the pin winner, but the only deer taken in two days.  Some of us met back at the cabin for lunch and after getting Chuck's deer to the check station and hung up on the meat pole, we headed off the mountain to meet up with the rest of the crew so we could make a push or two.  We setup for our long pond push which seldom lets us down, but it did on this day.  As one of our standers was walking in he jumped a lone doe and took a shoot and missed.  That would be the only deer seen on this drive.  By the end of this driver, most of use were soaked and picking thorns out of our clothes and body so with about an hour left many of us just head back to camp to get an early shower.  Chuck, James and Myself decided to butcher Chuck's buck and get it in a cooler as temps were not excepted to drop below the high 40s.  We had a good dinner, some more laughs and a night cap and then off to bed.

Tuesday morning's weather report was warm and damp.  According the to radar we had about 4 hours before it started raining so out the door we headed.  The rain started around 8:30am but it was light and mostly a mist, but the fog was heavy at times and visibility was down to 40 yards at times.  About 10:30 the chatter on the radio was to head back to the cabin because according to the radar, the skies were about to open up.  Well, some of us didn't make it back in time and we got soaked.  It looked like the rain was going to hold on through the majority of the afternoon so guys started to head home.  Busch Pilot and James decided to do a little walk about and ran into nothing but black bears.  We decided to pack it in and head back to CT around 3pm. 

We had one deer to show for the trip and only two shots taken in two days which is a far cry from our usual trips.  The weather didn't cooperate, most of the hunters that stayed through the mid day heat or rain, sat tight and so did the deer.  In terms of deer, camp was a letdown, but as always we had good food and lots of laughs with family and friends and that is truly what makes camp so special.

Two firsts - Guest Blog about First Buck

A while back OBN had a writing prompt suggestion about a blog post from a kids perspective and I have asked both my son and daughter to write a blog post for me so below is the first ever guest blog post, actually it's more like a short story, as written by my Son Brendan who currently is a Sophomore in College.

My First Buck

When my father asked me write about a hunting experience, my mind ran wild with the memories that I’ve acquired in the past 8 years of being able to hunt.  Should I talk about the turkey hunts in Connecticut (two doubles) or the harvest of my first ever deer while my father and his best friend watched.  It is tough to pick one specific hunt because they all have so much meaning.  The one I decided to write about was the 8 pointer I took in the Delaware Water Gap, New Jersey.  For those who don’t know much about this area, it’s something you need to go explore.  A place in New Jersey that is full of wildlife is hard to come by, but this place doesn’t lack excitement.  My grandfather, uncle, father, and I have grown up hunting the mountains of “the Gap” and chasing big whitetails.  

            My big buck was taken during the muzzleloader trip in 2007 that our hunting group goes on after Thanksgiving every year for the first two days of the NJ muzzleloader season.  We travel down the Sunday after Thanksgiving to hunt Monday and Tuesday.  We head down on Sunday to unpack and do some scouting before the two fun filled days ahead of us.  The food and company never seizes to disappoint and the atmosphere of a good camp is present.  As we sit down and eat we discuss where we are all going to sit in the morning.  I wasn’t able to hunt the archery season so I was depending on my father and others who were there to give me advice on where to sit for muzzleloader.  They decided to give me a spot overlooking a laurel area near the power lines we normally hunt.  I would sit behind a big tree that had fallen the previous year and watch out towards the pines that surround the power lines.

  As I lay in bed that night, deer fever got to me as it was hard to fall asleep.   The excitement of the hunt kept my mind racing all night.  As all hunters know waking up in the morning for a hunt isn’t hard at all and that’s what happened.  I jumped out of bed and got packed, ate breakfast, and we were off for a cold day in the woods.  My father dropped me off at my spot as he continued on his way to reach his spot down towards the power lines before sunrise.  It was a slow morning as the sun came up over the mountain and began to warm the air slightly.  I have to say one of the most amazing views is watching a sunrise light up the woods slowly.  There is nothing better than to sit and watch nature at its finest moments such as that.  The morning showed no activity so we decided to all meet up for lunch and discusses our plan for the afternoon.  I couldn’t walk away from my spot just yet; so I decided to go there again in the afternoon and wait it out for some deer to pass by my spot.

  As the afternoon rolled on, my hopes for anything coming by were diminishing.  Suddenly, a nice 8 pointer comes walking through the pine trees a little over 100 yards away.  My heart instantly started racing as my moment to take down a trophy buck has come.  I pull up my Thompson Center Muzzleloader and fire a shot.  After the smoke clears I lose sight of the buck.  I get a call on the radio about the shot and the situation.  My uncle Steve was the closest to me so he came and helped calm me down and prepare to look for a blood trail.  As we were talking about our approach of tracking this deer, the big buck appears on the hill about 75 yards away.  He seemed very much alive so my shot clearly missed.  Now it was my uncle’s turn as he slowly walked around the tree that I sat next to and set up for a shot.  Again smoke fills the air from my uncle’s muzzleloader.  The deer runs off and seems untouched as we sit in disbelief that this trophy has escaped two shots in the matter of 20 minutes.  

  As the day came to an end, we head back to camp for a big dinner and start swapping stories about our day in the woods.  Of course, I get a little heckling from the guys about missing a big buck, but it’s just part of being the young guy in the group.  I decided that I would go back to that same spot tomorrow regardless of the previous day’s events.  I had a feeling that my spot was in a prime location of the big buck’s path.

  The second and last day of muzzleloader camp came all too quickly as we all got up bright and early and headed out to our spots.  I was determined to sit in the same spot and hope for just one more chance at this beautiful buck.  Soon after we all settled down we get a heads up on the radio from Jimmy K about him spooking a couple deer as he was walking into his spot by the power lines and they were heading our way.  Thoughts raced through my mind about the buck coming by again.  My father sat with me on this day which made this hunt even more exciting.  He made the decision to walk to the bottom of the deadfall to get a better look at the deer that could be approaching from the hill below us.

  Sure enough, the big buck starts walking the same path he did before just 50 yards closer this time.  My father started using the grunt call to bring him to a closer range for a nice shot.  The buck decided to give me another chance as he walked 60 yards away and stood broadside.  Everything slowed down and got quiet as I looked into the scope and fired a shot at this buck once again.  As the smoke cleared, I could see the buck running directly away from me.  The difference between this shot and the other one was that the deer was running differently than before.  With the tail up this time, I was sure I had to of made contact, but was a little skeptical after the previous day.  My father came back up to meet up with me and had me retell what happened from the shot to where I last saw him.  After a couple minutes we decided to go to the spot of the shot and start to look for a blood trail.  Our first sign of blood trail was 50 yards after the shot and we knew we had a good chance of harvesting this deer.  As we were tracking the sign, we hear another shot that came from Ernie, one of our CT hunting buddies that was with us.  We hear from him that he put a second shot in my deer that was on a death run at this point.  As we were tracking our shot, Ernie and Bobby were tracking Ernie’s shot.

  Finally, my father and I get the call on the radio that the big buck is down and I have harvested my first buck.  As soon as we heard that, my father and I yelled with joy and hugged each other.  That moment we had is something I will always remember and cherish.  To have my father with me to witness the harvesting of my first buck made me feel proud and I felt that I made him proud.  He taught me everything I know about hunting and that moment made it all come full circle for me.  He always says that he gets more enjoyment from watching me hunt than him hunting by himself.  For me to see the smile on his face was all I could ask for because I knew that I was becoming the hunter he wanted me to be.  Once we finally got to the trophy, I sat back with awe at the beautiful creature.

After taking pictures and gutting it (thanks Ernie), the mile long drag was left.  I’m thankful the road was an old logging trail that was flat because the deer got heavier and heavier with every step.  As we made it back to the cars, I was congratulated by everyone on my kill.  I was the king of the woods that day and nobody could have brought me down. 

I want to thank my father for giving me the opportunity to write this story.  I always want to thank him for being a great teacher, role model, friend, hunting partner, but most importantly, being a Dad that has been there for me with the ups and downs.  Being at college, I have little time to get out in the woods due to my stacks of homework and extracurricular activities.  Having been away from hunting for a couple years, it has made me cherish the moments I had with my friends and family out in the woods.  Like my father and grandfather have told me though, “Get an education, have your fun, because hunting will always be waiting for you when you return.”  I think that is something that not many people realize is that the woods are accepting of hunters that care about it.  It’s a place to get away from everything and enjoy the beauty that is Mother Nature.